Running to Six...

We're about to start working more than one day a week on the feature, which will be a nice change of pace, but that means that we're headed towards the dreaded night shoot.

Normally, on a film set when you go to night shoots, it's not that big of a deal, it just means that you don't see the sun for a good long while and that you just get used to getting down when the moon comes up.

Not so for us.

Since most of us still have day jobs and haven't yet made it to the point where we get paid actual paper money for what we do, it just means that we're going to have to put in REALLY long days to get this thing done. It's not that much of a burden really but it will show who really wants to do this and who really wants to just talk about it. This is where we separate the men from the boys, the girls from the women, and the sexually confused from the possibly Canadian.

And I know I said that I would post pics here...I don't know how yet. Fuck you, stop judging me.

Later Days...

Another Day...

About to start another day of production on "In Trouble". We did the quick still shots work at the bar last night, went well. I hope we carry that momentum over to today. It's mostly dialogue so it should be pretty easy but...you just never know.

Later Days...

Oh...!

And follow me on Twitter, won't you?

www.twitter.com/rpmedrano

Hi...I'm sorry.

I know it's been a really long time since I posted and...you're just gonna have to forgive me for that. Right now things are a little hectic but we're back to shooting a movie! That I wrote! And...yes. So, this is going to be a short one. I will post more soon and, once I figure out how, I will post pics too.

Later Days...

Well, that sucked...

Trying to shoot something on our level is always something of a crap shoot. No one's getting paid so some have a tendency to not take it seriously. And especially here in ABQ, it seems like the more Hollywood comes to town, the more actors and crew here believe that working on something indie that has no promise of ever going anywhere, is simply a waste of time and energy.

Of course, there are exceptions and there are some people around town that would be committed to the project no matter what it is. Finding them, or course, is the hard part.

Yesterday was the first day of production on John's short and I can safely say, I think, that it was a complete mess. Nothing really got done and while that was truly no one's fault, it's just a reminder of how hard we all have to work. While the boons are things like smaller crews, increased mobility, and increased creativity, the huge downside is that one small hitch can shut the whole thing down.

Anyway, moving on, moving forward. Working on a short of my own now, in addition to the feature. Hopefully one of these things will catch fire.

Later Days.

And for me next trick...

So, writing project #1 has been completed and turned in. Now I’m just waiting to hear back on it and get paid. I’m not getting paid a lot, mind you, but still it’s something. It’s actually more than I got paid for that giant turd that has my name on it in Best Buy.

It’s always funny when I tell people that although I wrote a movie that is available nationwide, that I will never tell them the title and that I hope it was a colossal failure.

Also had another meeting for the short we’re shooting in April. It was a good meeting and we got a lot covered including who would win in a fight between Jack Burton and Snake Plissken. It was decided that that level of awesomeness could not be contained on celluloid and that the film would actually catch on fire when it saw those two titans together at the same time.

And that’s just science you can look that up.

And now back to focus on the personal script that I’m writing. I’m very happy to be getting back into that. I was hoping to shoot this flick in the spring but it might actually make more sense to shoot it in the fall. I want to have everything ready to go and running smooth so that we can just jump and shoot. The hardest part of filming this movie will be shooting the fight scenes (there’s three big ones and one little one), everything else is dialogue and we’re going to rehearse the shit out of those before we actually shoot anything.

The hardest part of preproduction, I can already tell, is finding actresses to play the female leads. I ask a lot of those two characters and the actresses we find are going to have to dig deep to pull off what the script asks for.

I also need a guy to play the main villain. And the character isn’t really a villain because, when you think about it, the main character, Frankie, is the villain. He’s the bad guy, but like they say, everyone’s the hero in their own story.

That’s all for now, babies.

Later Days…

James Gunn...

Check out James Gunn's wicked post about writing and film in general. It's a very worthwhile read.

http://www.jamesgunn.com/advice-blog-1-do-you-really-want-to-be-in-the-film-industry