HopkinsCinemAddicts

I'm Famous

So the biggest thing that's happened to me since we last spoke is this:

I'm on the cover of this week's JHU Gazette!  They did a piece on four of the senior Woodrow Wilson Fellows and subsequently took a photo of me staring down the camera while holding a camera in front of a computer and subsequently chose that image to grace the cover of their publication (we could get into how I then used a computer to take a picture of myself holding up a picture of myself but that would be EXTRA dumb).  Because the main point of all of this is that--I won't mince words--I am now a celebrity. Nowhere on campus  can I escape my own self-serious visage.  Not to brag, but a student in one of my classes said to me "hey, I read that article about you in the JHU Gazette."

Besides throwing wood into the fire of my burgeoning celebrity, the article also served to substantiate this whole filmmaking process It publically and officially announced the premiere (May 12th, 7th P.M, my loyal readers).  Right now the film is just an unexported (and half unedited) file on Final Cut Pro, but no matter what happens it will always have been a thing that was going to happen.  And there's something cool about that.

Substantiation is something I want desperately.  I really want to show the film to people.  Not (just) because I'm desperate for people's approval, but because I'm growing increasingly interested in film as event.  With this movie I feel like I didn't just bring to my fruition my artistic vision. I also captured moment in time.  Most of my friends are in this movie in one way or another, many as heightened versions of themselves.  Years from now we'll always be able to look back on the film and remember.  Remember what it was like to be young, to be dumb, to have our futures ahead of us.  

So I don't see it as just a movie screening, but also a community event.  Even if it happens to be a tiny community.  Maybe as I continue to work on movies my community will get larger.  But that paradoxical feeling of both insularity and extreme inclusiveness is not something I want to lose, at least not yet.  Because sometimes the love machine malfunctions a bit.  It's easy to lose love for yourself at times, even your art.  But when you've packed your film with a bunch of little buddies eagerly awaiting your finished project, it's hard not to crack a smile and keep plugging away.  

So maybe that's why I go through all this trouble.  To build communities.  Or maybe it's just to get my big 'ol mug on the cover of as many magazines as possible.  Either way is a model of nobility.

 

 

Mistakes and Okay, Successes

    I've made a lot of mistakes.  I've adjusted camera settings incorrectly (in multiple ways), leaving me with some interior shots that are far grainier than they need to be.  (Making a film has made me want to murder grain.)  I've tried to "shoot around" equipment that is in the shot rather than just clear it, meaning there are a number of unusable takes due to visible equipment.  I've forgotten the camera battery at a location that is 45 minutes away, necessitating an hour and a half round trip before we even started shooting.  I've had shoots involving over 10 extras that were poorly organized and thus sort of a nightmare, exacerbated by having to pause two or three times in the middle of shooting to charge the battery because I hadn't bothered to buy an extra and also forgot to charge it during the break in shooting that I designed specifically for completing such tasks as charging the battery.  I've neglected to hire people as crew that would have been able to help immensely with things like lighting up a room and making sure the shoots are run efficiently and reminding me to charge the battery.  I just simply haven't spent enough of my budget.  I've neglected until this late in the process (only one weekend left of shooting) to really learn how my actors work and design a system to draw out their best performances.  

    In truth, there are at least as many (if not more) parts of the process that I consider to be great successes and feel very proud about. I want to segue into the corny "yet this is has still been the best experience of my life" part because in most ways it has.  So far the hardest balance to find has been between a healthy obsession with the movie and beating myself up so much over my mistakes that I feel immobilized.   Because ultimately film-directing is a very emotional game.  You have to find a way to stay excited about the project without overlooking all the tiny flaws that might ultimately condemn it to mediocrity.  My two maxims right now are that I should use every day of filming to learn something new and that I should treat every scene as its own short film.  The former is an attempt to find some psychic rest about the mistakes that continually eat at me.  I guess I shouldn't ever forget (with the risk of sounding mock-humble) that this is, after all, my first film.  Maybe Scorsese doesn't learn something every day on his sets, but something tells me he wouldn't have reached his level of success if he didn't have that attitude at one point in his life.  And in regard to the latter maxim, it is crucial to remember that no matter what mistakes you've already made, filmmaking is constantly offering you chances at rebirth.  It's not quite like writing fiction where until it's published you can always go back and change things, but at least you can always go out there and shoot a knock-out scene no matter to what stupid depths you've found yourself descending earlier in the day.  

     That's why if you're looking for me on campus, you should know I'll be the guy wearing the custom-made t-shirt that reads "Filmmaking: The Ultimate RollerCoaster" with a graphic that includes the rails of a roller coaster subtly morphing into reels of film.  Trust me, these shirts are gonna get huge, fast.  You'll be purchasing and wearing one before you can even say "That's the dumbest t-shirt idea I've ever heard."  

P.S  Hope you enjoyed the movie stills included throughout the post!  Did I seamlessly integrate them into the tight logical progression of the post?  No, no I didn't.  But did I include them?  Well, yeah.

Adventures of the Young Director

The young, cocky film director steps upon his first film set.

He looks unerringly director-like, in oversized red-and-white beanie, black windbreaker, and slightly off-kilter haircut peeking under aforementioned oversized beanie.

He doesn’t need a shot list because he’s sure he’ll construct the movie in his mind, on the go.

He’ll hold the camera in his very own hands, sensitive yet sturdy as a stone, perfectly divining the sensuous contours of his own constructed filmic reality. 

After sixteen hours of filming like thus the young humbled director plans to plan out as much in advance as possible for this week’s shooting.  I missed some stuff.  Not crucial stuff.  A boom mic here, not enough light there. But you feel it.  Every mistake.  Every little instance that so easily could have been better.

But in total I am thrilled. With the risk (or certainty) of sounding silly, I have taken to directing like a duck to water.  I have never felt more focused and vital than I have while being in charge of a film set consisting of upwards of twenty people.  Additionally, some of my hypotheses are working out.  Casting people experienced with comedy in various small roles has led to a number of (in my opinion) hilarious moments that I couldn’t have anticipated while writing the script.

The key is to learn from erroneous methods and not convince yourself to keep them just to avoid cognitive dissonance.  A film moves and progresses in a narrative entirely separate from the constructed narrative from the film itself.

A film, quite simply, is a journey. That’s the stupidest sentence I’ve ever written.

But seriously.  I’m only like a third of the way through but I think it might not just be advantageous to continue learning throughout the process, it’s necessary.  Well, as necessary as things can be these days.  What you should take away is this:  next shoot I’ll be using a (tentative) shot list. 

P.S

Look at this desperate facebook page I made to extras for my film.  Also, though, it worked!  Seems like I’ll be writing at least fifteen personalized songs.  Sweet!

Extras for Westbaum in High School

 

 

 

Director's Notes 3/13/12

--Positives: Good read-through today.  Luke was even more perfect for the role of Bobby than I thought.  Should be hilarious.  Everyone present enjoyed the pizza and the Oreos.  Thought of a good opening shot for film, as well as title sequence.  Involves Thomas riding a bicycle.  

-

---Negatives:  Difficult to transcend awkwardness of gathering around a bunch of people to read from a dense thicket of stapled pages containing silly words upon silly words all written by me.  Pizza made me feel sick.  Oreos made me feel sick.  Should quit junk food.  Having difficulty deciding how much of my limited knowledge of theater directing I should bring to film.  I read in an interview with Ewan Mcgregor that Woody Allen doesn't even do rehearsals.  Coming from somewhat of a theater background, that seems absurd.  How can you get into the mind of a character without rehearsal?  That said, I probably won't have them do much rehearsal.  

 --What does gimmicky high-concept for blog post signify?  How about the devolution of syntax?  Does it represent the way my thoughts are increasingly clipped and scattered as I attempt to force the various mental and physical strands of what shall one day be a completed "Westbaum in High School" into coherence?

 --No, probably not.

--Had silliest argument of production so far.  "What does Thomas Westbaum (main character of the film) eat for breakfast?  Ian and I were saying he eats a full breakfast while Marc, the actor playing Thomas, said that he thinks that if Thomas eats breakfast at all he just eats a bowl of cereal.  Seeing as this is a shot in the opening sequence of the film I might be biased because I want him to rip open an orange or a grapefruit so we can see those tiny little specks of juice that squirt out of the fruit in high light.   

 -- Today one of my actors repeated to me a leadership acronym that he had learned in some kind of youth thing.    I won't reproduce the acronym here.  Why I bring this is up is that it really made something hit home: that the role of director is in many ways just the role of a "leader."  One who exudes leadership.  The same kind of leadership taught in conferences attended nationally by Type A high school students.  Directing can be kind of a "Type A" job at times.  I'm unsure as to what degree of professionalism I should try to give off.  Should I embrace the my own ramshackle charm in terms of my leadership style?  Do I even have any ramshackle charm, and if so, what does that mean?  Obviously a degree of efficacy and efficiency will help this film to be the best version of itself.  But I still haven't figured out exactly how to get the best performance out of my actors, or even my crew for that matter.  Guess I'm in for some on-the-job training!  

 --Filming starts April 1st.  Spring break, to put it melodramatically, will be the calm before the storm.   To put it casually, filming starts April 1st, and I'm pretty excited, and it should be nice to have all of spring break to prepare.  To put it stupidly, filming may start April 1st, but that doesn't mean that it will be a FOOLish production!  

 --I've somewhat abandoned my conceit.  Oh you've already forgotten it?  That works just as well.

 

Big Moves (and more)

    Since we’ve last spoke I made a Big Move.  With about a 16^th of my semi-considerable funds I hired myself a “producer.”  I put producer in quotes because I’m not exactly clear what a producer in Hollywood does. In my case, my “producer” just does everything I need him to do.  However, in line with the connections-based engine of Big Hollywood (I always try  to embody Big Hollywood), I’ve hired one of my best friends, Ian White, to handle the job.  While this might seem like a flimsy excuse to get one of my friends 500 dollars, he has actually turned out indispensable. In a week  I’ve gone from having barely done any work on the film (besides the screenplay), to being almost ready to begin shooting.  All it took was the power of Ian’s timely and spritely e-mail exchanges.  It turns out plenty of people would love to work on a movie!  To avoid burdening myself with working them into the complex narrative framework I’ve been sculpting with these blog posts, here are some of the achievements that just through e-mailing we have either reached or are within extremely close distance of reaching.

--Casting Ancillary Roles (mostly people who are not of college-age)

--Hiring people to record synchronous sound

--Hiring a cinematographer (mostly to help with lighting)

--Deciding once and for all one what kind of camera I will be using (SLR 7D)

--Making a concrete list of locations I will be using.

--Planning around everyone’s scheduling conflicts

--Last, and perhaps most importantly, creating a “Facebook Page” so that people can “like” my project.  (This is a meaningless but psychologically important component of the film-making process because each time I get a new “like” for the movie, I feel a tiny little surge of cyber-encouragement that keeps me motivated.)

    By the end of the weekend I will have a final version of the screenplay, and an (almost) completed shooting schedule.  One issue I’ve had with fine-tuning the screenplay is that the words have started to feel dead to me.  I didn’t have a co-writer on this project and I think I am the type of human being that would really benefit from a co-worker.  For this reason I’m really happy that a few close “writer-friends,” (if you’re reading this I’m sincerely sorry I called you a “writer-friend)” have agreed to do a final read-through/workshop of the screenplay.  I think fresh minds will help reinvigorate my attitude toward the text.  I am confident that once we begin filming the words coming out of the mouths of my actors will entirely enliven the process, but it is my hope to give them the best possible sandbox in which to play.  Part of the reason that I picked close friends as the main roles is that the way I conceive of a movie is as much in terms of shots and plots as it is in people.  The way people think and move and react and respond is truly what fascinates me and in some ways a film is just my best conduit to an artistic study of…well, like humanity.  I’ve self-consciously retreated into colloquialisms because I felt the tone was becoming too lofty, or too far shoved up my own head.  

    See, the hardest part is not getting down on yourself.  I watched Superbad the other night and thought to myself "man, there's no way I'm ever gonna beat Superbad."  But somehow I doubt that's the metric by which my film will be judged.  Because it's not Superbad and it never could be.  It's Westbaum.  Westbaum in High School.

(Cue: Link to "Westbaum in High School" Facebook fan page)

Westbaum in High School

 

 

Young, Dumb, and Full of Ambition

     A little pearl of wisdom that I recieved last Wednesday has really stuck with me.  It came from local filmmaker Lotfy Nathan, known for his documentary "The Twelve O'clock Boyz," who was giving a talk in a class of mine called "Baltimore Filmmakers."¹

    Said Lotfy (in so many words, I'm not a stenographer):

     "The first film is the best one to work on.   This is because you still have the ambition of fulfilling your artistic vision as well as the ignorance of how insanely difficult it's going to be to actually do so."

    Now while I don't recall Lotfy's exact wording, what I do know is that the sentiment immediately made a nice little home for itself in my mind.  I was sitting there thinking: "Wow, he's right!  I am really ambitious.  I am completely ignorant of how horribly frustrating this process is going to be.  I feel great!"  Not only do I recognize my own cognitive dissonance,  I embrace it.  I have to, or else this movie I'm working on will never get made.  

    I should add that a healthy dose of naiveté is not all I took away from Lotfy's talk.  He also gave us a good deal of much more practical advice, such as the type of excel sheet I should use to manage my budget, and that I should take my cast out to dinner every now and then on my own dime.  But I think what's going to get me most through this entire project most of all is an insatiable drive to concretize what I've created in my head (and on the page).  Because while I can't exactly call this my first film (I've made at least four or five shorts so far), I have never attempted anything even remotely close to the scale of the film that I intend to complete by the end of this semester.  I look forward to the ongoing battle of Jake's Ambition Vs. What is Actually Possible.

     As far as the practical stuff goes, I'm coming along.  It has a title:  "Westbaum in High School."  It's script has a ridiculous page count: 45.   I've casted all the leads for my film: all close friends of mine, nepotism be damned. (I'll return to this subject later.)  Right now I'm working on the preliminary steps of pre-production: location scouting, script re-writes, deciding exactly which camera to use, finding someone to do my sound for me, figuring out which pizza place I should bring my cast to (ideally delicious yet affordable.)  In later posts I'll go into more detail about my processes of casting, writing, and filming, as well as updates on my logistical adventures, which might be a little bit boring but will hopefully be useful to other first-time filmmakers.  

    But for now, I'll leave you with this:  I'm fully aware that I will soon be facing challenges of which I am now completely unaware.  But all these aside, I'm feeling pretty confident.  And that has to count for something.  

 

Truly Yours,

Jake Appet

 

^1. The class "Baltimore Filmmakers" is taught by local filmmaker and DMC guru Jimmy Joe Roche. It's been really fun and informative so far.  To avoid putting another footnote on the footnote I'll mention that the DMC stands for "Digital Media Center," which is a great resource for Hopkins students who want to rent out technological equipment and work on creative projects.  This post would have been punchier without this footnote, so in a way, I'm sorry.  But I guess it's a metaphor for... uh, the messy process of filmmaking itself?  That doesn't quite work.  Anyway, see you next time!