2/22/05: Here with my full report on Day 2. Blanket statement: up until now, this was the most succesful day of shooting in my life. Well, that's a relative term. In 'For the Love of the Dame' everything worked to perfection, so I guess I can't top that for being successful. But I had 14 pages to shoot in, and Cailee was down from Portland and could only stay for a limited time. But BAM! Got'em all done. Shot for 8 hours, watched the daily's and went off to Hovland to start editing. Put in a 14 hour day. Then on Sunday I stayed up till 5:00am editing, and am just now finishing (the scenes are rendering all the filters and such) at 3:12 am. I my roommate is right and I am manic depressive, then I am in manic mode. But anyway...
The day started off to be a NIGHTMARE. First of all I only got 4 hours of sleep the night before (for absolutely NO good reason). I woke up and tried calling the guy I'm supposed to get my equipment from. No answer. Try a few times, no answer. Go to pick up Cailee at the bus stop, not there. Drive home, call up Sami. No answer. I'm starting to think I am in the Twilight Zone. I start praying to God (I think and hope, I kinda forget, but I think I did), and of course He works all things out. Cailee shows up (she was on the bus that came 5 minutes later), Mike calls up with the equipment, and Sami is all ready to go. Also, Tim Gobble is all hyped up and ready to be the main tech guy for the entire day.
I run around like an idiot trying to get everything set up. Finally we are ready to shoot. The first scene takes FOREVER! It takes place in Keith and Calvin's room, and they are having their first of many conversations. Real introductory stuff. We learn about Keith's character and Calvins reaction to him. It takes LLLOOOONNNNGGGG.... Poor Cailee was about to pull her hair out. But after all of that, we get to Cailee's scene. "Keith you're such a loser, ah heh!" Comes out TOTALLY Valley Girl! I was rolling with laughter. She tones it down a bit and totally rocks the house after that. Girl can act, I tell you! She was el natural the whole time after that, and RARELY did she ever mess up a line, let alone miss one. Which is more than I can say for me. I wrote the frickin script and I have the hardest time with the lines than anybody! Ah well.
Sami again was awesome, only even more involved this time. He knows his character extremely well. It's amazing to see how he can act Keith from the beginning of the movie, all unsure of himself and awkward, and then see him act Keith from the middle of the movie when he is becoming a monster. You can see and believe the progression that his character takes, he really does a good job.
I would like to point out that Sami has a really tough job. He has to take his character from purgatory to hell and finally to Heaven. Keith is essentially a despicable character. He is well intentioned, but that's his only redeeming quality. Furthurmore, Sami hates him. He has to play a very difficult character that he hates. All I have to do is basically act wild the whole movie, my character is static. Not hard to play. Cailee has a tough job in making Kelly immensely likable, she's really the only redeeming major character in the whole thing. But Cailee's acting is more hard in that she's thrown into a terrible situation, and how to deal with that. Sami has a whole plate full of hardness to deal with.
Anyway, Nate Dogg (playing Michael) once again showed up on set and danced aroudn a little. Oh yeah, then we went to Big Town Hero to film the restaraunt scene, and it worked out great! We did the whole thing in two angles, and all three of us acted at the top of our game. Really though, it wasn't a tough scene. Easy dialogue, it flowed well. In the editing room I have the scene almost completely movie-ready, I just have to put in a few restaurant sound effects. After that scene I filmed a short car scene and then dropped Cailee off for her bus ride.
Then I called up Mike (equipment dude) and asked if he and a friend could play a role in my movie. He says sure, calls up Ed Finn (who I acted with in acting class, and he's a real pro), and they come down within 30 minutes. Meanwhile I'm watching the dunk contest and trying to delay shooting as long as possible. Eventually we make our way to the back alley and film a scene where I hold them up for money. Wow. It looks and feels authentic. Those two acted their freakin roles freakin awesomely. I left with my mouth agape at how well they performed. I felt almost bad trying to act with them, but they held me up. I get to let loose and go crazy in that scene too, ala Mel Gibson in 'Lethal Weapon' (I have ALWAYS wanted to throw in 'Lethal Weapon' homage, and I finally got to! I also got to throw in a 'Citizen Kane' homage).
So far I have about 11 minutes from the film well edited. Oh, if you're wondering why I edit the movie WHILEST making it, I'll tell you. I like the feeling of accomplishment. It comes back from the days I was making the Jamboree. We would film an episode, and I would edit it immediatly so I could have it done by the week. It was always a great feeling to see your work in edited form. So I get great encouragement from seeing my footage edited. It keeps me going.
2/16/05: I have a clip from the movie at the media vault. This scene is almost movie ready, with only some sound work needing to be done. I may retouch the color correction, but it looks pretty good. I am excited! I am shooting in actual wide screen, I didn't just chop off the top and bottom. Also, the lighting was way off in a couple of shots, but I was able to kinda manipulate it to make it not look so bad. And this was the toughest, most awkward scene, acting wise, yet Sami acts it out like a pro! I'm looking forward to the rest of the shoot.