filter coffee talkies

How does a film come about?

2009-11-11T11:56:00.001-08:00

This is an excerpt (My most favorite part) from the book "Conversations - Walter Murch & the Art of Editing Film" by Michael Ondaatje - author of The English Patient. It is long & calls for TREMENDOUS patience, but trust me, it is totally worth it.

(FYI, Walter Murch is the first guy ever to have been credited for 'Sound Design' and he is the editor of films like Godfather - I, II & III, Apocalypse Now, THX 1138, English Patient, Talented Mr. Ripley, Conversations & Unbearable Lightness of Being).

Murch: There's a great game--I forget whether we've talked about it--Negative Twenty Questions?

Ondaatje: No, we haven't talked about it.

M: It was invented by John Wheeler, a quantum physicist who was a young graduate student of Niels Bohr's in the 1930s. Wheeler is the man who invented the term "black hole". He's an extremely articulate proponent of the best of twentieth-century physics. Still alive, and I believe still teaching, writing.

Anyway, he thought up a parlour game that reflects the way the world is constructed at a quantum level. It involves, say, four people: Michael,Anthony, Walter, and Aggie. From the point of view of one of those people, Michael, the game that's being played is the normal Twenty Questions--Ordinary Twenty Questions, I guess you'd call it. So Michael leaves the room, under the illusion that the other three players are going to look around and collectively decide on the chosen object to be guessed by him--say, the alarm clock. Michael expects that when they've made their decision they will ask him to come back in and try to guess the object in fewer than twenty questions.

Under normal circumstances, the game is a mixture of perspicacity and luck: No, it's not bigger than a breadbox. No,you can't eat it....Those kinds of things.

But in Wheeler's version of the game, when Michael leaves the room, the three remaining players don'tcommunicate with one another at all. Instead, each of them silently decides on an object. Then they call Michael back in.

So, there's a disparity between what Michael believes and what the underlying truth is: Nobodyknows what anyone else is thinking. The game proceeds regardless, which is where the fun comes in.

Michael asks Walter: Is the object bigger than a breadbox? Walter--who has picked the alarm clock--says, No. Now, Anthony has chosen the sofa, which is bigger than abreadbox. And since Michael is going to ask him the next question, Anthony must quickly look around the room and come up with something else--a coffee cup!--which is smaller than a breadbox. So when Michael asks Anthony, If I emptied out my pockets could I put their contents in this object? Anthony says, Yes.

Now Aggie's choice may have been the small pumpkin carved for Halloween, which could also contain Michael's keys and coins, so when Michael says, Is it edible? Aggie says, Yes. That's a problem for Walter andAnthony, who have chosen inedible objects: they now have to change their selection to something edible, hollow, and smaller than a breadbox.

So a complex vortex of decision making is set up, a logical but unpredictable chain of ifs andthens. To end successfully, the game must produce, in fewer than twenty questions, an object that satisfies all of the logical requirements: smaller than a breadbox, edible, hollow, et cetera. Two things can happen: Success--this vortex can give birth to an answer that will seem to be inevitable in retrospect: Of course! It's the ----! And the game ends with Michael still believing he has just played Ordinary Twenty Questions. In fact, no one chose the ---- to start with, and Anthony, Walter, and Aggie have been sweating it out, doing these hidden mental gymnastics, always one step ahead of failure.
Which is the other possible result: Failure--the game can break down catastrophically. By question 15, let's say, the questions asked have generated logical requirements so complex that nothing in the room can satisfy them. And when Michael asks Anthony the sixteenth question, Anthony breaks down and has to confess that he doesn't know, and Michael is finally let in on the secret: The game was Negative Twenty Questions all along. Wheeler suggests that the nature of perception and reality, at the quantum level, and perhaps above, is somehow similar to this game.

When I read about this, it reminded me acutely of filmmaking. There is an agreed-upon game, which is the screenplay, but in the process of making the film, there are so many variables that everyone has a slightly different interpretation of the screenplay. The cameraman develops an opinion, then is told that Clark Gable has been cast in that part. He thinks, Gable? Huh, I didn't think it would be Gable. If it's Gable, I'm going to have to replan. Then the art director does something to the set, and the actor says, This is my apartment? All right, if this is my apartment, then I'm a slightly different person from who I thought I was: I will change my performance. The camera operator following him thinks, Why is he doing that? Oh, it's because... All right, I'll have to widen out because he's doing these unpredictable things. And then the editor does something unexpected with those images and this gives the director an idea about the script, so he changes a line. And so the costumer sees that and decides the actor can't wear dungarees. And so it goes, with everyone continuously modifying their preconceptions. A film can succeed in the end, spiralling in on itself to a final result that looks as if it has been predicted long in advance in every detail. But in fact it grew out of a mad scramble as everyone involved took advantage of all the various decisions everyone else had been making.

'River' at the San Antonio Film Festival

2008-06-04T14:07:00.000-07:00

OK! So we made it again to SAFILM!!

Thanks Scott, for getting across the DVD in time.

'River' has been short-listed for screening, during the San Antonio Film Festival '08, on Saturday night (June 20th). Check the following link for an up to date time schedule.

http://www.safilm.com/schedule.html

madness!

2007-10-29T08:39:00.000-07:00

Last week, I had sent an impatient e-mail to Sundance, enquiring about the status of 'River'. I got a rather amused reply today, saying they have received over 8000 films this year and they needed until december. I read it again as I could not believe my eyes. It was indeed 8K!!!

Now, assuming 70 percent of them were short films, we are talking about 5,600 films!!! Yeah, that doesnt augur well for 'River', but my first reaction was.....'That jury is about to go insane for life'!! can you imagine sitting through thousands of short films, conceived by warped minds all over the globe including yours truly?

http://www.sundance.org/festival/

rrrrouggggh sketch to rough cut....;)

2007-10-23T23:54:00.000-07:00

Ready for Sundance

2007-09-20T09:09:00.001-07:00

After what seemed like a million trips to San Antonio and back, finally FedExed 'River' to Sundance last night - a day before the deadline. Quite an achievement I think, given that we had auditions running till the fag end of July.
A zazillion Thanks to:
Jim Fox - for putting up with me for 4 straight weekends and editing & sound designing the film into a 'fun' piece. And for helping out during the shoot!
Mariscela - for shooting till her last week in San Antonio
Wes - for driving down all the way from Houston and for doing such a great job with the cigar!!
Barath - for handling the Boom for almost 2 full days!
Kiran - for those wonderful curtains and million other things on the sets
Victoria - for feeding all of us for 2 days and for the brilliant cameo!
Scott & Theo - for making the restaurant scene look so good! (and scott for sporting the 'blonde' just for the film!!!!!)
and Christie, for agreeing to be in the film (and saving the last day) in such a short notice!!

and of course Angela, Miki, Steve, Dr. Alves, Ashwin, Jorge, Dax, Hank and all of Mari's 'boys'. Will save their 'thanks' for the wrap party!

Call times

2007-08-02T22:43:00.000-07:00

Friday: Rehearsal / reading

Time: 9:30 PM
Location: Ruta Maya (Downtown)
Address: 107 E Martin St, San Antonio, TX 78205
Scene: Poker table
Talent: Miki Naik, Steve Brogdon, Dr. Alves

Saturday: Shoot
Location: Zinc
Address: 207 N. Presa St.San Antonio, TX 78205-2635
Scene: Poker table
Talent: Miki Naik, Steve Brogdon, Dr. Alves, Wes Linnenbank
Call time: 7:30 AM
Parking : (public parking available across the road. Call me for car pooling)
Wrap time (tentative): 5:00 PM

Saturday: Rehearsal
Time: 9:00 PM
Location: Oak Hill Taverns
Address: Medical and Fredericksburg (It is between Blanco cafe and Budget Suites of America)
Scene: Restaurant
Talent: Scott, Theo

Sunday: Shoot
Location: Oak Hill Taverns
Scene: Restaurant
Talent: Scott, Theo, Dax, Leigh, Victoria, Hank, Jah
Call time: 7:00 AM
Parking: Available at location
Wrap time: (tentative) 6:00 PM

For any information, please feel to call me at 210-528-0396 or any of the following crew members:

Kiran: 210-262-9745
Jah: 210-215-9846
Matt: 210-391-7241
Barath: 210-912-3339

what a weekend...

2007-07-31T04:08:00.000-07:00

I think I underestimated the effort of making River in San Antonio, while living in Houston! 180 miles is a killer! ;( and with all the location scouting, i think i did about 600 odd miles in 2 days...

But the fun is worth it....it is awesome that we are actually attempting to pull it off in just one weekend! That means that we shoot all day saturday and all day sunday. Man, I am so not looking forward to that Monday...

It is now official. This is where we are shooting the poker scene:

A wine cellar was definitely not the first choice, but it just looked fabulous. The irony is that 'zinc' is the restaurant where I first narrated the script to Mari and Scott! ;)

The restaurant scene will be at the Oak Hills Tavern...easily the most hung-out place for Frost & Sullivan employees.....have had many memorable and forgettable nights there ;)...Daxton is meeting the rather 'cold sounding' owner today.

Most of the casting is finalized......but Federico continues to be a challenge. Have too many choices.....but I guess it is a good problem to have. Hopefully by Wednesday night, we should be all set!!

River - Locations

2007-07-25T19:13:00.000-07:00

Here are the most probable locations for the restaurant. Let me know what you think. I personally feel that 'bumdoodlers' has the most suitable floor plan, but the wall colors suck. Spechts has beautiful insides, but:

- does not have the 'door' for the last scene

- we do not have permission yet

First 3 are Bumdoodlers and last 3, Spechts':

The River

2007-07-13T12:14:00.000-07:00

I think 'River' gets kicked off officially tommorrow. I hope to be on the road scouting for one of the two locations. It is such a relief that there are only two, as against the 7 for haze. I dont think any of us want to try that out again.

I personally think some parts are a bit over the top...but most of my friends have told me it does not sound cheesy. I am not sure if they are just being nice to me!

Fox News on SAUFF and Haze

2007-06-21T14:03:00.000-07:00

Fox news coverage

2007-06-20T21:31:00.000-07:00

Did not have the time to record it. So had to 'buy' this clip ;(

Click on the link below for Fox News' coverage on SAUFF and Haze

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2byrx_fox2

Will try to get it on youtube soon. I think sharing / embedding that is way easier.

SAUFF update and Haze on Fox news

2007-06-19T00:40:00.000-07:00

Today, we had a planned press conference at SAUFF, but only Fox 29 turned up. Myself and another director (Matt from Austin) were interviewed. The story came on the 9:00 PM news and Haze managed to grab a good 20 seconds of footage on air. Will post the video here when I get it.

Haze at SAUFF

2007-06-17T23:39:00.000-07:00

Haze has been chosen for screening at SAUFF (san antonio underground film festival). It is a decently respected festival in Texas and has been around for about 13 years. I am told there were about 150 submissions this year. Haze was among the better 62 that will be screened. No, we did not win any of the awards, but it seems like we could get a fair bit of visibility for future projects.

Schedule below.
http://safilm.com/2007/events.html

updates on their way.

The IFMASA screening - Dec 2006

2007-06-15T09:21:00.000-07:00

4 months of planning, 6 months of shooting, 2 re-shoots, endless nights working on the audio, two leading men and a million cuts later, Haze was finally ready to be screened last december. The first official screening at 'The Alameda' theatre in downtown San Antonio. The festival was Mary Harder's baby all the way. Red carpet and all that!! Initially, I thought it was too fancy for an independent film festival....but it was Mary! ;) All in all...a very proud cast and crew... (and my dad, who is behind the scenes of these pics by the way).

Scott and Alexandria won best best actor awards....for non-haze films though...I thought they both had a great 2006.

Its ironic that the Mariscela - director of photography, would not turn her face towards the camera....or is it a strategy? ;)

The Art department Angels- Kiran and Neha were dazzling as usual and on time - as usual....(The other dude who looks like the real star of the evening is Miki - who was forced into many a guest appearance in haze!).

You dont see Scott or Alex in here coz they are busy with the paparazzi and the red carpet. The lovely lady to Neha's(who is busy hiding her anti-paparazzi hand gun) left is Angela Barco - the girl who played the attendant at the resort. We had to cut that scene down to a few seconds, but she was amazing. It would be awesome if she would agree to be a part of the next one! And Irene needs no introduction in San Antonio! ;)