Monday, June 21, 2010

OK Go

Friday, June 18, 2010

Crying

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Best of Boston

ast Monday was the “Best of Boston” screening of the 48Hour Film Project, where the Audience Award-winners and judges’ favorites are shown together on the big screen one last time.  Then the awards are handed out.  My friends… Team ALBATROSS! walked away with an embarrassment of honors…

BEST FILM, BOSTON 2010
BEST ENSEMBLE ACTING
BEST WRITING: NEIL REYNOLDS AND ALBATROSS
BEST DIRECTING: NEIL REYNOLDS AND JASON HAAS
BEST ACTRESS: KATIE LEEMAN
BEST ACTOR: PATRICK FRENCH
BEST EDITING: SASHA GOLDBERG
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE: WILLIE CONRAD
BEST USE OF CHARACTER
... and our venerable AUDIENCE AWARD.

The winner:

I am immensely proud to have led such a talented team through this cavalcade of distinctions.  Team ALBATROSS!‘s accomplishments are rendered even more spectacular by the fierce competition from some very talented Boston filmmakers.  Among my favorites from the screening (that I can find online):

Congratulations one and all!

p.s. Does anybody know the origins of the “official selection” fronds that adorn every DVD box ever made?

Thursday, May 06, 2010

For a Few Flowers More

or the last four years I’ve participated in the 48 Hour Film Project, an international filmmaking competition wherein teams compete within their city to make a short film in 48 hours, after drawing their film genre out of a hat and being given specific parameters that must be included in the final product.  This year, the team I formed, ALBATROSS!, drew a particularly tricky genre: “Musical or Western.”  We chose Western.

For a Few Flowers More: As the internet becomes our new frontier, a man from a simpler time must defend his virtual property the old-fashioned way.

In addition to the genre, we had to include a character named Wilma or Winston Weatherby (a gardner), a scale, and the line of dialog “You win some, you lose some.”

To say that I am immensely proud of my team and what we accomplished in such a short time frame would be an understatement of epic understatedness.  Whether or not this film is recognized in the competition, it represents a momentous leap forward in the quality of our shooting, editing, scoring, and storytelling.  Congratulations to all the 48Hour filmmakers—every year I’m blown away by the creativity that panic inspires.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

The Tides of March

arch has been an overwhelming month.  I spent most of February obsessing over the particulars of my graduate/film school applications, which I finished back in October and then forced out of my mind.  But not for long, of course—as snow melted and winter receded, notification-deadlines began to loom, and by late February every day felt like waiting for the results of an MRI.  I remained cautiously optimistic, but only just.

Earlier this month I was offered a place in the Peter Stark Producing Program at USC.  I accepted on the spot; it was and is my first choice program, an intensive immersion in the art and business of the film industry that seems to implicitly reject the notion that “artistic” and “commercial” projects exist in different spheres.  Unfortunately I can’t talk too intelligently about the curriculum, beyond what I’ve read, which is half-fact, half-pitch.

Exhibit A (New York Times)
Exhibit B (Variety)
Exhibit C (Variety/Program Director)

I don’t begrudge any program its bragging rights—stellar reputation is what drew me there in the first place.  The little legends are awesome, too—I love the anecdote about a Starkie throwing a chair in a passion-fueled dispute.  (“There’s your Felliniesque!” I imagine him screaming.)  Still more impressive is whatever the other guy said to provoke the chair-tossing.  Apparently I have four months to hone my dodging skills.

THIS IS HOW MOVIES ARE MADE!

Anyway, back to March.  It’s about to end, you know.  And then it will be April, and then it will be May, and then, in June, Sarah and I will be enjoying our final days as Boston-Cambridge residents.  For me, it will have been just under seven years—for Sarah, closer to ten.  A friendly reminder that time flies, which is itself a friendly way of saying, life is too fucking short.  Our relocation is no trivial thing—in addition to the logistical and financial burdens, we’ll be leaving behind our community of friends, family, and artistic collaborators, just trusting that in LA we’ll find new opportunities and awesome people, and that eventually we’ll find the money to visit old friends.  Anxiety?  We have it in spades.  But we’re not complaining.  It’s exciting, it’s a priviledge, it’s a challenge, it’s the next chapter in the great adventure we promised each other when we married.

Onward, friends!  Come, collaborators!  Adventure awaits us all.