Good luck over the weekend L.A. friends!

The most depressing thing about making strictly low to no budget films is the inability to license music/songs.

Everyday I wake up and think, I need to write something great, so somebody REALLY wants it, so they want it enough to let me have creative control, so I can actually use some fucking great songs.

That’s the daily plan. Write pages. Try and make it great. One day…temp songs are actually available!

DON’T FORGET ABOUT THIS

2011 has been a pretty crazy year as far as my personal screenwriting output is concerned.

THE TOTAL NUMBER OF FEATURE FILM SCRIPTS since January of this year:

A PAGE ONE rewrite.

A HEIST film.

A CRIME THRILLER.

A WESTERN.

Another ‘HIGH OCTANE’ CRIME THRILLER.

A (Psychological) HORROR film (Co-written with my friend Paul).

WHY THE SUDDEN FLURRY?

I think the cost of setting up a film means I’m not directing as much as I’d like to be.

A NIGHT FOR DYING TIGERS drained my line of credit and credit cards (which remain drained), so “self financing micro budget style” is a challenge.

My management company are an inspiration. Great notes. Great attitude. Great guys.

I’ve learned the joy of outlining.  A more holistic understanding of narrative story structure, in both commercial films and smaller personal dramas, means less time meandering and more time writing. I’m certain the end result can be the same, whether you outline in great detail or not, but, for me, I find I’m making more productive keystrokes lately, and that keeps me at the computer.

Of course, characters continue to surprise, and often refuse to go where I tell them.

All of my Wordpress websites were hacked.

I’m deleting everything, including the Cinemanovel Site, sadly.

It will take a bit, but I’ll have something up very soon.

CASEY, TIJANA, and DAN in “VAMLET”

Thursday/Friday were spent polishing four scripts.

NOW it’s full on editing VAMLET. I’d like to get a rough assembly finished by the end of the week. SO MUCH left to slog through.

Back to it!

FOLLOW EVERY SINGLE ONE.

http://www.moviemakerdigital.com/moviemaker/iss91_vol18?pg=90#pg90

WHAT IS THE MODEL?

I’ve written the best script I’ve ever written. It’s not an expensive film, logistically.

It’s ready to go into production this afternoon, but, there are a lot of obstacles to production. A lot of funding bodies and companies are structured to include protracted development. Development can be extremely helpful for a work-in-progress or a very early draft, however, when a script is ready for cast and camera, it’s not ideal.

So, I begin the quest for SERIOUS production partners. Equity investors and film finance companies.

Get some funding. Attach some great cast. Get the rest of the money. Shoot.

Seems simple enough.

These are the undisputed best films of the year.

1. Dogtooth

2. Blue Valentine

3. Ondine

4. Black Swan

5. Fish Tank

6. The American

7. Solitary Man

8. The Father of my Children

9. I am Love

10. The Disappearance of Alice Creed.

Of note: Easy A, Catfish, The Social Network, Exit Through the Gift Shop, Another Year, Animal Kingdom

A little wisdom from Sandy Mackendrick

For me, this issue is a central question. My writing and filmmaking life is this constant struggle to determine exactly the right time to move the idea from my head to the page or screen. If only there were an easy answer.

Each time, by feel, one idea takes its place ahead of the others.

The idea that demands more time, then demands that those characters are given a voice.

Back to some demanding voices.

Yesterday I took a break from writing to grab lunch and I remembered an email somebody sent a while back. It pissed me off all over again.

This person said they were inspired by the way I just went out and made WHEN LIFE WAS GOOD with myself as the only crew, how I just decided to make a film and then went out and made it. I replied to the message with a thank you and a brief “all you need to do is decide to make a film and then…you make it” message of inspiration.

Then I received a further message, pretty much asking for my help making their film, because, they said, unlike me, not everybody can just go out and make a film.

They pretty much wanted me to take their script and make their movie for them.

THAT IS SO WEAK

Something I learned very early on when making music transferred perfectly to film:

There will always be better filmmakers.

There will always be more talented filmmakers.

There will always be luckier filmmakers.

There will NEVER be a filmmaker who works harder than I do.

It was the only thing I could control, so I decided to control it.

SO, PLEASE

Don’t be a lazy fuck and expect people to create for you.

If you need equipment, find a way to buy it.

If you need actors, find them.

If you need a script, write one, get a friend to write one, remake The Tempest in a high school and shoot it on your iPhone, anything.

If things aren’t working out for you, if you’re not “getting the breaks,” if you’re not working on a new script because, even though nobody’s rushing to make the ONE script you have, you know it’s the greatest thing since Matrix Reloaded…if you spend more time talking about what you’re going to do or reading books and magazines and blogs about what you want to be doing, then you’re not doing anything.

All you really need to do is…something.

Now, I’m going to stop playing around on this blog and get back to writing.

Oh, and I procrastinate EVERY day. I find the secret to good procrastination is to switch back and forth between projects rather than the dishes, playstation, online “research,” etc…

Can you imagine yourself going down with just a cameraman and sound man and half a dozen people and shooting a film?

Sure I can. In fact, any contemporary story is best done just that way. The only time you need vast amounts of money and a huge crew is when you require complex special effects, as in 2001, or big battle or crowd scenes, as in the Napoleon film. - STANLEY KUBRICK