Saturday, June 28, 2008

Mind: Thoughts on Filmmaking

It's been a hell of a few weeks. It's oscillated between the good (seeing many films for free with friends at the Another Hole in the Head Film Festival and the San Francisco LGBT Film Festival) and the bad (surprise root canal)...but at least it's never been boring.

My short film, Everything I Needed to Know About Zombies I Learned From the Movies, is in the final stages of completion. It's so close I can taste it, but there's been some major, discouraging setbacks this week.

Brian battles zombies in the basement.

I'm not going to go into the details, just that's been hard to keep my spirits up about it...or even to focus on any new projects, be they on paper, canvas, computer, or film. I think I'm learning I'm not really enjoying being a producer...though I dig the shit outta being a screenwriter and director. Baby steps, learning processes.

Looking at pictures of the shoot does cheer me, though, which is why I thought posting them may help me. It was a seriously amazing time, almost a year ago (yipes!), when everything just gelled perfectly in two days. The right mix of people, energy, creativity, and dedication...it moved like clockwork. I was so lucky to have the cast and crew I did. Never in my life have I been so excited and willing to wake up at 4:00 a.m. three days in a row.

That's why post production has been so weird for me. I got so used to getting my hands dirty, being involved in everything, that when time came to hand the footage off to the editor and sound designer I felt like a mom dropping off her only child for his first day of kindergarten.

The zombies having good, creepy fun on set.

I'm not quite sure I'm over the feeling yet, especially since the child is flunking in coloring (though it's an awesome speller and singer). It's taking more time than I thought. But then again, what creative project doesn't? I just need to grit my (root canaled) teeth and put my head down until this baby is locked and loaded, which hopefully will be very, very soon.

Very soon.

Pictures in this post by my brother, Xander Kent.