"Sleepskating" - New Short Film

As you know from the previous post, I took part in the Kino Kabaret challenge whereby you make a film in 32 hours (from thinking up idea to screening the next night). This is what we came up with in 8 hours. It's called "Sleepskating".

Kino Kabaret - the 32-hour filmmaking challenge

This year, I chose to take part in my first Kino Kabaret challenge. The rules are you make a film in 32 hours, to be presented at the Kino Kabaret party 32 hours later. I felt that it would be a great way to push myself back into making films again, and it will be good practise to get back behind the camera again.

What I had not remembered when I signed up and had my place in the weekend session (this weekend, 23-24 October) of Kabaret was that I had already bought entry to the annual SPAA Fringe film conference, held on 22-23 October.

I guess a challenge isn't a challenge without a few amateur scheduling mistakes, right? The other downside to this is that I won't be able to start shooting till at least 8pm tonight, which makes it all the more challenging. I've shot a short in 3 hours before, so perhaps it won't be such a bad next 32 hours.

I'll be uploading the film to Vimeo and will share it here once it has premiered at Kino tomorrow night. If you're around Paddington with nothing better to do at 6:30PM on Sunday 24th of October, come down to the Australian Centre of Photography (Oxford St) for the closing night of Kino Kabaret. $15 at the door will get you free drinks, food and some freshly made films. Hope to see you there!

Are you Hungry For Talk?

As part of the Korean Film Festival, the new Hungry For Talk competition calls film lovers and goers alike to talk about their favourite Korean film, director or actor/actress in a short clip. There are prizes up for grabs (like free movie tickets), and even the chance for the winning Talkers to have their clip shown on the big screen throughout the festival.

Or, in other words, I'm asking you (my loyal viewers) to step up and participate!

Check out our short video about how to join in the conversation.

Last "Night"

Since that last post about my thesis film, I have come up with a completely new idea and story which I am confident will make a great short film. It is along the same lines of my initial concept and thought, but down a different path.

The new concept or thesis statement is "May I remind you, this is not poetry". It will be a simple, under 10 minute short with a narration or voice-over of a piece of free verse poetry over images. That's about all I intend on giving away at this stage of time!

Yesterday I watched Michel Gondry/Charlie Kaufman's beautiful Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for the fourth time, and it had made more sense than it did the last time I saw it. I found how much the film's themes and ideas related to my new thesis film idea, and found inspiration to adopt a similar Gondry style to my proposed film.

As I am supposed to have my film greenlit tomorrow, I decided to start writing a treatment for the new film, or some sort of a proposal. By the end of the day, I had not one word down on a document, but a two-minute short film titled "Night" inspired by Jon Brion (who composed the music on Eternal Sunshine) and Michel Gondry, starring my very helpful boyfriend, Kieran. The film is an extract of a young man's sleepless night. I'll eventually have to write that treatment tonight, but check out the two-minute short we shot and edited last night. Also, I shot this on my new Canon 7D with a 50mm f/1.8 prime lens. There seems to be a problem with the quality of the film as there are clear lines moving over some of the pictures. Nevertheless, it looks quite the success.

The song is "Theme" by Jon Brion, from the soundtrack of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

"4907" Goes Online

4907 from Fan Chan Pictures on Vimeo.

Any constructive feedback would be highly appreciated.

Cloverfield, From Paris With Love, and Other Film Things

My apologies for not getting around to updating. Kieran and I had started working on building our production company Fan Chan Pictures up post-social networking sites over the weekend, and now we have a great website, domain name, official logo and proper emails set up. It's unbelievable what you can achieve from one full day of sitting in front of a computer!

I recently started school again this week, although I haven't been to any classes yet! I was back at school last week to get my school ID taken, and to sit in an orientation day lecture. It was also nice to see everyone back from the holidays, and to finally set my mind back into the 'film-making' mode. Between then and now, I managed to come up with some rough ideas and concepts for my final project, which the school so professionally calls your 'thesis' film. I've been looking at Wong Kar-Wai's 2046 and Neill Blomkamp's District 9. Both are two very different films, with very interesting concepts which I would like to explore in a film of my own. After seeing many of the films produced from last semester, I have this urge to stand out from every other student film by doing something impossible to produce. I guess this is my goal for the next six months.

I got around to seeing Cloverfield and From Paris With Love yesterday. Kieran and I faced another big fail by firstly, going to redeem our free double pass tickets to see Jacques Audiard's Un Prophet at Verona, only to find out that Monday was their discount day. And secondly, walking down Oxford St ticking off all the movies we could have seen for free but unfortunately couldn't because we had no free tickets at hand, only to realise back home that we actually had a chance to see Andrej Wajda's 1957 film Kanal at Chauvel Cinema's Cinematheque Night - for free. What a fail of an evening.

Cloverfield

It was unfortunate that I didn't have the opportunity to experience the film in a cinema, as I thought it would have been more effective. Nevertheless, I absolutely enjoyed it. Produced by the very interesting J. J. Abrams and directed by Matt Reeves, Cloverfield is another one of those derivatives of The Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity and REC - only different. While the latter three explore the paranormal and have themes of ghosts (not including REC, as it takes on a different form of 'paranormal'), Cloverfield explores the very human experience of an attack on a small but seemingly large city by an abnormal, parasitic creature. A monster, if you will.

The film had all the concepts of a 'threalist' film (threalism, which I coined to describe films that Thrill with Realism) - the 'Queasy-Cam' effect giving the viewer a first-person perspective of the situation, and the cinema verite documentary style to push the "real" factor out for the ultimate viewer experience. Oh, and throw in a viral marketing campaign to get those viewers really riled up for the film, pre-release. Cloverfield's first trailer was debuted at the opening of Transformers in 2007, which showed a scene of a large explosion in the heart of New York City and the decapitated head of the Statue of Liberty being thrown down the street, shot on a camcorder. The trailer was given no title. Only J. J. Abrams could have thought of that.

I wasn't as frightened throughout this film as much as I was in REC for example, but the whole concept of the film centering around these few characters trying to make it through the entire ordeal - oh, and throw in a giant unknown, alien-like parasite of a monster wreaking chaos throughout the city - well, it really excites me. I am falling in love with this sort of film-making. Putting the viewer in a fictional environment and situation, with the sense of realism all over it.

I do recommend this film to anyone who firstly, is into J. J. Abrams, and secondly, anyone who doesn't quite like to be scared out of their wits like they were in a film like REC.

I gave this film 8/10, and will most definitely watch it again.

From Paris With Love

Directed by Pierre Morel who brought us the action thriller Taken in 2008, and co-written by Luc Besson (The Transporter, Taken, Leon The Professional), From Paris With Love stars John Travolta and Jonathan Rhys Meyers. The film seemed like just another Taken, only minus a very angry, over-protective and direct Liam Neeson, with lots of terrorists and lots of gangsters. I appreciated Taken, and do like these sorts of action thriller films, but From Paris With Love just didn't work for me.

The directing was pretty awful. Liam Neeson in Taken was plain frightening. John Travolta here, on the other hand, did nothing for me. His character's intensity seemed to vary in the extremes throughout the film, and this didn't help the character. In all fairness, it may have been on purpose to give Jonathan Rhys Meyers' character room to develop, especially when Travolta's character's unstoppable bravado was the star in the first half of the film.

I'll admit though, the story is interesting - about an unlikely duo of agents who discover a link to a group of terrorists planning an attack on the US Embassy in France. However, it's a pity the execution and direction of the film couldn't do it any justice.

I rated this film a very generous 5/10. Generous, mainly for the Vince Vega and "Royale with cheese" reference.

Fan Chan Pictures

Kieran and I co-founded the film production company Fan Chan Pictures last year, and have finally created a fully functional website for it.

Come check it out!

http://www.fanchanpictures.com

4907 Teaser

Kieran and I recently finished a film titled "4907". Here's a teaser clip from the film...