Lucas Madigan did some nice work in his short film Bloor Street Cinema, and we thought we could help some with his next film Joan & Jonas, also written and directed by Lucas.

It navigated through post in September and we are delighted that the Beloit International Film Festival has invited the film to play the fest February 17-20th.

Also, another Ardent short written by myself and directed by Christopher, The Danger of Secrets has been invited to play the festival as well.

It was a pleasure working with Lucas, who is currently hard at work on his documentary feature about comic writer-performer Greg Thomey of This Hour Has 22 Minutes fame.

As a Second City alumnus and an admirer of Thomey’s work in comedy and in the drama The Boys of Saint Vincent, personally I can’t wait to see it.

but even the organization of the screening with a small bar is a lot of work for 2 people with very little money. Ah the glamour! (We’re celebrating Canada and Mexico here… a representative from the Mexican Consulate might be in attendance, what do you mean we can’t serve tequila? Corona? We have homemade tortilla chips from La Tortilleria but we need cheese and fruit trays…)

Trust me, no one wants to see what happens when one has been running on an hour of sleep a night in order to just solve tech trouble and then the cheese trays go belly up. And by “one” I mean Chris. (And by “Chris” I mean that’s not true and I mean “me”.)

This is when somebody invaluable like Judy Evans is worth her own weight in gold. She’s a friend and enthusiastically supported our movie from the get go. It’s not just about the location and the work… when you mobilize a unit on location there’s a home you leave behind. Who looks after the animals? The house? Neighbour Alison shoveled the walk and collected the mail. Sue was dog-watcher extraordinaire. Judy was on cat patrol. You can’t set up camp in another country without those that hold down the fort while you’re away.

Back to the prepping the screening: Judy was enthusiastic on a buying trip for bar supplies and full of good advice.

She was un-fazed by t-shirts and having to prep cheese trays. Everyone should have a professional Judy. She is a natural party planner and really, she ended up keeping it together while we were up in the projection booth, talking to people, etc.

Even more incredible was she invited her friends to see the film and she pressed them into service! I turned around and there were Brad and Doug frantically slicing fruit and cheeses and arranging them artfully on trays!

Every crew doesn’t have Judys, Brads and Dougs, but they should, believe me.  And they may not have been on location with us, but their willingness to jump into action screening night makes them honorary crew as far as I’m concerned.

If you too would like a Judy, Brad or Doug, leave a comment here and maybe you can borrow ours or get a few for yourself.

With gratitude,
SS

Because we were such a tiny cast and crew, we opened up the invitation list to include supporters of the film as well as reminding invitees it included ‘And Guest’… admittedly, there was a lot of laughter when Sebastien Aguirre (credited as an assistant editor in post but who really qualified as Totally Dedicated All Round Helper Man – can the Directors’ Guild make that a credit?) said “Oh, I can bring one guest? Because, ahhhh, I invited 15.”

So perhaps the biggest surprise of the night was that there seemed to be more friends of the productions and strangers there than cast and crew… they really seemed engaged. Lots of laughter earlier in the film, and lots of reacting when the story got less funny and and uglier as it progressed…

We were briefly introduced to a very nice woman who is a critic for a film journal; given that she was there socially, invited by a friend of hers, we didn’t think anything of it other than she was a nice member of an enthusiastic audience… imagine our shock when the private screening of our film got a stupendous write up 2 days later!

We are delighted by the piece. The name of the publication?
10 Movies To See Before You Die.

SS

Estoy feliz de haber formado parte adel equipo de THE DEVIL’S TAIL (La Cola del Diablo), mi intervención la disfrute muchisimo y la calidez de los compañeros fue inmejorable, pocas veces he estado tan a gusto trabajando, el idioma no fue ningún obstáculo, al contrario, es maravilloso encotrarse con personas tan entregadas en su trabajo. Sólo me resta felicitarlos por los buenos resultados, enhora buena!!!

Gracias amigos
Mucha suerte (good luck) con la presentación y mucho éxito.

AM

Off to the venue to finalize the details, but it will be nice to show all who contributed the fruits of their labour… with a drink after too of course.

The band might even be able to play at the venue!
SS

The jury “felt that your film demonstrated superior and standout filmmaking and is deserving of special recognition.  Your film was among the best submitted from over 30 countries around the world.”

Will have to get the designer to add the festival laurel leaves to the poster and the DVD cover…
definitely helps in marketing the film, but it’s also nice to feel that there is some small pat on the back in there too. As Chris said “We have to celebrate. This is a film that gets into festivals and wins awards before it was finished.”

We should do something to mark the occasion. Easy to work round the clock and forget to celebrate.

Here’s to more laurel leaves!
SS

I include these tidbits about recording sessions in the Production Diary simply to illustrate that I belong to the John Cassavetes-Gena Rowlands / John Sayles-Maggie Renzi school of filmmaking. That is, as Cassavetes and Rowlands worked for hire as actors, then used their income to make their own films, so do I, so does my partner in all things Ardent and ardent, Chris.
As John Sayles is a screenwriter for hire and Maggie Renzi also produces films that aren’t hers and Sayles’ so that they may put that money into their own projects, so do we. We already work in the film industry (I’m an actress in theatre as well) and we invest in our own work.

I have chosen to post about this as a kind of note to film students, aspiring directors, or people in the business already who want to do their own projects etc., (indeed, as this entire Production Diary is a note to all who might be interested) to remind people to invest in themselves and their own work…

… To remind indie and guerilla filmmakers to do the work, to do the work, and NOT to sit around waiting for permission from some funding body, distributor, moneyed producer, etc. Nobody’s sitting around waiting for you to make your film for God’s sake; so just make it.

Wishing you well in your own creative endeavors,
SS

Then I will race back to my computer and prep another film festival submission.
SS

So, once you’ve made the most simple, honest, workmanlike cut possible, you start getting tricksy.  Oh, it starts innocently enough.  You’ve done your best to preserve the integrity of the actors’ performances by using masters whenever possible, or trying to stay with a particular take for each actor’s one-shot.  Then one day you realize that the dialogue from an alternate take is cleaner than in the take you’re using, and to your astonishment it matches the actors lip movements perfectly in the better-looking take. So you swap the audio.  Suddenly you’ve taken the inherent Frankenstein monster aspect of movies, of your movie, to another level.  Next thing you know, you’re having the actors re-record vast swatches of dialogue to get rid of troublesome ambient noise.  Then you realize that the only way to deal with the noise in a particular scene is to add more noise.  Tastier noise.

So you add some noise that has nothing to do with the original environment of the scene, a low level tone, say.  Uh oh.  It sounds very cool, and injects a new visceral tension into the scene.  Next thing you know, you’re designing soundscapes for almost every scene in the movie.  It adds impact, makes the movie slicker, more professional, more impressive.  But now, what are people responding to?  The story and the actual moments between the actors?  Or some sexy noise you added?  Certainly, it’s all part of yer cinematic arsenal, and when deployed effectively this stuff gets the audience totally jazzed up and can make you millions of dollars and win Oscars.  So why should I be concerned about some notion of purity?  Does it have any value at all?

I believe in the end it comes down to personal taste, and what kind of movie you’re making.  So many of these effects, both sound and visual, are cues to the audience.  Used excessively, and more and more viewers are going to feel like they are being spoon fed, while there will always be some viewers who never feel like they’re getting enough candy.  Myself, I’m the kind of movie watcher who feels Spielberg really screwed up in Schindler’s List by making that little girl’s coat red in an otherwise B&W movie.  Others think it’s the best thing in the picture.

CC