Laserium lives and other tests

Been doing a lot of tests with various techniques in After Effects for future iterations of video classes. This one takes me back to the 70's. I also think this one is neat...

Theatrical production design

Examples for your viewing pleasure... on the noisefilm channel!

The Singing Ringing Tree


Kwaidan


One from the Heart


Dogville


Mishima


Forbidden Zone


Tears of the Black Tiger

Dante's Inferno in puppets

The all-puppet (no CGI) Dante's Inferno DVD is being released on August 26.

Legend of the Sacred Stone

Psychotronic Chinese kung fu puppet film enhanced with CGI.

Strings

Real puppets!

Dan's daughter in... Fear House (2008)!

Dan's daughter plays the ghost girl Anna Lisa in this direct-to-DVD horror film.

Desperate Remedies

Very theatrical film available on youtube (not available on DVD).

The Samurai Cop solution

We've been trying to figure out how to shoot an additional scene for the desert sequence even though Ben's hair won't match because he cut it. Cult favorite Samurai Cop (1989), a Lethal Weapon takeoff known for its spectacular and amusing ineptitude provides one solution. During the filming, star (ex-Sylvester Stallone bodyguard) Matt Hannon cut his hair. In order to match the existing footage, Hannon wore a cheap woman's wig.

In the scene below we see Hannon's real hair. This sequence is fascinating in its bizarre use of cutaways and its inability to create risque buddy cop repartee. The only way that this movie makes sense to me is to imagine it as an foreign Lethal Weapon homage film somehow cast in the US and performed in English (Director Amir Shervan shot several Iranian films before coming to the US).

Dust Devil

Dust Devil is a gorgeous pre-digital art-horror movie that looks like a big budget noise film. Beautiful, expansive desert shots. Film noir lighting. Peeling green walls, crazy people's rooms, still life-like tableaus, dream sequences and anachronistic imagery. OK, noise film doesn't have a dream sequence but maybe it would if it were longer. Dust Devil also has elements that I hope aren't reminiscent of noise film—atrocious dialogue, structure that goes nowhere, terrible acting, some clumsy directing and scenes that don't play. Director Richard Stanley used to direct music videos in the UK in the 80's so the cinematic lineage makes sense. As someone predominantly interested in visuals, Stanley falls into practically every trap I've written about in this blog. But the film was still compelling enough for me to make it all the way through.

I did feel a kinship with the film's sense of silence and isolation. This is a movie about wide open spaces and individuals who connect only during fleeting moments. All of my film ideas tend to be very similar. Note that in Dust Devil, there are very few two-shots. Stanley shoots conversations by going back and forth between one-ers. That's the way I would do it. I don't think I saw an over-the-shoulder shot in the whole thing.

The acting moments that stood out to me were the unplayable moments—I'm going to commit suicide... no I can't do it... or can I? I'm going to shoot him... no I can't do it... or can I? As I wrote earlier (post), these kind of internal struggle scenes never work for me. They're just so actor-y. The problem isn't the acting. The problem is asking an actor to perform an unplayable scene.

The new Mozarts

I've been coming across more and more marketing references to this 1991 quote from Francis Ford Copolla in which he predicts that one day, "some little fat girl in Ohio is going to be the new Mozart and make a beautiful film with her father's camcorder."

In the publicity materials for Able Edwards, writer/director Graham Robertson states—“Francis Ford Coppola once said there would come a day when some little fat girl from Ohio would borrow her dad’s camcorder and become the next Mozart of moviemaking. We like to think that we are that little fat girl.”

Here's another one from the website for Jason Tomaric's CL.ONE—"Francis Ford Coppola is rumored to have remarked: 'Some little fat girl in Ohio is going to be the new Mozart and make a beautiful film with her father’s camcorder.' It turns out the girl in question is actually Jason J. Tomaric (who purchased his own camcorder)."

It's curious that the quote is used to describe two extremely effects-heavy science fiction films. It's almost as if visual effects are seen as a fusion of "beautiful" and "camcorder"—an integration of art and technological progress. It's also surprising to me that it's OK to think of oneself as the next Mozart. I would guess that calling yourself the next Newton or Einstein would be seen as unforgivably egotistical, but not so in the case of Mr. Mozart. My only guess is that perhaps Mozart has been devalued and that today, "we're all Mozarts." Or maybe they're just being silly.

This is very cute

It's always surprising to me when things like this don't appear on my radar until late in the game. Martin Scorcese directs a "lost" Hitchcock short in this advertisement for Freixenet wine. An amusing take off/simulation of Hitchcock but in the long run it really doesn't make sense

Pink the series

The Canon XH-A1 doesn't seem particularly popular but you get a lot of bang for the buck. It's about the cheapest prosumer 24f HD camera you can get (a little over $3k). If you want to see what it looks like (with a 35mm lens adaptor) take a look at pink the series.

The deafening silence of music being scored and people being consumed

Well, that posting gap was probably the longest I've had in the past couple of years. The reasons: the beginning of the school year, work on some other projects, Sean going to a new school and the hand off of version 33 to Dan for scoring/sound design. For now, some mini reviews of films I've seen.

Astronaut Farmer.
Subtitle: Desperately seeking poetry
Probably one of the worst movies I've fast-forwarded through. From the opening shots of Billy Bob Thornton riding a horse in a space suit, this one has grand poetic aspirations thwarted by images that don't make sense and an overall directorial clumsiness. I have a thing for backyard rockets, but this was really terrible.

Grizzly Man
I liked this quite a bit. Not a flattering portrait of Timothy Treadwell whose love for bears was apparently surpassed only by the size of his ego and the depth of his delusion.

Inland Empire
I watched part of this. Amazing transfer of PD-150 Standard DV footage to film aided by a super (expensive) gadget box. I liked the rabbits. But it made me realize that part of what I enjoyed about Mulholland Drive was Naomi Watts' fresh-faced appeal and simultaneous quirkiness (I liked how she repeated everyone's name in a seeming attempt at memorization). It was the surface quality of that movie that made it watchable. Less so with Inland Empire, which seems to be only about oddball characters and mysterious moments in typical Lynch-ian fashion.

Chased by Dinosaurs
This stars Nigel Marven in an imaginary nature doc in prehistoric times. It's well-performed and pretty amusing, like the croc hunter with visual effects. Marven, an actual zoologist, goes back in time, traipses among prehistoric beasts, and almost gets eaten many times.

Prehistoric Park
Follow up also featuring Nigel Marven. This one blurs the line and goes from imaginary nature documentary to all-out drama. I was waiting for Marven to fall in love with the blond vet's assistant thereby provoking the jealousy of the just-comely-enough vet herself. The idea behind this one is that Marven is going back in time to collect prehistoric animals to bring them back to the present to save them from extinction. A strangely colonialist effort. This one doesn't work as well as Chased by Dinosaurs. One major reason is that they try to have it both ways. On the one hand they want it to be a reality show/documentary. On the other hand, a lot of the shots are designed for maximum eye appeal without regard to authenticity. It's like an awkward blend of a Hollywood film with a pseudo-doc.

Koi... Mil Gaya
The first Bollywood science fiction film. I didn't mind the goofiness of this one but I was surprised by the production values which I thought would be higher. Has the goofiness that we Americans expect of international efforts. I was half expecting Bumblee Man to jump out from behind a tree. Watching this made me realize that Miike's Happiness of the Katakuris is simply Bollywood wrought Japanese.

Errata
Earlier I wrote that director Albert Pyun was a real-life Ed Wood. Ben informs me that Ed Wood was, in fact, a real person.

More on Hillary Duff

Some of you remember my Hillary Duff post. I found the promo I was referring to on youtube (posted above).

Kristen Wiig & cinematography

This idea is really half-baked, more of a note to myself. I've been thinking about SNL's Kristen Wiig and how she's a good model for filmmaking aesthetics. I think she's really attractive... it's something about the way she looks plus the way she comes across. It's like there's a kind of "discoverability" about her, like maybe you're the only one in your group that really likes her. To me, that's why she doesn't come across as well when she plays sexy (green leotard in video above)—she loses her discoverability. (This is the point where my old friend Veronica would say very seriously, "Ron, she's married.") At any rate, I think that's the problem with some of those all-CGI films like Mirror Mask. They don't want to be discoverable. They want to be all-out beautiful. They demand your attention and don't allow you to give it. I wonder if this comes from the way that 2D imagery works. In a sense, a painting or illustration has to call out to you because it's competing for attention. It just sits there in a crowd of other voices. But a film already has your attention. Plus it's moving. A film doesn't need to shout at you. It just needs to keep you engaged and intrigued.

The Miracle Worker

This is a pretty funny take on director's DVD commentaries.

noisefilm channel: Fabulous World of Jules Verne (1958)

It's always surprising to me when I find something like The Fabulous World of Jules Verne on DVD. Somehow I think I've seen every bizarre hybrid animation DVD that's ever been released. I guess not. It's available from retroflicks.com and Amazon but apparently the print is terrible.

Copyright: now this is great art

This wonderful Disney mashup/instructional video does two things: it provides a challenge to unfair copyright practice and it's an interesting approximation of what the noise film final exposition video might look like. A must see! From Stanford University... [view]

Noisefilm channel... low tech Raiders of the Lost Ark

If you're like me, you've heard about this project for years but never seen it. Now WIRED has it—VIEW. See some scenes from the VHS shot-by-shot remake of Raiders of the Lost Art created over 7 years by a small cadre of teens. Low-tech filmmaking at its finest.

Noisefilm channel... Dave McKean

This is an excerpt of the film The Week Before by Illustrator/Director/Musician/Master Thespian Dave McKean. I like this short a lot better than McKean's unrelentingly static Mirror Mask. I sometimes show this clip in class to examine visual artist film tendencies. I love the intent behind this project and it's nice to look at. But compared to the pieces by Guy Maddin, it seems so stiff and self-conscious in its grasping for poetic form. Supposedly, a compilation DVD of McKean's short films will be released from www.allenspiegelfinearts.com.