At some point, just before Raya, I decided it would be nice to shoot an incredibly DIY short film for iFilmIndie's 'the Gathering' event at KLPac. 'Some Like It White' felt overplayed and a long time has passed since 'Nicotine'. As for the short I did at the beginning of the year, 'The Writing on the Wall', I felt that it didn't have enough me in it.
What do I mean by me? Well, the short film was written more to suit the event itself, the Youth '08 festival which was all about youths empowering themselves to follow their own dreams professionally (or something of that nature), and I wrote a script based on that. So whilst the other two filmmakers used the event as a lot to shoot their own ideas, I crafted mine based on the event. And though I had a HDV camera and a steadicam, what the film didn't have ultimately was true heart. The film had a lot of the techniques that I use and themes that I explore, but I had already explored these themes in other projects.
It didn't have enough me. At least, the me of the time.
And what was the me back then? A sad, pathetic man gripping on the fringes of normality, still shell-shocked from the events of the time. I didn't notice for a good long while, but a lot of changes happened, and though they always say it's always darkest before the dawn, that dark period got pretty fucking dark. In retrospect it's a good thing I didn't put any me of the time into the short film. The kids at the event would probably turn their backs on hope and all end up becoming dullards.
I found myself looking back at the past as opposed to living in the hear and now and thinking about the future, and found myself wallowing in past glories, past lives and past accomplishments, trying to make some sense of it all, and at this point of my life, at the here and now, something became very fucking apparent.
I was once again an emoboy.
Now, whilst emo is a viable marketing brand for the young and angry romantics of our time that enjoy the expressiveness of black eye liner and side parting fringes that seriously impair vision, it was something I had, for a good number of years, managed to watch from the sidelines and take the piss out of, and it's that piss-taking aspect of me, the cynical, sarcastic, cheeky lil' bugger that I once was had been replaced by a twenty eight year old man listening to 'The Black Parade' on loop.
This. Will. Not. Do.
Working on a high profile TV job made me paranoid, scared that shooting my mouth off would endanger my future jobs. Knowing that certain people were keeping tabs on this little site, reading the thoughts of the Guber and scrutinizing every detail made me watch my words. And this was not the Guber way.
Back in the days of the Ballad of Justin Guber I was never this wary. I wrote what I thought and felt whilst still maintaining a semblance of privacy when need be, but I certainly never feared the consequences of my typed out thrash.
And I realized all this whilst making my little short film for the iFilmIndie Gathering.
The short was nothing ground-breaking. I had been watching a lot of comedy (mainly to keep my spirits up) such as the Judd Apatow and Christopher Guest movies as well as Ricky Gervais' tv shows and wanted to do something similar - improvised gags, humor out of an uncomfortable situation, all that bollocks.
Whilst coming up with the plot outline and going through it with Col. Kurtz, he brought up something from the first draft. I can't remember the exact words, but it was along the lines of "there isn't enough you in it". We bounced a couple of ideas and I wrote a second draft of the plot, which was what I shot.
Shooting the thing was like going back to the first year I started making movies - for the first day there was just me and a boom guy as I ran between three cameras, operating them all in unison. Day two was me and Col. Kurtz with one camera operator, improvising away. And whilst the shoot itself was fun, it didn't really hit me how much I was enjoying the whole experience until I started editing it.
This was the feeling I had missed for so long - actually enjoying the edit. I was up non-stop editing the thing to make it for the deadline, trimming down the material to fit into the slot, even though there was so much material I wanted to put in, and I was loving it. Sure, I hadn't slept, I was filled with caffeine and my neck felt like I had been sucking cock in the alleyways of sunset boulevard for 21 hours straight but I was loving every minute of it.
(Though I doubt I'd enjoy sucking cock for 21 hours straight as much).
Screening the thing elated me even more, watching the audience react to the movie. After weeks of stressing out over work, work and more work this tiny little film brought back a feeling I hadn't felt in a damn long time - the joy of filmmaking.
I rebooted, and all systems are go.
Of course, it wasn't just the short film that's helped me out of the funk - throughout the year, I've had nothing but the help of a great number of good friends who've all pulled me up piece by piece. Some of them may think they did nothing, but they did. And some of them may have even been frustrated with me, trying their best to pull me back as I sank deeper and deeper into insomnia and lethargy, and to those friends I apologize for being such a damn sourpuss and thank them for sticking with me through the proverbial shit. Some of them are friends that I've only recently made and have shun a light through my windows like a 2k Arri and brightened up my day immensely.
The short film was that last step on the long road to recovery, and an important one. I feel recharged, re-energized and ready to reprezizent. None of this takes away the shite-load of work that I still have piled up, none of this speeds up the payments that I'm waiting for from various clients, but it helps.
In fact, it's helped so much that this post sounds like the confessions of someone in a therapy session after having an epiphany.
Or a character in a PG-rated movie.
Fuck me, I hope my life doesn't turn into one of those.
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