Learning Experiences

                The two most important lessons I have learned about moviemaking are: 1) The Importance of Good Sound and 2) The Importance of Proper Lighting. These lessons are based upon my own mistakes, which eat away at me and make me want to make another film.

1. The Importance of Good Sound/A Designated Sound Recordist

When interviewing people, it is probably best to avoid shooting in a location with background noise. You can always add in background noise in post, but you can’t always get rid of it. It is not uncommon for background noises to be barely noticeable when you’re shooting, but completely distracting when you’re playing back footage in the editing room. Each location presents its own challenges. If you’re shooting outside, you want to avoid things like chirping crickets, hissing cockroaches, buzzing cicadas, singing toads, planes flying overhead, traffic, wind noise, street lights, and air conditioning units. You can always add any of these sounds in post, to create ambience, but if these sounds are already present in your location sound or under your interview, it’s going to be very difficult to control them. Similarly, if you’re shooting indoors, you also want to avoid air conditioning units, water fountains, refrigerators, overhead lights, etc. Basically, you want to avoid anything that could produce a low-level hum, hiss, or buzz. This is really hard to do, because we naturally tune out those sounds since we hear them on a daily basis. You have to re-train your ear, which is why it is important to have a designated sound person. This person should not be the director or the DP, because those people need to focus on other aspects of production.

In my last film, we didn’t always have a designated sound person—the DP usually monitored the sound, which was almost all recorded in-camera. I shot an interview outdoors, in Ohio, in early September. I didn’t think about it at the time, but summer is cicada season in Ohio, and I had to scrap most of the footage from that interview because the cicadas were so loud! One of my favorite editing techniques is to pull sound from an interview and lay it over other shots, but I couldn’t do that because the forced cicada ambience was so recognizable (not to mention distracting), that it would have been completely disorienting to hear while seeing footage of people skating in a rink. Another interview, which I shot indoors, had a noticeable 60-cycle hum in the background. I was able to run some filters on it in post, but it is still there. I suspect a refrigerator caused it, because we turned off all of the overhead lights and the air conditioner.

Not only will my next film have a designated sound person, but sound will be recorded separately, we will avoid shooting outdoors (too hard to control the environment) and we will avoid shooting near air conditioning units, refrigerators, drinking fountains, overhead lights, etc.

2. The Importance of Proper Lighting/Manipulation of Existing Lighting

Documentary production usually involves a lot of location shooting under less-than-optimal shooting conditions. It is not practical to lug around an entire grip truck, nor is it within my means to do so. My last movie had some scenes that were shot in a rollerskating rink with garish, very green lighting that I was not able to completely color-correct in post. We were following a competition, so we couldn’t change the existing bulbs or set up light kits—if we had rented the location, that would have been an option, but we were covering a pre-scheduled event, so this was not an option for us. In retrospect, we could have brought some reflectors and a white balance card, but I don’t know what else we could have done. This particular location and event were central to the story—had they not been, I would have cut these scenes out of the movie. If I could do that shoot over again, I would have wanted to scout the location prior to the shoot to gauge existing lighting conditions, so we would have been better prepared for the shoot.

I don’t know if I will have access to light kits during production of my next film, but if I do, then I want to use them whenever possible to ensure even lighting and make my production look more professional. If not, then I shall depend upon reflectors, work lights, and practicals (fitted with daylight-balanced bulbs) to achieve my goal.

If I can afford to do so, I may purchase a DSLR camera (which has been recommended to me by a trusted source), which is more sensitive than the digital video camera I currently have, and also has adjustable shutter and f-stop settings, so that I can have more control over my images.
I want this next film to be more stylized than my previous one, and for me, lighting is a huge part of it, so I plan to put a great deal of thought into that element, as it can make or break the “look” of my film. Even though I am shooting a documentary, I want to plan my shoots and control the shooting environment as much as possible to help avoid making past mistakes. It is a huge relief to know that the MFA feature is a long-term project, with specific courses designed to guide you through the production process—I can’t imagine trying to make a feature film without having that level of guidance!

COP for The Last Laugh

The COP/premise for The Last Laugh is that we derive our value from how much others value us.

Movie Pet Peeves

                The one thing that enrages me as a viewer and completely pulls me out of a movie is anachrony. Whenever I am watching something that is supposed to take place in the past, and there is music, wardrobe, hair/makeup, locations, technology, currency, etc. from the present or from a later time than the story is set, I feel that the director and crew did not do the proper research and weren’t really committed to setting a story in the past. Please note that I am not referring to science fiction or steam punk here. Instead, I am referring to period pieces that either through carelessness or the director’s will, choose to incorporate contemporary or anachronistic elements. If it seems like the director didn’t know any better, then I would assume they were just being careless (Season of the Witch). If a director has deliberately rejected historical accuracy in favor of his/her artistic vision (Marie Antoinette, Inglourious Basterds), then I feel they are being self-indulgent. Either way, I become annoyed and will stop watching the movie or, if I can manage to stick with it, I will brood about that particular film for years.

What follows are a few examples of wardrobe/hair/currency/vehicular/musical anachronisms in recent films. Some of these anachronisms are likely the result of carelessness (Monster, Dumb and Dumberer), but others (Marie Antoinette, Inglourious Basterds, Gangs of New York) are deliberate.

I can’t decide if the anachronisms present in Catherine Hardwicke’s Red Riding Hood (2011) were deliberate or careless, but it felt like both. This film is set in eastern Europe in the Middle Ages. One of the first shots you see is of an androgynous child skipping down a path. The narration very quickly tells you that this child is a girl. The child is wearing pants. Pants. In the Middle Ages. Women didn’t start wearing pants until the 20^th century, and even that didn’t become a widespread phenomenon until the 1980s. Most of the male characters are clean-shaven, which is also unrealistic given the time period. To top it off, the male lead has his hair styled in a faux-hawk! Again, I’m not sure where Hardwicke’s artistic vision ends (Twilight set in the Middle Ages) and the hair/makeup/wardrobe   department’s lack of research begins. Either way, it felt messy.

Likewise, if you set a movie in the 1980s, you wouldn’t have the main characters driving a mid-1990s Pontiac Grand Am (Monster), or paying with currency from the mid-2000s (Dumb and Dumberer)! Either get it right (do your research and make sure that everyone on your crew is aware of when the story takes place) or don’t bother. Seriously, if it is too much hassle to create a world that takes place in the past, then don’t set a movie in the past.

I love retro, but I will probably never set a live-action movie in the past, because it would be too hard (without a Hollywood budget) to make sure that modern elements stay out of the picture. However, it would be completely doable to make an animated feature that takes place in the past, because I could control all elements of production and make sure that wardrobe, locations, color choices, etc. are consistent with the time period. 

               The second anachronism that bothers me is when characters use language or phrasing that does not match the time period in which a movie is set. When the dialogue happens to be bad and historically inaccurate, it is doubly distracting. Another example: I was recently watching a movie that was about the Black Plague (Season of the Witch), set in the Middle Ages, and one of the main characters actually said, “You’re buying the first round.”

The third anachronism that really bothers me is when inappropriate music is used. When I watched Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese, 2002), the techno music completely pulled me out of the film.

Similary, in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds (2009) there is a scene where the woman burns down a movie theatre. This film takes place during World War II, but this scene is set to Giorgio Moroder/David Bowie’s “Cat People (Putting Out Fire),” a very 1980s-sounding song, complete with synth and flanger effects. It didn’t help that I already associated that song with another film, Cat People (Paul Schrader, 1982). I wouldn’t have minded as much if Tarantino had Ute Lemper or Nick Cave cover it and make it sound like a cabaret song. That would have been acceptable. I would have still known it was a song from the 1980s, but it would have sounded appropriate for the time period.

Some movies contain multiple anachronisms (music/dialogue/wardrobe), and those are the ones I find the most aggravating. Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette (2006) falls into that category. Marie Antoinette reimagines its title character as a Paris Hilton-type but still takes place in 18^th century France. All of Marie Antoinette’s anachronisms are deliberate, from its 1980s rock music soundtrack to her purple Chuck Taylor hi-tops to her valley girl “Those are soooo Dubary” speech pattern.

               As far as common qualities in cinema that I dislike, the one that stands out the most to me is shaky, handheld, Friday Night Lights-style camerawork. It makes me nauseous, gives me a headache, and I don’t even like to see it used in documentaries. The only time it might be appropriate to use this technique is when you’re shooting a battle scene or explosion and even then, I would rather see something horrific be beautifully photographed in slow motion with a dolly or steadicam, with opera music playing in the background. Manipulative? Cliché? Definitely, but at least it looks nice.

              Even though I make documentaries, I try to avoid using handheld camera because it looks sloppy and distracts viewers. I use tripods whenever possible and, if I have to use handheld, any shots that are shaky do not make it into the final cut of my film. I don’t shoot period pieces because I think it is hard to do a good job on a microbudget, and if I were to shoot a period film, I would not let my artistic vision get in the way of historical accuracy.

Influences and Sources of Inspiration

The films that have been the most inspiring or influential to me are Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Meshes of an Afternoon, and Mulholland Drive. [i] Whether fiction or non-fiction, I am drawn to movies that are, for lack of a better word, weird. The weirder and more stylized, the better. I am reminded of the scene in Beetlejuice where Lydia is explaining to the ghosts why she can see them and no one else can: “Live people ignore the strange and unusual. I, myself, am strange and unusual.”

In a way, that’s what filmmaking, especially documentary filmmaking, is like for me. I like to think I can see the ghosts no one else can see, and I like to watch movies that show me the ghosts I cannot see.

Even though I didn’t see Superstar in its entirety until I was in film school, I saw snippets of it much, much earlier, in the PBS documentary Barbie Nation (1998), which my parents videotaped for my sister and me.[ii] Ever since a well-meaning relative got me my first Barbie for Christmas (which concerned my mother), Barbie has been a huge part of my life. My very first movies were Barbie movies, and I bought my first Barbie Dream House from a local independent filmmaker, who had used it in one of her movies. From a very early age, I connected Barbie with moviemaking and realized that you could buy fun things like Barbie Dream Houses if you were making movies. Right then and there, I knew that I wanted to make Barbie movies for the rest of my life.

Going back to Superstar, when I first saw pieces of it (in Barbie Nation), I didn’t know what I was seeing, but it fascinated me. Here in the middle of this documentary about Barbie, was a more sophisticated version of what I was doing—a Barbie narrative! It featured stop-motion animation, which I didn’t know the first thing about, miniature set pieces that weren’t neon pink, and sparkly costumes from another time (the 1970s)! For years, I would wonder what that movie was and where I could see it. Oddly enough, it came up in a documentary production class (taught by the same person whose Barbie Dream House I had acquired years earlier), and I finally found out the title. It was Todd Haynes’ Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987). Barbie made an occasional appearance in some of the short stop-motion narratives I made, but it had never occurred to me that she could be used in a documentary or biopic until I watched Superstar.[iii] Superstar opened up documentary filmmaking for me by making me realize that you could experiment with form and content and still make a non-fiction film. I was so inspired by Superstar that I made a stop-motion short (featuring Barbies), with occasional live action sequences, about Dennis Wilson’s alleged love affair with Charles Manson.

Another movie that inspired my Barbie stop-motion films was Robert Weine's The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), because it showed me that you can eschew realism and still tell a compelling story. When I think of Dr. Caligari, I think of the German Expressionist sets and how they are used to convey the psyche rather than be realistic-looking backdrops. Since I was using Barbies, my movies were already not going to be realistic. Trying to make elaborate, photorealistic set pieces was going to be too time-consuming. However, I could use foam core and paint and put together an entire village (in the German Expressionist style) in one sitting!

Of course, not all of my movies have been Barbie movies. In terms of movies that have inspired or influenced everything else I’ve made, I would have to cite Maya Deren’s Meshes of an Afternoon (1943) and David Lynch's Mulholland Drive (2001). Both of these films have influenced my imagery and approach. Meshes of an Afternoon is significant to me on two counts: one, it is one of the oldest experimental films I have ever seen, and two, it was made by a woman. Most of the films I admire have been made by men, so it is empowering when I see movies that have been made by other women. I still feel that women are underrepresented in the film industry, particularly as directors, and I would like to help change that. There is a cloaked character in Meshes who has a mirror for a face and glides up staircases in slow or reversed motion, which I found so unsettling that I made a movie in which all of the characters were wearing masks and dancing in slow motion.

I share David Lynch’s fondness of retro imagery, especially of 1950s Americana. The documentaries I want to make are about vanishing aspects of1950s Americana. I love how many of his films feature a lone woman singing into a microphone (Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive). She is usually lit fairly harshly, with a follow spot, and is standing against a velvet backdrop. When I made Roger and Betty, a documentary about artistic dance rollerskaters, I knew that I wanted the final scene to “look like something out of a David Lynch movie.” The final scene of Roger and Betty is the only time you see them skate a whole dance, the double-cross waltz. The scene was lit with a follow spot, and we did three takes, with three different camera placements. I layered the three takes in post and adjusted the opacity. The resulting effect is ghostly and somewhat sad—here are these athletes doing this beautiful dance for no one. I use layering a couple of times in Roger and Betty, and that was inspired by the miniature old people who come out of the box in Mulholland Drive.

So, there you have it. These are the movies I have borrowed from shamelessly throughout the years. I hope that this list is at least twice as long by the time I have finished graduate school!

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[i] Mulholland Drive is the only one of these that I saw “before” film school, and it is also the only one that I saw in a theater. At the risk of sounding pretentious, I do feel going to film school changed the way I watch movies and thus it is worth making the distinction between movies I saw before, during, and after film school. Since I am once again studying film, perhaps I should change “after” to “in-between” and film school to film schools.

[ii] I am overjoyed to learn that Barbie Nation has finally been released on DVD, and that new material has been added to the DVD, including commentary on some of the newer dolls and follow-up interviews with people featured in the film. For more info, please visit this site: http://www.bernalbeach.com/bn/synopsis.html

[iii] Superstar is not commercially available due to copyright restrictions (Todd Haynes was sued for not getting the rights to the Carpenters’ music, which he used throughout the film) and the fact that this film alleges that Richard Carpenter was homosexual. However, the resourceful viewer can find this film online.

Why I Want to Make Another Film AND What Makes a Film Great to Me

I want to make another film because I am not completely happy with the last film I made, a documentary short about artistic dance rollerskaters. As far as content goes, I was completely satisfied, but there were certain technical aspects—namely bad sound and garish lighting—that really made me want to make another film. I have never made a feature, so I worry that I will not have enough material for one.

I want to make another film because there are so many stories out there that need to be told and I want to tell them. I want to make another documentary because there are so many dying art forms that need to be documented and, in some cases, there are so few living witnesses that if I wait too long to make these films, entire chapters of history will be lost forever!

I want to make a documentary about Harry Wise, the last ghostmaster of central Florida, because he was a local guy (Sanford, FL) who practiced a now obscure art form: running “spook shows” that accompanied midnight horror movies. Spook shows were live entertainment of a scary nature that served to get the audience in the mood for the horror movie that would follow. These shows were a phenomenon between the 1950s-1970s and were led by ghostmasters with such names as Dr. Jekyl (AKA Harry Wise), Dr. Evil (AKA Phillip Morris), Chan Loo, et al. Ghostmasters performed magic tricks, such as sawing women in half, but they also performed séances and promised moviegoers a show so scary that a week’s worth of nightmares would ensue!

Two popular hallmarks of the spook show included an escaped monster running amok, grabbing people (usually women) in the crowd, and the “blackout.” The blackout was where all of the lights in the theater would shut off—sometimes this was when the monster would do his grabbing. The blackout typically signified the end of the spook show, and then the horror movie would start.

Harry Wise’s connection to the area not only means that there are people here who knew him, but, in his case, two local museums have exhibits dedicated to him. There are few, if any, scholarly resources devoted to Harry Wise or ghostmasters, so it will be vital to mine local resources for information.[1]

Unfortunately, Mr. Wise is dead (as of 2009), and although there are a couple of people in Atlanta and Detroit (and possibly a handful of other cities) who perform as ghostmasters, Harry’s story is in danger of being relegated to obscurity or, at best, local history. I don’t want that fate for him.

Ghostmasters and spook shows were part of pop-culture history—a precursor to the modern haunted house attraction—and even though modern audiences are probably too sophisticated to be entertained by dead chickens and men in gorilla suits running amok through the crowd, there is something quaint about it all.

I want to make a movie about Harry Wise, the last ghostmaster of central Florida because this is a story I feel compelled to share. This is a story I would be honored to share.

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I am a picky moviegoer—I will watch all sorts of movies, but as far as considering a movie “great,” well, very few movies make the cut. I consider a movie to be great if it is one I would watch more than once.

Some of my favorites are film school “classics”—Psycho, A Clockwork Orange, Eraserhead, but just as many (if not more) are campy. Mommie Dearest, Cry Baby, Psycho Beach Party, and Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story all come to mind. While some of these movies are technically perfect—good sound, great photography, brilliant performances, others have bad sound, ridiculous dialogue, and over-the-top performances. Yet all of these are movies I would consider great.

For me, a great movie has nothing to do with technical perfection and everything to do with the director’s voice. I don’t mean that the director literally speaks in each of these films; rather, when I watch each of these films I feel like everything in them is part of the director’s vision. Each shot, each angle, each lens is intentional. Everything down to what color nail polish a character wears is intentional. If the dialogue is bad or the performance is over-the-top, it is because the director wants you to laugh at the absurdity of the situation. If the sound is bad, it is because it was the director’s first film and the Carpenters sued him so the only copies available are bootlegs.

When I watch a film, I want to be completely absorbed. Art direction that isn’t period appropriate removes me from a film. Camera movements that seem unmotivated remove me from a film. While I realize that some art is not meant to be understood, I at least want to feel it, to forge a connection with the director. I want to know that everything in a shot has some significance. I am a control freak, so when I watch a movie, I want to be assured that everything I am seeing has been carefully engineered to suit the director’s vision. Seeing that intentionality is what makes a film great to me.

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[1] To date, I have acquired what I believe to be the three available resources devoted to Harry Wise and/or ghostmasters: two books and one DVD. One book is by local author Charlie Carlson, entitled The True Story of Magician Harry Wise, A Wizard’s Tux and Tales (Luthers, 2004). The other book is Mark Walker’s Ghostmasters: A Look Back at America’s Midnight Spook Shows (Cool Hand Communications, 1994). Rounding out the group is Monsters Crash the Pajama Party Spook Show Spectacular (Something Weird Video, 2001). In addition to having several bad horror movies on it, Monsters includes spook show radio spots, directions for setting up your own spook show, and commentary from Harry “Dr. Jekyl” Wise and Phillip “Dr. Evil” Morris. Harry Wise also performed as “Mr. Magic” on a local TV show in the 1950s, so I may be able to find footage of that.

Hello, World!

Hello, and welcome to my virtual abode! Here you will find my musings about movies, making movies, and what it means to be someone who makes movies. Although my main interest is in documentary filmmaking, I also enjoy watching fictional movies (especially stop-motion animation and claymation features) and TV shows.