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.