REBORN

My feature script Reborn, an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's "The Thing on the Doorstep," was called a "perfect updating" by the folks at the H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival. Above, you'll find the Mike Mignola (Hellboy)-designed poster for this year. The press release is here:

http://hplfilmfestival.com/news/2008/09/19/stop-presses-may-i-have-envelope-please

More news about Broken August in a moment...

BROKEN AUGUST, first weekend

Shooting on BROKEN AUGUST began Saturday night in a Culver City parking garage and then continued for a few hours on Sunday over in Arcadia at a chiropractor's office (thanks a million, Dr. Goff!). I wish I had more time Saturday -- we got about 24 of the 34 setups I had storyboarded -- but the actors were wonderful and there's only so much you can ask of a crew that is working for nacho cheese Doritos. Everyone who came out was a trooper and we got a lot of great material. I am deeply lucky to be working with producers Eli Loghavi and Sharon Chin; they are tireless and smart and are making me look good. I hope this movie is something we can all be really proud of, even if it's the darkest thing any of us have touched.

We had been thinking we'd put Alaina in a wig for her transformation scene -- her character basically becomes another person after a tragedy is visited upon her -- but the wigs within our budget were just crap, so we went with Alaina's real hair, which is currently kick ass, anyway.

We shot 1080P, DVCProHD, on the Panasonic AG-HVX200, on two 32GB P2 cards (not tapes) from the kind folks at Moviola. Using 32GB cards was a true luxury. We shot for about a full day, all-told, and never had to download the footage on set. Two 32GB cards at 1080P uses about a gigabyte per minute, so it was super-sweet to not have to reload after every eight or sixteen minutes of footage shot, as we would have to do with smaller cards. For the record, I'd like P2 cards for Christmas, please. There are 64GB models coming out this fall.

That's all for now.

BROKEN AUGUST begins

It's all happening! Our new short film BROKEN AUGUST starts shooting today. We have a script, schedule, budget, most of our cast and most of our locations. Eli Loghavi and Sharon Chin and Gina Tucker are producing, Ilya Lyudmirsky (Bangkok) is shooting it, Kevin Manthei (Invader Zim) is writing the score, Jack Waldrip (Night Dawn Day) is editing, Martin Carrillo (Supernews!) is our sound designer/mixer and Sara Karnowski is casting it. The movie stars Alaina Huffman (Smallville), Dave Waterman (The Sarah Silverman Show), Bru Muller (Behind the Terror: A Comedy), Lisa Carnahan (Indefinitely), Kinna McInroe (Office Space), Nathan Barnatt (We All Has Problems), Kirk Dauer (Behind the Terror: A Comedy), and others yet-to-be-named. More later...

Black Winter

I was checking out this crazy new search engine called Viewzi yesterday when I came across a listing for Black Winter, the feature script I wrote for director Jesse Dylan (Kicking & Screaming, American Wedding, How High). This is the first public mention of the project, as far as I know. The listing, on Hollywood.com, described the film thusly:

"A crisis counselor plunges into an odyssey for her own survival, as she must confront her personal crises and fears amidst a strange killer in the Alaskan wilderness."

The film will be produced by Jesse Dylan, Priscilla Cohen, Sukee Chew and the production company Form.

BROKEN AUGUST

Well, who would have thought I could ignore this blog for three years? Yikes. It's not that nothing has been happening -- I'll catch you up on some of that today -- it's just that much of it is stuff that has to remain private until the movies actually become real. So far, the big movies have not yet become real. Maybe tomorrow.

May 2008 saw the release of my first DVD, the concert film VETERANS OF VOLUME: LIVE WITH EIGHT CAMERAS for the band Jucifer. It was a monumental amount of work and time-consuming beyond all belief, but I think it turned out great and no self-respecting Jucifer fan should spend a single day without owning several copies. You can check out a four-minute trailer and buy it cheap ($10 + postage) at www.JuciferDVD.com. It was professionally replicated via a glass master and the packaging is a really amazing-looking six-panel DVD digipak. Oasis Manufacturing in New York did a wonderful job with the manufacturing of it all. The DVD also features five music videos (four of which I directed since I last blogged here), a nine-minute trailer of all the band's major releases, a rock poster gallery with 60 posters from past Jucifer tours, 100 photos, five rare or unreleased studio recordings (plus mp3s of those), and more. This was the first "for sale" product I've ever put out there into the world, and it has been interesting seeing it catch on. I'm really pleased with the results so far. Hopefully there will be another DVD down the line. Actually, here's the trailer:



But that's last month's news. The new project is BROKEN AUGUST, a five-minute short film I'm making with Dirty Little Films. It's sort of the origin story of a really damaged superhero, but not really. It's about revenge: a optimistic woman (Alaina Huffman) is brutally attacked, her view of the world is completely changed, and she goes out into the night looking to find thugs and teach them a few things about right and wrong. Something like that. It's actually just the tip of the iceberg, this short. There's definitely enough story to make a feature, so we're shooting this 1080p even though 720p would probably be perfectly acceptable (and would save us a ton of drive space). We're shooting on the Panasonic AG-HVX200 (the "P2 Card" camera), going tapeless until it's time to back everything up permanently. We're recording VO tonight and hope to have a finished movie in September or October. Eli Logavi and Camelia Adibi are producing. Jack Waldrip is cutting it. Martin Carrillo is doing Sound Design. Kevin Manthei is composing the score. I'm stoked.

That's all for now. I'll blog again in 2011.