The Clones

So, it was my friend’s birthday today, and for the last week I’ve been working on a film for him. This is the end result! Nothing like a sleepover with Angela: we write a script till 4am, while watching the inspirational and most subscribed individual on youtube, Nigahiga. Then, we join up with what resembles an Asian boy band to make the script come to life on film. Bring on the caffeine highs and lack of sleep!

Film Review #2: Ip Man

Ip Man (2008)

Director: Yip Wai-Shun

Starring: Donnie Yen, Simon Yam, Xiong Dai Lin

Language: Cantonese

I’d heard whispers of how good this movie was, and my expectations soared. I was afraid they might have been too high, but Ip Man proved its worth and honoured those expectations.

About Master Ip, the Kung Fu master who taught Bruce Lee, this movie is filled with dazzling action sequences that my martial artist friend tells me are quite realistic. Unlike similar films, which rely on strings to amaze you, the Wing-Chun in Ip Man is mind-blowing for its simplicity and strength up against other forms of Kung Fu fighting.

Master Ip is a highly respected figure in Foshan, China, being the only undefeated martial arts master. However, he refuses to take on pupils, so he can spend more time with his family. He is able to avoid opening up a school, until the Japanese invade in the late 1930s, forcing him out of his own house and into abject poverty. In order for the Chinese to defend themselves against the Japanese army and powerful robbers, Ip Man shares the art of Wing-Chun with them.

The story, though nothing new, is potent and inspiring. There are some dull moments, and unsatisfying pieces of characterization (though I wonder if it was just bad subtitles), but that doesn’t stop your heart from soaring at the end.  It will make you want to learn the secrets of Wing-Chun, and see the sequel.

A solid 4 stars **** from me!

A Student Film-maker’s Top 10 Loves

1 )  Creative brainstorming – nothing like throwing ideas around with talented people till the wee hours of the morning. Totally inspiring!

2 )    Caffeine – elixir from the gods

3 )    Celtx – a scriptwriting programme that works… and it’s free!!

4 )    Free equipment hire – that’s why we go to university.

5 ) Youtube – cures the long hours of editing, helps you share your creativity and inspires it.

6 )    HD 16:9 – it’s a magic combination

7 )    MAC/ After Effects – need I say more?

8 )    Good catering – makes the actors happy and everyone else less cranky. Hmm, food. =P

9 )    Flexibility – the best character trait to have in the film world, because what can go wrong probably will go wrong and people are unpredictable creatures.  Bless people who go with the flow.

10 ) Innovation – those who think outside the box and work within the budget are freaking amazing! Homemade steady cams and SFX come to mind.

A Student Film-Maker’s Top 10 Pet Hates

1)    Cinepak – ridiculous format you can render a film in that makes it pixelated, slow and otherwise grotesque. Whoever made this format is clearly insane…

2)    The storm cloud – this double allegorical creature comes in two forms. a) An actual storm cloud appearing when the weatherman said it would be perfectly sunny all day for your essential outdoor shoot. Moron. b) The person on your team who “leaves it in your capable hands” for a few hours, then comes back and rips apart everything you just did in that timeframe.

3)   Lens fluff – your D.O.P forgot to clean the lens and now you have lovely splodges ALL over your footage.

4)    AWOL actors/ crewmen – so you have your whole cast /crew all rearing and ready to go, but then someone (or a few someones) don’t show up (probably because they aren’t getting paid).  It’s sometimes easy to adapt, but other times you have no one to hold the boom or say a pivotal line.  Damn non-commitment.

5)    Disorganized producers – this is certainly pretty common amongst students. Do they not know who to call, or did they just forget? Where’s the food? Who’s coming and when? Where are the location releases? Endless holes to fix.

6) PCs – they crash, freeze and take forever to render. They are also non-compatible with many wonderful MAC programmes. Damn your Error 404s and FAT 32s. We only buy you cause you’re cheap.

7) Logging – quite possibly the most mind-numbingly boring job in the universe.

8 ) Cabin fever – everyone goes a little bit crazy cooped up in a room during post-production. Those fits of delirium mean break time.

9) CRAP sound – nightmare

10) Pick-ups – No, we can’t fix it in post. Filming take 2.

BORN OF HOPE

Wow, this film was extremely impressive. Take a young actress with 25,000 pounds to spare and TA DA! You have all the indie film-makers in the world totally reeling by the achievement!

Born of Hope is a prequel to the Lord of the Rings. It recounts the story of Aragorn’s family and how he came to be living with the elves of Rivendell. It is most exciting that a film like this can be such high quality for less than the cost it took to feed the crew breakfast during the making of Lord of the Rings!

Born of Hope is A HOPE for people who have daring desires to make an impact on the film industry, but do not think they have it in or around them to do so. This woman, Kate Madison, is truly an inspiration for us and has crafted a piece of art out of a simple passion for Tolkien’s work.

Watch it! Be inspired. If you are not a film maker, simply enjoy how inventive people can be.

Procrastination

Scriptwriting, like any sort of writing, can be very hard to get into. First, you suffer writers block, then procrastination, and then finally, the whip comes out: forcing yourself to soldier on. Once you do this, and get into it, the art can become quite enjoyable. Yet at the moment, I’m still hovering between procrastination and the whip.

On my procrastination adventures, I have discovered more Foamy the Squirrel. For those of you who do not know who foamy is:

So yes, he is an outspoken, opinionated, foul-mouthed little squirrel, but I absolutely love non- politically correct humour. It relieves the stress of University, where they tell you that you have free speech, only to mark you down for not being PC enough. Right.

So, back to the grind for me. Not much of the post, but i didn’t want to go another week without updating.

Hong Kong Dreaming

You know what I really love? Hong Kong films!! No, not those silly b-movies with bad dubbing and outlandish martial arts. I’m talking quality here They are so good that Hollywood steals their plots and adapts them for westerners who can’t be bothered with subtitles. (You know how lazy that is? You’re missing out on sooo much!) Case in point:

You probably know this story as The Departed by Martin Scorcese. Yet Infernal Affairs is more awesome, and a whole trilogy of awesomeness at that!

So anyway, back on track. There are a few HK films I think everyone should watch. One is the Chungking Express (1994)

This is just a beautiful piece of art from start to finish. The cinematography is clever and the stories of two completely different couples are highly enjoyable.

Another is the insanely addictive and clever, Mad Detective (2008)

I watched this twice in the same week, it was THAT good! It was clearly remarkably simple to put together, but the story is wildly complex with many different layers and interpretations. It had me hooked from start to finish with its wacky humour and absorbing characters.

Anyway, those are just a few films I’ve highlighted to you. The thing I love about Hong Kong cinema is its simplicity coupled with depth. The directors don’t use wild special effects or impossible camera angles to create their movies, but use the K.I.S.S principle to absorb you into their cinematic worlds. I reckon their smaller budget has caused them to be inventive and more original. This makes it refreshing and inspiring to watch.

I suggest you discover a good HK flick sometime. Try something new. I doubt you will be disappointed.

Film Review #1: Repo! The Genetic Opera

Film: Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)

Director: Darren Lynn Bousman

Starring: Alexa Vega, Anthony Stewart Head, Sarah Brightman, Paris Hilton

With a name like Repo! The Genetic Opera, you know this film is going to be quirky. I have to say, I personally had NO idea what to expect when I saw this film, nor had I heard of it before my friend began raving about it and humming the soundtrack to me. Yet even if I had, this visual feast of zaniness is not like anything I’ve ever seen before.

Starring former Spy Kid, Alexa Vega, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Anthony Stewart Head, Repo! is set in a future where good organs are hard to come by and plastic surgery is the new thing. A repo is someone who repossesses organs when a poor sod misses a payment ( and yes, it is wonderfully disturbing as they do it Sweeny Todd style). If that wasn’t freaky enough, junkies who are addicted to the post-surgery painkillers also abound in this reality, harvesting their drugs from dead bodies. Oh yeah, did I mention the director did some of the Saw films? It’s gross.

Repo! is a dark story, yet kind of hard to take seriously. There is plenty of music, singing, outlandish costumes and unusual dance sequences making the atmosphere extremely surreal, which is only accentuated by casting the talentless Paris Hilton, who no body takes seriously in reality anyway.

I’d say this film only fails on a few accounts. The first is allowing Paris to sing, the second is having a cringeworthy emo rock starlet sequence, and the third is remaining a little too surreal and distanced from reality. It makes it hard to identify with the characters and story.

However, there is plenty to get excited about in this non-conformist extravaganza. Sarah Brightman is truly wonderful as a washed out diva and Anthony Steward Head is an inspired piece of casting. The musical numbers will get stuck in your head for days, and inspire you to be that creative with your own writing, composing or film-making.

Although not for the average movie-goer, if you enjoy something truly different and artistic, this film should be on your must see list. THREE and a half truly deserved stars out of FIVE big ones.

Theatrical Trailer

Suckers!

So I’m walking through the mall expecting the usual Christmas fever. You know, the ‘pa rum pum pum pum’ and ‘come bring us some figgy pudding’ (which, for the record, has not been present at any Christmases I’ve celebrated, so I fail to see why you’d want to sing about it?). Yet the biggest fever at the moment? “New moon! Twilight! Edward!” … Right.

So instead of celebrating the birth of Christ, Yuletide, family, togetherness, maybe just a bit of indigestion… its vampires? But wait, not just any Buffy the Vampire slaying vampires! That is so old school. Rather, it is the most pasty pale nerd available, who happens to have some romantic impulses and pointy teeth. There are DVDs, books, posters, t-shirts, websites, adverts… all with his face on them. And they are EVERYWHERE! Those marketing people are relentless.

What do I want for Christmas? Definitely NOT anything to do with Stephenie Meyer’s creations. I’d like to watch some decent, good flicks this summer, and not teenage, soppy clap trap.

Furthermore, I do not hate Bella for dating Edward. She is welcome to him. Please keep him…and FAR AWAY from my Christmas. Go back to Halloween where you came from, suckers!

For your amusement: Twilight Trailer Spoof

Render, Render, Render

Ah, word press. One wonders how I got here? LiveJournal, xanga, blogger… they all ended before the fourth post. It will be a miracle if I make it to number five on this one! But hey, I believe in miracles, so let’s get going!

So this blog is about my film work mainly, and any other imaginative, filmy/creative things that pop into my mind, so here goes!

I just completed a little DVD for the after school childcare I work for. I don’t believe I’ve laughed so much while editing a movie before. From the boys who claim to ‘shoot people with their guns”, while displaying their extremely nifty Lego rifles, to the little girl who shyly admits ‘ I like to do homework’, there is just oodles of cuteness thrown into this piece of work. Of course, the boys who shoot each other with Lego guns usually end up smashing them on the floor and sitting in the naughty spot, whilst the girl usually insists she doesn’t have any homework to do, and makes a big scene if I peer inside her bag to make sure. Ah, the joys of little kids. Their lack of inhibitions, however, usually makes up for their lack of focus when it comes to filmmaking.

Now that the university year is over, and exam results are out, I feel as though I can breathe again. I possibly need a proper break this week, as last week was spent sitting at this very laptop repeating the usual Final Cut Express steps of ‘in’, ‘out’, ‘select’, ‘crop’ and the satisfying ‘render,render, render’.  In fact, I literally say ‘render, render, render’ as I make my coffee

‘render, render, render’ while I check Facebook

‘render, render, render’ while I watch the fourth season of Bones

‘render, render, render’ while I eat my toast (which accounts for my crummy keyboard…thank goodness for MAC keyboard covers!)

Well, you get the picture. 60% + of a film is done at a computer, so one needs to be entertained somehow. Talking to your computer and then answering back for it is one way to do this: ‘Work damn you’, ‘I don’t want to work today, I’d rather freeze in the middle of upload’, ‘ ARGH! What do you mean there is no space!? There is 5 GBs of it!! At least!’ ‘but I feel cluttered…’

You know you are going kooky if your laptop actually gets a personality of its own and talks back. Especially your MAC, because we all know Windows has multiple possessed personalities, so it naturally talks back in a demonic, undecipherable language: ‘FAT 32′ or ‘Error 404′ perhaps? Maybe it even lies by saying ‘loading’, takes half an hour about it, then crashes just before it reaches 100%. Goody…

So, about that break…I think it should start by finishing off this triumphant, first blog post.

As my lovely buddies like to sign their e-mails:

Film love xx