Free Work

Recently I go a text from a friend telling me that the PA position I had recommended them for was not paying. That really made me mad as I was under the impression that it was and that having to be informed of it this way was rather insulting. Now, the director of this film is a friend of mine and clearly all of this is being done in the indie filmmaking world. Having been essentially raised in that culture during my time at NYU and my continued experience in seeing it after graduation (it's kind of a side-effect of living on the east coast), I am no stranger to the challenges of trying to create something with no money and can only imagine that trying to make a feature length film is 10x more difficult in that regard.

Shooting a film is hard -- especially an indie film -- it is boasts all the problems of launching a start-up with significantly less flexibility in procedure and NO immediately marketable product. Despite all that, however, it is NOT ok to advertise a PA position that will ultimately be unpaid -- and let me explain why.

The film and television industry is flooded with naive kids ripe for taking advantage of -- all just trying to get into the industry somehow. -- I used to be one of them, so I know first hand how quickly you become jaded once something legitimate comes along (and rightfully so). Generally, it's not until then that you come to realize that at the end of the day, asking a PA to work for free helps no one but yourself. Typically, asking someone to work for free comes with something for them. It is only a partially legitimate argument that you can use whatever work you did on the film for your reel and that working on this project will be a great benefit for you once the film goes somewhere. It is a shitty reason at best, but at the very least, a reason. If we look at everything realistically, the chances that your indie film will go anywhere are fairly slim. Alongside that, as a PA, the very simple question arises of "how does this in any way benefit me?". If you are making a film with the intention of profiting from it, which you are (don't give me any bullshit about artistic integrity) unless you're a moron who likes to waste money (in which case, you can afford to pay your PA's) or a nonprofit organization (in which case you should either have a legit budget or be working with a skeleton crew), it is not fair to be asking someone to sacrifice weeks to months of their time for nothing when you clearly aren't willing to do the same.

As I stated previously, your film has little chance of going anywhere and in the unlikely case that it does, no one is gonna look at the film and say "hey, that's a really great film! I think I'll look through the credits and see who the PA's are so I can hire them, because they clearly did an amazing job on this film!" Credits do NOTHING for PA's except provide minimal bragging rights in the off chance your film gets anywhere -- and even then, "yea, I was a whole crew's unpaid bitch on that production" doesn't really sound impressive.

Now, having said that, with an indie film I understand that there are always budgetary concerns, and I'm not asking that PA's be paid the full $200 a day rate (as is industry standard), nor do I expect you to pay them more than your DP or Sound mixer -- especially if they are bringing their own gear -- but I do expect them to be paid something -- anything to at least let them pay their bills (at least pay them the equivalent of minimum wage).

Comments not only welcomed, but encouraged.

You've Got a Friend in Me

Today I FINALLY saw Toy Story 3 and it was worth every penny to see it in theaters.

I can't write 3/4 of what I want to talk about here because, well, then I'd spoil the movie for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, but please please please trust me, if you have yet to see it, GO DO IT. It was phenomenal.

Having gone into this movie not quite knowing what to expect except something amazing (though I was worried that it wouldn't quite live up to the hype it was getting), I was blown away. Having developed a strong bond with these characters after seeing Toy Story 1&2, its hard to see them suffer through what they are suffering through and the story is every bit heart wrenching as it is funny, (and it gets REALLY funny).

This is a movie I would go to the theaters repeatedly to watch and then buy it on DVD as soon as it comes out, which is a huge rarity for me since I'm, well, a cheapskate. But there it is, that's my glowing review of Toy Story 3 and I think everyone should go see it.

Unproductivity

Somehow on Sunday night I had managed to keep myself too distracted to go to sleep. In fact, by the time I actually got myself to crawl into bed it was 6:00 and my dad was getting up. I had planned to go into the city and do some work, maybe meet up with some people as well, but that just didn't happen because I woke up at 1:30 and figured that it would be a waste of time and $10 since I'd have to be back home around 5 or 6 anyway so I spent the entire day until my parents got home in my room staring at my computer, although I managed to watch an old John Wayne western "B" movie called "Stolen Goods," it was rather hilarious because it was just so campy.

Aside from that movie I also watched Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Western called "Once Upon A Time in the West," which was rather entertaining, especially since I had seen the opening about 5 times throughout my time in film school but never saw the entire film. Charles Bronson was actually pretty bad ass in that film... unlike in Death Wish 2 and 3 where he's just... shooting things, which I guess in its own right is kind of bad ass. However, I'm getting off the point.

I haven't been writing or researching or doing much of anything that I should be doing and its driving me crazy because I'm frustrated at my laziness but at the same time I'm too lazy to do anything about it. Some catch-22 I got myself into, huh? I have, however, been drawing on occasion, so once I get myself to scan some stuff in I'll post them, I promise.

Some Movie Reviews

So I've realized that I haven't really posted much of anything about film recently, which is problematic because that was what this blog was supposed to be about, but recently it's taken on the role of my xanga and picked up a lot of my random bitching and moaning about how miserable the world is, so here's a return to what this blog was supposed to be related to.

Movies I've recently seen:

District 9
The Spirit
9

District 9:
I was sort of apathetic about district 9 because on one side it was way too hyped up but on the other hand it was difficult for me to tune out the rage of my friend who sat next to me and absolutely hated the film. Personally I liked the style and cinematography and hell, the concept was great for me too but the characters were difficult to relate to and therefore everything that happened seemed rather distant and unaffecting. I believe the solution to that issue would be to make the main character less of an ass/less selfish. (everything that motivates him up until the last 5-10 minutes is entirely for his own benefit.

The Spirit
I went into this one expecting a serious attempt at Will Eisner's "The Spirit" and the film noir genre, I shouldn't have. This was clearly one of those movies that recognized how bad it was and just went with it, from Samuel L. Jackson as The Octopus smashing a toilet over The Spirit's head (and indeed trapping him in the bowl) to the endless supply of clone flunkies that seem to enjoy dying. This is in no way an angry attempt at making fun of the film, to me it just honestly read as that.

9
I was really excited for this movie, especially when I saw the trailer and even more so when I saw the short it was based off of. After all the hype in my mind I thought it was only ok though, which was disappointing. I think the characters could have been developed more (I don't really know anything about anyone) and that's the film's greatest flaw. I don't feel anything when great adversity is overcome and I don't feel anything when failure falls upon our group of heroes either. There are pluses though, I thought the animation was amazing, backgrounds and character designs breathtaking and the craft in terms of movement, spot on, but at the end of it all the story didn't quite hold up entirely for me. I might just have to watch it again, but yea, it didn't do it for me.


Ok, so that's my return to movies and stuff, hopefully soon I'll have something of my own to show and critique so I'm not just criticizing other people's stuff.

Helping Others as a Means of Procrastination

Today, despite it being one of the few prescious days of the week where I can grab a few hours to edit my long-overdue films, I skipped out on any work of that sort and helped my curly red-haired jewish long-time collaborator since freshmen year friend move from his apartment on Sullivan between Prince and Spring St.'s around the corner (or rather, through a playground) to an apartment probably in the same place as his old apartment, just on a parallel street (Thompson Street between Prince and Spring.)

Of course, this is a very good friend of mine, one who I've collaborated with... well, I guess I said that already... but anyway, I think I tend to find myself in these kinds of situations a lot (although, this one, more than any others, NEEDED to be done, I swear!) where I use opportunities to help my friends as a means of procrastination, but the kind of procrastination where I don't feel guilty. Basically, I think it goes something like this: When I procrastinate by playing games or watching something useless I eventually feel bad and beat myself up about not having done any work and in a sense, even if it's only momentarily, motivate myself to do some sort of work. However, in situations like this, I can procrastinate and not feel guilty because, well, I'm working, and it's not like I can argue with that.

This kind of thing doesn't just happen with helping someone move but comes down to working on too many productions too, or volunteering my time for too many things. I remember being told by my screenwriting teacher that I need to be selfish about my time, to reserve time for writing (and this applies to other things such as editing too) and to hold onto it tightly. I don't think I'm very good at being greedy, but I guess I should start to work on that in these areas if I ever want to complete something of my own.

In other news, I think my attention span is quickly becoming shorter and it's getting annoying. I really need to find some sort of solution to that problem.

Hollywood Chinese

So Saturday I sat around and watched a bunch of movies. Naturally I get into movie watching AFTER film school (go figure). This is interesting because, and yes, I will take the time to digress and talk about this because it's important, but yea, anyway, I was never really THAT into watching movies, the experience of going to a theater was something I rarely got to experience as a kid and not really captivating in and of itself anyway. Going to the movies was expensive and a pain since my parents would have to take me to them and I had no friends to go with anyway. As I told many of my friends at NYU; I enjoy making films a lot more than watching them... it's kind of that way with sports too. I'm never one to be a spectator, my attention span won't allow for it, I want to get in there and get involved. So even when I had movies at home or in college when people would ask me if I wanted to see a movie I'd be kinda hesitant about it and suggest doing something else.

Despite all that, recently I've been finding myself more interested in actually watching the movies I've bought. I don't know if its the boredom or the fact that I'd rather not look at the pitiful script that I'm writing and thinking about my own uncompleted films just makes me depressed, but I've been watching about a movie a night, if not more.

This is relevant because recently I've sat down and watched Hollywood Chinese, which I got from my internship a while back. I found this production, for some reason, rather inspiring. It was one of those rare moments where I felt really motivated to get up and make something great. Naturally, this feeling faded within the hour and I popped in a new movie to watch. I don't know what it was exactly that got me excited, maybe it was this notion that others out there are making films about something that I could really relate to, but I was riled up, riled up enough to get a decent enough amount of faith back in my own film, which I shot this past year.

Its easy to lose faith in your project, easy to lose heart and become unmotivated. However, after looking at Hollywood Chinese, as well as all my dailies, I felt really motivated to work on my project and I hope this motivation lasts.

Another thing about my film. I've made decent progress with it so far in the editing room... maybe once I finish a rough cut I'll cut a trailer and post it up here.