Random Inspiration 2

Been a bit since I did one of these, and thought I'd catch up on what I've been watching/reading/whatevering lately:


Yuengling.



This just finally came to Atlanta, and in time for me to go back out on the road again where it's readily available! Oh well, it'll be waiting for me when I get back. And in the meantime, I'm going to drink some of it abroad in honor of it coming to A-Town. And because there's a $15 all you can drink special at the bar down the street here in Jacksonville. Win win. But...


Trackside.



On a sad note, one of the local places I had planned on getting said beer burned down recently. I loved Trackside. They even stole a wing sauce concoction me and the missus kept asking for when we got wings there (Hot and Teriyaki. Not like it's mind blowing, but I didn't see you requesting it.) and they didn't even credit us on the menu when they added it. So close to glory! Anyways, here's hoping they rebuild better than ever (but in the same location).


La Dolce Vida.



Awesome film. Never seen it before, just bits and pieces here and there. You can really see the influence on Billy Wilder and the comedic filmmakers of the early 60's (I guess especially Blake Edwards), up to Scorsese and Woody Allen (in some regards), and even Alexander Payne in terms of pacing and absurdist situations presented in a naturalistic way. And I'm all about Marcello Mastroianni now. Fucking perfect. As I bonus, I also now get those really funny skits on SNL even more where Bill Hader does the Italian talk show host.

I totally feel like I'm playing catch up with Fellini, so I've got 8 1/2 and La Strada next. Also, and I'm just going to say this despite the risk of sounding dumb as hell, but I really like the Italians over the French. I'd kinda lumped them all together, and am not a huge fan of French New Wave, so that's the excuse I'm giving to just now discovering Fellini. Xenophobic ignorance. Sue me.


Down and Dirty Pictures & Chopper 1.





Got these both in Leeds on the New Years trip to the UK, so they're linked in that way that reading books at the same time will do. But besides that, they're basically about the same person or types of people and they tell their stories in the same way. They're anecdotal accounts of the rise of Miramax Pictures and Mark "Chopper" Read. And they're both pretty entertaining and both feel stretched like they didn't have enough material to fill a book. Chopper's got several more books, and I got the second one when I bought the first because I've just never seen them in a bookstore over here, but I'm assuming they took all of the best stories from the run to make the film because that's 80 times better than the first book. The movie is so fun and Andrew Dominick did a great job adapting the material into a cohesive story. Which reminds me:


The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.



Loved this film when it came out, but for some reason it got pushed into the back of my brain with There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men. I think it was that the script on a whole was so good, and the film was so well put together, that it felt too slick and polished. In these cases, I think I usually dismiss these films because I feel like they're not going to hold up on subsequent viewings. Like I got duped into liking them, and won't like it once that first viewing haze is gone. But I watched this film three or four times over a month recently, and loved it more each time. And the only thing that kind of kept bothering me was the weird (what I wrongfully thought was an) effect that they'd put on the edge of the frames in scenes that almost gave a shitty History Channel re-enactment feel to it. I was corrected by my DP friend that they were actually using period lenses that they had refitted to shoot on current cameras. Now that, if not in practice but in theory, is a really cool visual idea to put you in a different mindset and something I can get behind. And thus, the only thing keeping the film from achieving perfect status in my mind, was eased and forgotten away.


Coco B. Ware.



Why is HE shrugging in the picture, like "Yup. It's me, Coco B. Ware. That's all I've got."?


Evil Wezil.



This is a guy that's working on the Florida CMF tour with me. He's making music on an old Gameboy, like the giant original ones. He says he likes the challenge because he only has so many tracks to work with. And that he doesn't want to make game sounding music, but use the gaming system to make something larger sounding. Pretty cool. I just heard it today, so I haven't listened to it more than just the first pass. But it sounds awesome so far, and just thought I'd plug him. You can hear his album here, and see what you think:

http://www.last.fm/music/Evil+Wezil/Evil+Wezil

Oh, I've just been busy filming a grown man running around naked in the woods at freezing temps, you?

(Believe me, this is one time you'd thank me for including a pic of Rocky Dennis.)

Man, two months have flown by since I last posted. Damn holidays! Went to N. Ireland with Meggy to visit the Mom and spent the new year there. Really fun. I'm back on the road with CMF, and am in Florida and beyond for the duration. So, time to catch up on the blog.

We shot a new Bervis short right before I left, as it was of course left until the last minute to do so and Travis had to get butt naked in the woods while it was snowing and rainy. For those that don't know, a little back-story on Bervis. He's basically a mix between Ric Flair and Aileen Wurnos, a drifter who goes on wild adventures that I can best describe as "Duck Tales-esque". The character started as part of a comedy show that we were producing for the school television station I used to run. It ended up being really funny and the character was oddly endearing. We then put together a cartoon pitch dubbed "Bindle Yarns: Tales from the Barrel Fire" and tried our luck over at Adult Swim. It turned out pretty cool (thanks to Adam Ford and Joe Karg), and we got some interest in it.









(Art by Adam Ford)

Then months go by, and we hear nothing. Not a no or a yes, just a "Change this one thing if you want..." and then nothing else. Okay, they didn't go for it. So Travis and I re-tooled it, and started writing it for live action again. We were kind of figuring "fuck it, it'll find an audience online." We now wanted to go all out, and make it dirty as fuck since it was going online. We ended up shooting four short vignettes for it. So now we have a couple of shorts about a hobo who is dick swinging naked for most of the show's running time, and I mean full glory naked (Travis is awesome, and I can't believe half of the shit he's agreed to do for this. Amazing.) urinates openly, talks shit, and gets butt raped for an ambulance ride to the hospital. Ridiculous. And then we got word that Adult Swim was willing to take a look at it again, now that we've shot some new stuff. Pretty cool. Doubt anything will come from AS, but it's an opportunity none the less. And I kind of feel like this is so different from anything else, that it has a better opportunity despite being unshowable on t.v. We'll see.

Working on this means, unfortunately, that I also haven't even looked at that little project we shot while I was in L.A. with the still images. I'll get around to it as soon as I polish up Bervis. And I'm trying to decide if I should just post the new cut of the Agoraphobic or not. I want to send it to festivals, but want everyone to see it ASAP. I'll probably put it up soon.