Monty Python All Things Dull And Ugly

Have to admit this parody of All Things Bright and Beautiful is perhaps the smartest and most pointed re-wording of a song.  Despite not being an atheist myself, I've got to respect the ZING here.

The fact is that I remember these lyrics and have long forgotten the religious original.

Directors Getting it Right or Being "Loose"

A benevolent dictatorship is how I have heard people describe movie-directing. It might be out of fashion, but I like that way of looking at it. I envy the Farrelly Brothers telling their crew at the start of Dumb and Dumber, “Hey, we don’t know anything about filmmaking so we are counting on you to save our asses.” Very disarming. Peter Farrally has said that if you come off like you think you are Stanley Kubrick the crew will make your life hell. I don’t know how true that is. But if I believe in being fair and up front I think it is essential to say that especially when doing a low budget movie the ethic of preparation makes sense and respects everyone’s time. Roger Corman liked storyboards. The sleepless nights and the anticipation of directing a movie would not be worth my time and I wold have no clue as to the final result without being high maintenance or at least specific about certain things, namely the frame and the cut. The myth of “coverage” is that as long as you “got” the content on one camera, you can cut to that wide shot as a bandage if anything else doesn’t work. There is nothing wrong with wide shot, over, close-up, over, close-up for the whole scene, except that you are stuck in the mentality of recording a stage play. It is fine to give the actors a running start, but I likely already know what segment of a scene will be shown from which view. Each beat within a scene might have its own best angle. I may also work “joins” into the scene where I know that in this or that motion the edit has to occur. That might make life tedious for the editor, and if that is a deal breaker he or she must have the opportunity to beg off the production so that someone more amenable can come in and accept direction. I know from past experience that it will eat away at me if I have found the best way to present something and – for example on a student film – it isn’t followed and there is no way to correct the problem. Coppola has said that the reputation of a director as “dictatorial” can come from the tendency of an experienced crew to have such a routine and to know so many variations of how something is usually approached that they want to do things by rote. The more vision and preparation the director has, the more this machine will seem to be impeded by specifics. But I expect that a good cinematographer appreciates time being properly budgeted and a day being planned. One can spend all morning tying to get an all-purpose master shot done and close-ups where there is a best performance and no flubs and ultimately have a dull scene. The audience may feel the generic shots intercut the way they might feel a live multi-camera interview. Those set-ups might provide a hiding place for a director’s entire career. Contrary to what I was recently told in a workshop, I would not equate this with every shot being “coverage” after you record a wide shot from the hills looking down at a traffic intersection. That bump might only be good for one early establishing shot or a reveal, but it is where the “master” concept breaks down because the rhythm of the scene will be made in specific shots and specific cuts. A director might claim, “I can do fancy shots but I find them distracting” reveals by the broad use of the term “fancy” an indiscriminate attitude about the use of cinema tools. I do not love bullets and guns, so I would not justify a loving slow-mo or digital shot which tracks a bullet. But there might be a story-relevant instance where that information is important, namely a shot in the TV series Fargo which follows a piece of buckshot from a shotgun, through a cop, and into the hand of an antagonist, and its resulting infection. Had that shot played as is the first time the scene ran, it would have felt showy and fancy but as a subjective recap or flashback, it was a strong use of modern digital technology. Some people include crane shots for “production value” even though they usually ruin the rhythm and flow of a rom-com and often get cut out. So if you can’t imagine spending half an hour or even ten minutes storyboarding that and reflecting on why the crane shot needs to be there, it might not be worth a morning on the clock shooting it. In High Noon, I often mention Gary Cooper stepping into the street of Dodge to find himself alone and the camera craning up to look down at him and establish how he feels – abandoned and small. That is historically perhaps the single best use of a crane shot. If it feels integral to the inner life of a character or to the story, it will be rendered somewhat invisible because it plays as content. What if in a dialogue scene, two people meeting in a coffee shop, the talking heads and the words they say were not the only content? What if the way they are framed and the bustle of crow around them also had to be considered content? Then the director would be tested. Of course, the behavior of extras and their timing and the assistant directors managing them will play a part. The cinematographer will want to know the workload for the day or the morning, so the preparation should be outside of your head. What if this dialogue scene was going to be what your next job prospects hinged upon? Is it then enough to just get along with people (which does matter) and get a job done as opposed to THE job done? The actors will also want to know that they are not playing their hearts out for nothing. I have acted and worked on sets where there seemed to be no light at the end of the tunnel and where I have lost faith in the idea that there is a plan or anything special going on. I’d usually keep it to myself, but I have a feeling smoke might be seen coming out of my ears. It is usually the non-storyboarding director who will create this unease. Better to have a plan that is not 100% followed than to say that because they won’t get 100% done there is no need for a plan. Fail to plan, plan to fail. Some writers don’t mind taking full screenplay credit even when others have made substantial contributions of even more than 50%. Some directors feel comfortable letting the crew “do their job.” Which is likely fine and healthy. If the cinematographer’s job ends up incorporating decisions that should be part of the director’s work – like deciding what the angles will be or literally calling the shots – it is less because this director cares so deeply about the actors than that he or she just looks at the camera’s job as something to “cover” the action and not be part of the action and part of the whole performance. When a live person sits from an audience watching a play, the brain creates cuts and close-ups and zeros in on what it must. A camera covering this from the same position does not. In a movie, the camera and the cut hold the sensibility of the audience and either jerks them around or carefully crafts a journey and a way to perceive the events and it should feel even more like we are there and involved than the objective audience in a live theater. Sometimes I care so much about this that it freezes me. I know people generally fuse director and producer, and that even though these are two very different disciplines the director’s ability to get across the proper message and feel is reliant somewhat on production value. I rue every compromise I have made in the past, and each time I was too relaxed or trusted too much. If I ask to see a shot or a take or a cut a certain way I NEED to see that first, before any other options are presented. Some people may test the role of director and feel somebody else gets the last say, but it is a long journey and when the omission of one bit or the addition of an other in the alchemy of good cinema it can be as different as the temperature between light and shadow on the moon. I like my work, for example, to have a prickly edge that others will file off. It may travel better if it is very smooth and offends nobody, but there is no shortage of that kind of thing. So it is especially vital that people know a plan is on track and a screenplay will remain much as it was when they said yes let’s make this. A storyboard is much like a script as well, especially if the movie is not a rom-com or talking heads. Even in that case, new approaches to a less director-friendly genre can make them interesting, and create problems that can be fun to solve. Sometimes I am willing to let someone else direct a script until I sit down and storyboard it. Then my appetite to direct it returns. I mean, you can and certainly want to be friendly and keep the actors relaxed so they can make mistakes or try things you might not use, but in terms of allocating time to get the shots and managing the crew I would rather run a tight ship than a loose one. And that might just be something that is understood in advance. I know that's the way I prefer it when I am being directed or when I am on a crew. We don't need more directors or fewer directors from any social stripe - except those who are both talented and organized. The field is crowded. In film school, it's difficult to put your foot down. But anywhere, anyone would expect common sense and communication. If a take is chosen, it's not asking much to use that one in the edit. If a zoom-out should stop on the shoulders, it is astounding if it ended up going to the full body and becoming a heartbreaking "wrong" shot that might mean re-do.

Taxi Driver Audio Commentary (Director & Writer)

The Day After (1983) - Director's Commentary

The Fly Audio Commentary

The Silence of the Lambs (1991) - Criterion Audio Commentary

2001: A Space Odyssey Audio Commentary

Starting Movie Co-ops

Badness

http://oitnb.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/111.jpg Finished watching Season 2 of Orange is the New Black. Every now and then what is in the zeitgeist filters into their dialogue. One example that struck me was a woman talking about her marriage being too tame or nice guys negating the “fear” of romantic or sexual engagement. She says that fear is an essential ingredient in her passion, whether it is fear of discovery or danger projected onto the male or partner. This is an idea that has been pushed aside by the blogger culture and those who might compulsively post links on Facebook. One recent post I’ve read asked men to ensure that they project a non-threatening presence when approaching or sharing an elevator with a woman, to engage her to diffuse tension, all of which sounded contradictory to me and overly self-conscious. Much is being said about something called “rape-culture.” This appears to be in bizarre tandem with compulsive use of the term “slut-shaming.” Shame in general is considered uncool, just as perhaps shyness may be considered repression. One – perhaps unrelated – line I appreciated on Orange was, “That stuff about don’t snitch was probably made up by someone who needed to be snitched on.” The concepts of loyalty are especially transparent for their contrivance in a prison setting, where loyalty to a psycho or a criminal is especially absurd and most likely one-sided at best. There are conceits in life that are exposed as false when placed into a dramatic structure. If we talk about cracking down on bullying, are we pouncing on the kid who throws a punch or the person who badgers him/her verbally leading up to that? And are social dynamics in school part of a set of trials we have to go through, or should schools micro-manage kids to make sure they have to make a show of including each other? Is it naive? Is it necessary for a child to identify his or her sexual identity as soon as possible and then be loud-and-proud of this through High School to test the system, or is it okay for kids to feel the slings and arrows of adolescence and rejection that everyone pretty much has to go through? Later in life, the reality is that many people put on whatever mask is necessary to get a job or to rent an apartment or make their way and package or market whatever goals they have. The same with marketing – instinctively – whether a girl is in control of her image or a boy is in control of his. One axiom going around is, “It’s none of your business what people think of you.” That seems like a head-in-the-sand mentality. Of course it matters. A girl might want to project a conservative image and if asked how many guys she has been with she may say skew her number lower than reality, while a guy being asked how many girls he has been with might skew his number higher than reality. This has been true for a long time, and might be the product of generations of frontier societies where a woman’s future was presumed to be either wife or prostitute. But regardless of its origin and its compatibility with modern society, people are still working the numbers that way. Thoughtful men don’t want to be jerks on-line and to be the target of lectures, so they will likely avoid playing devils advocate or offering the dissenting opinion when it comes to the assertion that equality means embracing all and pretending that we have no preference between a completely independent woman with hundreds of lovers or someone focused more on one person who may be content and less restless in a relationship. I mean if you throw out the idea of marriage or monogamy, then it is easier to be accepting of this trend. But if you don’t want a relationship based on a lie, eagerness and enjoyment of sex may not increase in a woman with the number of lovers she has nor necessarily will her confidence; a boy or man’s confidence will increase with the number of women he has had sex with, however, and this confidence does have more value to a woman than a man’s genteel or shy or repressed virginal image. Even his full dedication and devotion to her will not be ultimately what keeps the fire burning. This brings us back to the line in Orange about fear and now the nice guy or the tame husband routine is not going to hold her interest. There is an axiom that goes or may as well go, “Talking about sex is like dancing about architecture.” I’m seeing links to a lot of talk about what must be done to regulate “rape culture” and to get rid of the word “slut” while still making use of the neo-feminist-blog term “slut-shaming.” This all ends up in a context where every guy from Marc Lepine in 1989 to Elliot Rodgers who have done something horrible gets knighted as the poster boy for the ostensibly heterosexual male population. While I acknowledge that everyone has an opinion, I don’t respect every damn one in the sense of admiration. So I won’t throw around the word respect. There may be well-meaning bloggers and fans of these but most of what I see is just self-serving propaganda, and not even ideas to be contemplated and weighted but matter-of-fact-sounding babble that makes me nostalgic for Andrew Dice Clay being accused of isms and phobias. The culture is so used to being placated, for marketing or seduction purposes, that a person looks ten times colder and meaner by offering a dissenting opinion. Speech or conversation is inherently political. We make choices, either off the cuff or carefully considered. Therefore, what we say can be judged. What people feel, as instinctive reaction or attraction or repulsion, is not a choice and can’t reasonably be judged. But here’s where it gets mechanical and our flesh and blood humanity is turned into data and digitized and categorized until mere admission of taste calls for punishment or shunning. I’ve seen it too often, the artificial camps that pop up. Someone jabs two fingers at your eyes and if your reflexes are healthy you evade impact, and then your tormentor punches you twice in the shoulder, “Two for flinching.” There are many forced-answer questions out there, opinions or platforms we are supposed to pay lip service to, many of which are nicey-nice lies. In one’s forties, a conversation about whether high school girls call each other slut is exasperating. In my old Catholic high school, the girls pretty much did what they did. People are going to want to prop up their own stock market value. Whatever they have, that’s what you need in order to be cool. Pretty basic. But that is at the heart of bullying – status. If someone asks a guy at any age whether he finds a set of attributes or characteristics attractive, it is academic what the truth is. A woman might prefer a man with confidence, and might not care that some of it comes from his “score” with women; after all, it is part in parcel. She might find power attractive or his status, so if she ends up dating her boss maybe it’s not coercion or harassment but just mutual attraction. I’ve seen some exciting women with much older guys and appearing to be happy. Men are not especially attracted to the power or status of a woman. Those things are incidental and may even pose a challenge to his own ego and how he is perceived with her. As for external beauty, there is an expectation that a woman will lose appeal to a younger lover when she ages. If a man finds success later in life, in his forties or beyond, he might not be seeking out someone who merely remembers the same era of music videos but someone who has a physical draw and someone he expects to maintain interest in as a monogamous mate for decades ahead. He could compromise and lie to himself and to whoever he is with, because that is the politically correct thing to do. Imagine living to satisfy TMZ or the local gossip with who you are marrying, since they are not the people who have to sleep with her and wake with her. The opinion of the community therefore is useless. It may read as cruel to point out what should be obvious. What we know is there under the surface. I struggle with weight, so I don’t expect petite angels to fall at my feet. But I don’t want to register for any kind of dating service either and write in my weight when I know how it reads to me and when I historically feel no obligation to play couple with someone merely because we have the same size waistline. When that bubble bursts it will be a mess. I don’t feel the driving need enough to have someone fill the position of girlfriend for me to “learn to love” someone I might only have empathy for. But again all of that is noise, brain chatter that is like the pentagon shape of thought coming to terms with unpleasant reality – the finger turning in a circular motion beside your head indicating crazy. There is the effort to make the world better, even the will to do your part, and openness to ideas, but also against the tide of your own identity. We observe our own personal reactions and this can be much like observing characteristics of others and yet it will be judged if only because it has been perverted into language because words are often choices – truth can be rude or unkind. Maybe those of us who would rather talk about movies or sport statistics know more than they are being credited. Sometimes there is no point in openly pulling something apart until it shapes into the right comforting lie or over-simplification.

Why I'm Anti-Feminist and why Feminism does NOT equal equality

Had to share this in my blog. Not a fan of abortion, but I agree with much of what you said. "Slut-shaming" seems like a perfect term for this era being raised on advertisements and pandering. When people cross the street, I hear them complain that bikes and cars don't watch or abide the lights consistently, and yet the complainer persists in failing to LOOK BOTH WAYS before crossing, as he/she learned as a child. They see the green light and care only that it is their RIGHT to cross the street. Some drive defensively and avoid daydreamers and accidents; we also have to walk and live defensively. It is crazy to blame a rape on what someone is wearing, because responsibility lies with the rapist - or under the rapist - who in turn is expected to read rape-shaming blogs and tweets and socially responsible Facebook updates and learn to be a non-rapist. If I equate the aggressor with an animal - a predator - the answer from a "feminist male" will be, "Well I sure don't feel the impulse to rape when a woman is dressed sexy." That's because he is not the dangerous offender we are talking about. Bono sang, "I don't believe in forced entry / I don't believe in rape / but every time she passes by wild thoughts escape." I was once with my nephew at a hotel pool and my mother quietly made an observation that "girls today have no modesty" because there were girls anywhere from tween to 16 flaunting bodies and tattoos that cause an adult to turn his head and then blush and flinch away. The fashion industry has no problem photographing them and sexualizing them.



Some refreshing arguments, well put forth.  Had to share this, even if there are

sub-issues with which I disagree.  Not that anyone is asking.  I'm no fan of

abortion, legal or illegal.  That is to say that I don't respect it, and the rush to

whitewash it as a way to feel good about having done it I do not respect.

The fertilized human embryo with 46 chromosomes, begins a process that may

end 100 years later, that of a growing and aging human being.  It may be

spun as the same as a (23 chromosome) sperm, but THAT can be called a

belief, just as "the baby becomes quick at birth" is a belief.  Gestation being

a stage of human life is not a matter of belief nor of opinion.

  ----------------------------------

That aside, I like this woman's willingness to challenge the popular opinion

of her peer group.  I personally think that in theory feminism is a good thing,

in the sense that equality is a good thing.  Equal freedom and responsibility,

as well as equal treatment and accountability are vital.  If that - in practice -

is officially part of feminism, then there is no problem.  Otherwise, the word

seems arcane.