The Theatrical Experience pt 2

Scott from Three Fingers Hold the Pen commented on my post about experiencing movies on the Big screen. Here's what he had to say:

Well,duh!
Been preaching this for years.
These things are MEANT to be seen big.
I caught the Director's cut of Das Boot in LA that same year while working for Disney. Un-believable.
How did they get those dolly shots of the guys running down the length of the sub?
Went to every screening I could manage.
Saw Ben Hur one night at the Egyptian. Twenty Thousand Leagues at the El Capitan.
Actual Technicolor prints!
Lawrence of Arabia at the Cinerama Dome.
But the best was 25 years ago - a superb print of Midsummer Night's Dream, the old 39 version from Warner Bros, in one of the great grand old movie palaces...suddenly understood what it must have been like to go to the movies back then and why it was such a big deal and why The Movies became the Thing we revere today.
It is interesting how apple etc. can make a big sell out of movies that are meant to be seen big, on tiny screens( ipod, iphone, etc.) What is the attraction of Youtube? We (or rather those who don't know better) are being sold a bill of goods!

The problem with television and more so with video on Ipod and youtube is that we've altered the visual style of filmmaking to accommodate the smaller screen. If you look at the change in films in the last thirty years you'll notice that we've gotten closer and closer to the face. Scenes are designed more and more where we cut between closeups. Establishing shots have been truncated and the camera has studied the actors faces at close range. The size of the television and the advent of home video made filmmakers reconsider their visual style so it would have impact on the smaller, lower resolution screen. The internet compounds this with low resolution images that are often less than four inches wide.

What this amounts to is removing cinematic storytelling and makes us rely even more on talking heads. A contrasting example of this is the popular 1988 action classic 'Die Hard'. Pay attention to the lack of closeups in the film - it was designed for the theatre. The majority of the close ups in the film are from stomach to head where now we see the top of shoulders to the top of the head or closer. This is also due to the modern editing equipment where editors got used to looking at the images on small broadcast monitors which fool you into feeling that there isn't enough detail. With digital editing, you are much less inclined to take your workprint and project it in a theatre. Walter Murch understood this and he would place a size comparison by his monitor so he would always be aware of the theatrical exhibition.

High definition television has been a terrific invention and is starting to reverse some of these visual trends. With its much higher resolution it has allowed television filmmakers to think more cinematically. Just look at many of these new shows that look and feel much more like movies than traditional television - '24', 'Lost', 'Breaking Bad', 'Deadwood', etc. Even situation comedies like 'Malcolm in the Middle' got rid of the staged, three camera setup and replaced it with a single camera, four wall design.

Still, theatrical exhibition is the most powerful way to see a motion picture. It's too bad that the theatre exhibitors and studios are so paranoid about losing the market they are pushing carnival tricks like 3D movies. The filmmakers need to worry less about these quaint technical solutions and focus more on getting back to more cinemactic visual design - to experiment more and most of all, tell great stories.

Canadian Film Idea #22

Premise: The 'Marijuana Party of Canada' accidentally wins the election. Beating all odds, The Marijuana Party members remembered to vote and not only that, actually got off of the couch to go out to the polls.

**note to self** We don't have chads but we could find some similar hiccup in the election to make it legal (at least for a while).

Required Canadiana: Munchies... Lots of Canadian munchies - Old Dutch Potato Chips, timbits, beaver tails, french fries with vinegar (not freedom fries), poutine, smarties (etc)

**note to self** Lots of opportunities for sponsorship financing...

Possible Soundtrack: Stompin Tom (no brainer), The Rheostatics (god love em), The Tragically Hip, Bachman Turner Overdrive. **Neil Young? Joni Mitchell?** The Weakerthans. Celine? More financing? Lavine?

Favourite scene - When the 'boys' are arrested while visiting America on a trade mission. They don't even get off the tarmac before being taken by the FBI - in an homage to 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High' they open the doors to the Canadair jet and the abundant smoke wafts out of the fuselage. The arrest causes an international incident whereas the party leader, let's call him 'Riel MacDonald', tells the President and the world to 'chillax'.

Possible cast: Sean Penn as the President (round out the homage and add some irony)

Is there a part for Pam Anderson? Definately something for Meg and Jennifer Tilly. A 'Kids in the Hall' cameo - surely.

Dialogue notes: Copious use of the word 'dude'.

I think I might be on to something here.



I've used 26 dollars worth of Photoshop today.

Michael Ondaatje

My previous post got me thinking about Michael Ondaatje's poetic novel 'The English Patient'. This 'Canadian' book was adapted for the cinema by a British writer/director with American funding and starring a French actress and an English actor.

I love this passage from the novel.

"And all the names of the tribes, the nomads of faith who walked in the monotone of the desert and saw brightness and faith and colour. The way a stone or found metal box or bone can become loved and turn eternal in a prayer. Such glory of this country she enters now and becomes part of. We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. I wish for all this to be marked on my body when I am dead. I believe in such cartography-to be marked by nature, not just to label ourselves on a map like the names of rich men and women on buildings. We are communal histories, communal books. We are not owned or monogamous in our taste or experience. All I desired was to walk upon such an earth that had no maps.

I carried Katharine Clifton into the desert, where there is the communal book of moonlight. We were among the rumour of wells. In the palace of winds."

Culture Canada

Here in Canada there has been a lot of discussion about the proposed splitting of the Canadian Television Fund into a 'cultural' fund and an 'entertainment' fund. The fund consists of money from the Department of Canadian Heritage and the privately owned cable and satellite companies and it's mandate is to support home-grown television. Without such funding, it is believed that we will be totally overshadowed by American programming and in the face of such competition, Canadian television will cease to exist. The CRTC, the regulating body for Canadian television, radio and telecommunications, watch over the process to ensure that Canadian broadcasters show and support a percentage of home-made television.

The broadcasters cry foul as these home-made shows bring down their ratings and force them into showing 'cultural' programming. If they can split up the fund into culture and entertainment and they can control the 'entertainment' fund then they will have an opportunity to push their own agendas, as Alex Epstein states on his blog: "The hidden agenda here is that the "entertainment" subsidy will be media-giant-controlled rather than artist-driven, and will mean more fresh, original programming like CANADIAN IDOL, e.g. SURVIVOR: MUSKOKA and THE AMAZING CANADIAN RACE. Meanwhile the 'cultural' subsidy will only go to 'worthy programming' like ANNE OF GREEN GABLES remakes."

This whole idea of 'culture' has bothered me for years. Whenever applying for these cultural funds, Canadian filmmakers are subjected to some sort of bizarre scale of Canadian-ness. It's as if every story we have to tell involves stabbing a flag into the yard, running through the beaver infested wilderness, slapping a puck around or throwing rocks down the icey pond. And we can't forget about our characters' absolute loneliness in the face of our vast uninhabited landscape. Our beloved Bob and Doug Mackenzie were created out of this mentality. A confused Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis figured you couldn't lose if you put on a touque, said 'eh' all the time and drink copious amounts of beer. It's no wonder that Hollywood is stacked full of Canadian funny-guys who went south because their brand of 'culture' (aka entertainment) was too American. Their names include (and are not limited to) Ivan Reitman, Harold Ramis, Mike Meyers, Jim Carrey, Eugene Levy, John Candy and new talents like Seth Rogen. I'm not sure when our cultural watchdogs are going to realize that part of what makes Canadians unique is our wickedly subversive and ironic sense of humour. We can't help it, we inherited it from our British masters.

Our major networks have embraced a few family friendly comedies, 'Corner Gas' and 'Little Mosque on the Prairie' and Showcase fully embraced our seedier side in 'Trailer Park Boys'. The major networks only need look to the BBC to see how the British support their own culture with such sublime programming such as 'Peep Show', 'Coupling' (the adults version of 'Friends'), 'The Office', 'Extras' and 'The IT Crowd' to name a few. What makes these shows 'British'? Well, they are made by Brits (the actors even speak with British accents!). They aren't 'quaint' and they don't need to highlight tea and crumpits, Union Jacks or the Royal Family. They are a part of the British culture by being made by British artists and they are terrifically entertaining.

We need to shed this idea of 'culture' and just be. First and foremost, we are human. We share our stories of love, hate, kindness, anger, heroism, murder, greed, generosity, fear, anticipation, life and death. When I've fallen in love it had nothing at all to do with my country. These are human experiences and sometimes they are affected by what is going on in the world around us but often they are not. Either way, that is what makes the story unique - our own experiences in our own little world, without borders. If I describe an experience to an American, he won't say "You asked her to marry you at the restaurant? On one knee! Wow, that is so Canadian". Our cultural watch dogs might ask us to change the location to hockey arena or a dog sled expedition in order to make it more 'Canadian' but that would be dishonest, stupid and have nothing at all to do with the real Canadian culture or individual experience.

The truth as I see it is that Americans and Canadians aren't all that different. Yes, there are fundamental differences in politics but in a real sense, we all share similar values and goals. Most people in the world share the same dreams - food, shelter, love, family, success and justice. These are the stories we should be allowed to tell. Our 'culture' will come out in the specific details of the telling of these stories. We don't need culture to be the focus of our experiences. We, as the writers of these stories, need to tell our stories. We need to share our experiences and be honest when we write. We, as Canadians, need to be less concerned about losing our culture. It's a silly discussion - we are who we are. If Americans were like us they would expel all of our funny people who are infesting their culture with Canadian irony and wit. We might just turn them pink after all...

The Theatrical Experience

I've been a big fan of the home theatre for many years and the industry's move to high definition plasma and lcd televisions is exciting. Having said that, nothing compares to seeing a film on the big screen.

I saw Wolfgang Petersen's 'Das Boot' on television yesterday and it transported me back to one of the best theatre experiences I've ever had. Ten years ago Petersen released a director's cut of his classic 1981 film. Originally conceived as a 282 minute mini series, it was cut down and released as a 149 minute feature and then given another theatrical release in 1997 as a 209 minute director's cut. The extended version added more characterization and depth of story and it also restored the picture and added a new soundtrack optimized for 5.1 surround sound.

I was at film school at the time and my good friend Vince and I decided we'd go to an afternoon matinee. I had to work that evening but the one o'clock start time made sure I wouldn't be late. I had no idea what I was in for!

I had seen the original theatrical version on Laser Disc (I know, I know) and was familiar with the story. I was not, however, familiar with spending four hours in a claustrophobic U-Boat being hunted by destroyers. The theatre was equipped with a huge screen and a superior sound system and Vince and I were held in terror for hours. Petersen's visual style employed tight shots and hand held camera work. With a screen that envelops most of your peripheral vision, you were transported into this vulnerable tin can. The tight compositions and cramped spaces enhanced the sense of claustrophobia and the fear of having no place to escape. All of this was punctuated by the new 5.1 sound track that emphasized every creak and groan the submarine would make. Every depth charge that exploded would rattle your clothing and those long moments of hearing that sonar ping getting faster and faster squeezed the breath out of your lungs. Everytime a depth charge would go off, all hell would break loose on screen and the camera would shake violently as the characters were thrown around like rag dolls or desperately held on for dear life. The darkness and scattered light would illuminate the sweaty submariners as their eyes would drift up towards the surface with extreme fear and anxiety.

In a word, it was brilliant. It was pure cinema, visceral and emotional, and by the time the credits rolled and I got onto the subway to go to work at the bookstore I was physically and emotionally exhausted. I have since lamented missing films in the theatre after I've seen them on the home theatre. I missed 'Master and Commander' in the theatre and when it came out on dvd I was disappointed. I love high seas adventures and the film was so beautifully made, the little screen did it no justice.

On the big screen everything is amplified. A subtle look by an actor can say more than any bit of dialogue. A beautifully composed wide shot is detailed and rich. I saw 'The Maltese Falcon' on the big screen after having seen it on the television numerous times. I laughed in places I hadn't before because Bogart and Astor were making such great subtle gestures that were lost on a television. In 'Apocalypse Now' Kurtz's compound becomes even more surreal and frightening when you can see all of the disembodied heads and all of the details of the art direction. On the small screen these are all spots on the screen. The bigger screen is like turning the sound up - it amplifies the visuals and your entire line of vision is concentrated on the flickering light in front of you. There is no refrigerator, closet door or sofa. There's no pause and no escape from what is in front of you.

When a movie works on the big screen there is nothing like it.

The Business of Screenwriting in Canada

The Legion of Decency has posted a frank and candid criticism of doing business in Canada. Suffice to say that most people in the film and television business have been used or abused in some form or another at some point in their career. There are many scoundrels who have left a path of unpaid invoices, poor working conditions, poor wages (pocketing your fair share), lack of benefits and sick days. It seems to come part and parcel in an industry like ours. Doesn't mean that you shouldn't do or say anything...

I have worked for some upstanding folks as well - they just don't seem to last as long.

(I had to look up the word benefits - I'd forgotten how to spell it)

Go have a gander and shake your fists.

More conversations with Mills

Mark

When I was doing ‘Tigga and Togga’, a musical show with no dialogue, the production manager laughed when she saw the writers credit come on screen. A twenty year veteran couldn’t understand that a show with no dialogue had to be written! Dialogue is overrated in film. When it’s sublime, it’s sublime. However, if you haven’t worked the film out on a structural or visual level, dialogue can often become a crutch.

I’ve often struggled with Martin Scorcese. He has made some great films without a doubt. But he’s also made films that have relied so heavily on voice overs. It works in Goodfellas but Casino seemed to be a mess. It’s as if he shot a four hour movie and then hit the edit suite with a pad of paper and a pencil and filled it all in.

I think Kaufman is alright but I find his stuff too intellectual. Like Wes Anderson, emotion seems to be an exercise - something you don’t want to get too close to or you might look foolish. They’re odd and strange but it doesn’t have much of a lasting effect on me.

One thing I’m hammering the students on is theme. For me, theme is so incredibly important and if you keep working your script on a thematic level, you’ll wade your way through the plot. Satisfy the theme of the story and you’ll come up with an appropriate ending.

Thoughts on Mamet?

Rob

Mamet's great for character - his dialogue can become great when it is delivered from the mouth of an accomplished performer - the slightest hesitation and it comes across like they're chewing on a plank of wood - and when that happens it reflects not just on the performer, who bears the brunt of the immediate audience reaction, but also inevitably on the writer because it makes their words sound stiff and hollow. Mamet can write poetry when he wants to and is not above writing dreck when he can get away with it - cast his shit with the best performers and he sings - why? It's not because of the famous Mamet dialogue - it's because he depicts human beings acting badly with each other and we love to watch that so long as we aren't directly in the line of fire. Emotional gladiatorial games. The intellectual exercises of Mamet's work hinge not on mind-fucks but on emotional manipulation - emotional sleight of hand - look over there - feel this - oh, by the way, I just stole your wallet, stole your heart and dropped your pants.

Of course visual storytelling requires writing. Truman Capote dismissed Jack Kerouac's "On The Road" saying: "That's not writing, that's typing." That has nothing to do with what I'm ranting about here but I've always loved that quote and can never say it without doing my own lamentable impersonation of Capote. But, I guess, it speaks to: "What is this craft called writing?" Jack Warner used to go crazy bug nuts when he would pass the writer's building on the lot and not hear a constant clacking coming from every window. Every writer has a tale similar to this: a spouse or boss passes the door of the office, looks in and sees the writer with their feet up staring at the wall. "What are you doing?", they ask, incredulous and suspicious of the writer's obvious lazy behaviour. The writer doesn't avert their gaze from that spot on the wall as they reply: "I'm writing." The work isn't words. The work certainly isn't words on paper. That's the GRIND. The work - the stuff that's really hard but we perversely enjoy it anyway - the real writing - happens in the head. Often the process of the GRIND brings this forth. Everyone has their own discipline, their own method, their own means of bringing what is inside to the outside in a form that others can see, read, share and (hopefully) understand. But quantity is not quality. One of the hallmarks of screenwriting is "less is more" - always strive to say what needs to be said with as few words as possible.

"The Charge Of The Light Brigade" with Errol Flynn is, perhaps aprocryphally, credited with the most expensive single (and profoundly short) line in a film script:

They charge.

I don't know who wrote the script for it and I'm too lazy to look it up right now but I do know this: they understood the vagaries and necessities of the industry and resisted the urge to indulge in purple prose.

They charge.

That's it. That's all they wrote. That's all they had to. The set up and the knowledge of history provides the reader with the means to imagine a scene far greater than anything the writer could commit to paper. It's a visual medium. But you don't write out all the pictures. It is always preferable to show and not tell. But - like the Far Side comics of Gary Larson - the best scenes are the ones crafted by the audience themselves. Eisenstein showed that with his practical application of montage, taking the same image of a person's face and cutting back and forth between wildly different scenes back to this same face with the same expression and the audience swore they saw changes in the expression - it was, of course, the audience themselves projecting their own emotions upon the face before them. Most comics consist of several panels and there is always amongst creators of graphic narrative a discussion about what goes on in the "gutter", in the space between the panels, that part of the page which is the graphic equivalent of Walter Murch's "blink of the eye", that part of the narrative that is filled in not by the author or illustrator but by the reader. In Larson's case his comics were almost entirely single panels - the "gutter" existed in the timeline of the action contained within the frame - what had just happened or what was just about to happen. It provided a conceptual form of humour that required the participation of the reader to imagine the "what was" or "what will be" - and by their own participation it made the humour more funny, it made a deeper connection, as if Larson was finding some magical way of connecting directly with what you yourself personally found to be most funny - and in fact all he did was open a door so your funny could step through and present itself.

I recommend Scott McCloud's books: "Understanding Comics" and "Reinventing Comics" - along with Will Eisner's "Comics and Sequential Art" and " Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative". They all deal primarily with comics and graphic narrative but are equally and incisively pertinent to narrative storytelling in film. They're not about drawing pictures - they're about telling stories with pictures - and they dig deeper into the process far more effectively than ANY book I've read about filmmaking.

Silent films are, by their very nature, more difficult to watch than sound films because they require our attention. You have to participate. You have to keep watching the screen to know what has happened, what is happening and what will happen next. Regardless of Eisenstein's montage we still bring ourselves to that viewing experience, filling in the blanks, sharing the emotions, enlarging them within us and lending an unconscious hand to the construction of the narrative playing out before our eyes. It can wear a person out. Early film going was an intense, entrancing and consuming experience - not dissimilar to what people are experiencing now in their virtual worlds as they navigate through endless "narratives" and experiences with social cues limited by startling yet still emerging technologies which require the active participation of the users.

Intellectual exploration is all well and good within any film, novel or theatrical experience - but it really only works when all the other crap is taken care of. Sit back, put your feet up, stare at the wall, don't work too hard, we'll do it all for you - and now we do the little dance of thought that we think is cool and hope you do too. Yeah - okay - but - couldn't you have just written an essay? Essays can be entertaining. Entertainment is generally defined as: "an agreeable occupation for the mind; a diversion; an amusement". On the surface this speaks of numbing or of some for of soporific - but look closer - "agreeable occupation" - the mind is not shut off, it is occupied, active, and the experience of this active mind is "agreeable". That, of course, doesn't mean that ALL films (or any other form of entertainment) have to be "happy" - many of us enjoy a good cry, or the rise of righteous anger, the catharsis of revenge, the empathetic connection with the suffering of others ---- others ---- that's what makes it entertainment.

Mel Brooks defined the difference between tragedy and comedy thusly:

"Tragedy is when you walk down the street and fall in a manhole. Comedy is when it happens to somebody else."

Any entertainment takes us outside of ourselves while at the same time engaging our mind to connect with that sense of "other". It can be done in words, song, dance, pictures, movement, comedy, tragedy, action, adventure, truth, fiction, people, animals - times and places may vary as required. It can be as simple as picking at a stubborn loose thread on the sleeve of your jacket. It can be as vast as the charge of a doomed army through a desolate mountain pass. A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down the pants.

Ideas exist within their own time. They have relevance. If they are really good ideas - or if we are sufficiently inept at evolving beyond them - ideas can live a long time. Emotions we carry with us - within us - for without them we cease to exist. Entertainments that draw emotions which cause thought have far more lasting and deeply effective power than the best written essay in the existence of the entire fucking universe. If I can tell you a story - that requires you to lend yourself to understanding it - which relates a tale of some "other" - who suffers and is changed, or effects change, by that suffering - it changes you. It changes you because it allows you to "feel" what another feels. Not just to see or understand or hear or read or touch. To feel. That changes you. And that's what a writer does. Write with pictures, write with words, write with sound, write with food, write with touch or taste or smell or light or crappy little terra cotta figurines that end up selling for 10¢ in a yard sale - doesn't matter what the medium is - the fundamental notion of narrative remains the same: tell a story - make a connection - with emotion - make a change.

This is a tired old saw but I love it to much to leave it alone:

Act One: Put your hero in a tree.

Act Two: Throw rocks at your hero.

Act Three: Get your hero out of the tree.

Drape that fucking tree with as much intellectual bullshit as you want - prune that fucking tree within an inch of its life so anyone who looks at it says: "That's a tree?" - dig the fucking tree up, turn it upside down and bury it so the roots are sticking up in the air - set fire to the fucking tree - blow it up - borrow Rambo's 50mm bad ass weaponry and splatter that fucking tree all to hell and gone - just be sure to get he hero out of the tree - cuz the hero is the audience. That doesn't mean they get a happy ending or even have to intellectually understand why everyone was so pissed off with the tree they decided to climb - just be sure to get them out of the tree - set them down someplace else.

And I love Scorcese but I consider every one of his films to be a "schoon". Thelma made 'em. The true author of his films is Thelma Shoonmaker. So there. And Bogdanovich was nothing without his Polly.

And you are absolutely correct about theme - it doesn't have to be "what the film is about" - at least on the surface - the theme is what connects the audience to what is going on, the thread on the coat sleeve, the sign at the side of the road, the "line" of any good clean visual design - find the theme and the story drapes over it like a satin gown caressing Myrna Loy's ass. I won't apologize - I have my obsessions - but the point has been made. Once you pick a certain set of crayons to make your drawing with, the opportunities and reasons to use them present themselves. It can even be approached (in a less disciplined manner but relevant and legitimate nonetheless) an artsy fartsy manner of having a genre, having a structure, defining a theme and then "just let go" ------ (here's where you wave your arms over your head like a first grade theater student pretending to be a willow) ------ oooooh, look at me, I'm expressing my theme. No your not. You let the fucking theme express itself. All you have to do is recognize it when it shows itself - your job as a writer is to take dictation from the theme. It sounds flakey and it is and I don't mean to denigrate the obvious craft and hard work involved in structuring and beating the crap out of every fucking word in order to write the most perfect script in the world that someone else gets to piss all over, fuck up and claim as their own when it works. But hey - I'm on your side - theme - yes - and any theme is a set of recurring ideas or images or emotions that effectively speak together.