My new toy: Hipstamatic

Capturing Cowboy Life in Modern Montana

After spending a week script supervising for a commercial project in Montana, it will be strange to return to civilization, but I hope and believe I’m returning armed with some valuable information. The project, a hybrid of traditional scripted spots and doc-style webisodes presented many interesting challenges, not the least of which is the location: a set of ranches nestled in the Crazy Mountains that receive no cell phone service and are connected by a series of single lane often dirt track roads tracing their way through valleys and cow pastures. In the spring and summer, the lifestyle there is idyllic and spending a week off the grid in such a beautiful and awe-inspiring landscape is revitalizing. Obviously, moving a film crew through this remote and sometimes forbidding location is a logistical feat of the highest proportions, but all of it is made much easier by the use of the Canon 5D and 7D camera. 

While the Canon DSLR video capable cameras have been transformed by DPs and ACs alike from consumer cameras by the addition of countless grip, focus, and sound equipment and firmware upgrades into professional tools of the highest caliber, many still have their doubts. While I think that with the right lenses and focus pulling, the 5D can look as beautiful as film, after having watched my company pioneer the use of this camera for the past year and a half, I am positive that it is one of the best tools out there now available to documentary filmmakers. Small, inexpensive, and supported by a relatively small crew, this camera allows a director the freedom to get right in the middle of organic moments that cannot possibly be recreated. During this project, I observed at close hand how it can allow the director, the camera operator, and the AC to all get their hands on a body and totally cover an event as it occurs, without getting in each other’s way. This is the only way to shoot verite. Here is the big lesson of Montana for me: equip yourself with a light and mobile camera package, hire an operator and an AC that are eager to shoot, and pick up a camera yourself. This seems like an obvious statement when you are working on a project that relies heavily on verite and has a small budget, but as a filmmaker, you belong in the action.

Montana: Toyota Tundra Shoot Days 0-3

Color Palette

Livingston, MT

 

 

 

Wheeler Butte School

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sailing San Diego Bay

Inception: Best Fare of the Summer

The blockbuster of the summer Christopher Nolan’s Inception has grossed $486M worldwide for Warner Bros, while only costing the studio $160M.  All in all, the gamble paid off.  Should we be congratulating WB for going out on a limb in this economy and have the guts to produce something that wasn’t a third or fourth film in a  tired franchise?  The other studios have been playing it safe, so why shouldn’t they?  Humans are risk averse and that includes consumers who don’t like the idea of forking over more than $10/person for a movie they might not enjoy, particularly when movie night might not roll around again soon with everyone’s belts still clasped at that too tight notch.  But what exactly was the gamble?  Nolan’s last three films have been highly profitable, with The Dark Knight grossing $1B worldwide.  The fact that the lead is played Leonardo DiCaprio is alone enough to get butts in seats.  With a trailer promising a film that’s action packed competing against films like The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, it was a recipe for success, even if the plot was “mind-bendy.”

The film itself is extremely entertaining.  Just enough to make you think and keep your mind occupied,  the film is also constantly in motion.  Despite it’s 148 minute runtime, the entire film is so engrossing you just might forget about that popcorn you splurged for.  Beautifully shot, and pulsing with Hans Zimmer’s sonorous soundtrack, Inception is sensually awesome to consume.  In Cobb’s (DiCaprio) world, corporate espionage takes place in the mind, thanks to a U.S. military program to develop “shared dreaming.”  The young widower and corporate spy wants desperately to return to his small children, but his guilt over his wife’s death is ripping at the fabric of his consciousness, threatening to completely tear away his grasp on reality and his control of his dreams.  His hopes rest on one last big job that will buy him the right to return home to his family.  With a cast of experts he will attempt the impossible: inception, or the planting of a thought in the mind of the target without his detecting its foreignness.  As the team attempts to plan this seed with a complicated strategy involving multiple levels of dreaming, the viewer is completely caught up in the “science” and “art” of constructing and controlling dreams.  As a work of fiction, we accept the premises, but it begs an interesting question at the end of the film, when your mind begins to sort out what was “real” and what was a “dream.”  None of it’s real of course, which is sort of the point.  We allow ourselves to accept these elaborately constructed dream worlds, as long they end after two hours or so, we know, that is not real.  When you walk out of the theater and into the street, you know that reality has recommenced.  But how often have you simply wished you could disappear into that world and just never come out?  Who’s to say you can’t choose your own reality? 

Overall, there’s plenty of food for thought in the film, but never once did the philosophy get in the way of the plot.  Highly entertaining, visually stunning, and thought-provoking, what more can you ask from a Hollywood blockbuster?  So skip your Starbucks for a week and check it out in the theater, if just visually and musically, it demands a big-screen experience.

Check out these links for some interesting Inception info:
"Why intriguing 'Inception' is the Hollywood exception" - Christian Sicence Monitor
Inception soundtrack created entirely from Edith Piaf song - The Guardian

Getty Villa: Macro Filters

Mad Men Returns!

The opener for Season 4 of Mad Men aired last weekend and it promises to be yet another summer of sinfully superb entertainment.  Beautifully lit and shot as always, Mad Men appears ready to reclaim the mantle of best show on television.  As an added bonus, Time-Warner Cable finally carries AMC HD, so I get to watch it in all it’s glory now.  Since the show began in 2007, Mad Men has influenced the direction of fashion and decor, helping sell products from Zippo lighters to precisely cut Banana Republic suits and dresses.  Interesting, if not morally inspiring, the characters feel real and three-dimensional.   The carefully selected dialogue and the well-constructed scenes, like a Don Draper advertisement, lead you to an inevitable conclusion: this is what I should be doing right now... sitting here, watching this.  I can’t wait for Episode 2.

For a dose of reality, check out this NY Times Blog with Q & A from a “real mad man.”