Indelible Freckles

If I knew five-plus years ago how hard it would be to be a professional screenwriter, I might have tried a little harder to understand the Star Trek-like technobabble that was part of the editing classes at film school. At the very least I would have been employed much more contiguously in these post-film school years.

I doubt that I’d be as happy and content as I am now, though. When I look back, I can exclaim - just like those Hallmark cards or chain-email-angels insist - I’ve come a long way, baby!

My trick to surviving, I think, is my ability to be wilfully short-sighted. Take the short film, for example. I thought I had a pretty straight-forward project: five talking heads, no gun-fights, no car-chases, a half-dozen locations, and a nine to ten-minute running time. The devil is in the details.

• Inside or out? We had just one interior. Everything else was either on the street or in the car. As the shoot approached, I realised how vulnerable we were to weather. I worried a lot. And slept little beforehand. (But it worked out.)
• Location variables. So you think you’ve picked a reasonably quiet street, right? It was quiet when you recce’ed it earlier, it’s away from busy roads - and it’s a cul de sac, for pete’s sake. All those things doesn’t stop someone within microphone range from blasting away with their weedeater. Or a truck pulling up across the road from you and unloading a mini-dozer and heap of wood. (The dialogue’s gonna be re-recorded, and the truck/dozer-driver was a sweetie and we worked around each other.)
• It’s just some people talking in a car. Did I mention that the car’s travelling at the time - like, the car is moving - it’s on the road - while the actors are delivering lines and the camera is rolling. When the budget doesn’t stretch to a low-loader (a really low trailer towed by a truck) ablaze with lights and possies for a camera and attendent crew, you make do. (And I’m really happy with what we got - no make-do’s about it.)

I obviously like to kvetch.

In the end, in the heat of of any stressful moment, I’m always struck by two thoughts:

As post-production winds down on To’ona’i, Lucy Vee’s excellent series on genre (the thriller article is a must for such geeks) has been a nice kinda welcome as I catch up on blogs before I settle down to the next project.

Which is… hrm.

Last night, whilst tearing my nose-hairs out over an imminent deadline, I rashly responded to Mr Woods‘ post on the Jules, Ben and Dave Forum guild forum.

Apparently, I’ve got plans.

Chop-chop.

… Once I’ve devoured Aaron Sorkin’s Sports Night: The Complete Series (thanks TradeMe!).

Gosh.

Hundredth post.

I may not have written as much as I wanted to since 1 January 2007 but I’ve -

• run a total of 558kms (97kms of that sans mongrel);
• picked up 170 books, comics and scripts, and read 137 right through;
• and sat down to watch 128 films, DVDs and TV series, and watched 105 right to the (sometimes bitter) end.

‘S not bad. And because it’s that time of the year, I give you a list of notable and recommended reading and viewing experiences (in strict alphabetical order):

• comics: Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos’ Alias, Charles Burns’ Black Hole, Brian K Vaughan and Tony Harris’ Ex-Machina, Chester Brown’s I Never Liked You, Jimbo’s Pulp Sticktion strip in DMC’s New Ground anthology, and Alex Robinson’s Tricked;
• scripts: 28 Weeks Later, The Bourne Ultimatum, Casino Royale, Gone Baby Gone, and Perfect Creature;
• books: Carl Hiaasen’s Basket Case, Mike Figgis‘ Digital Filmmaking, Thomas Harris’ Hannibal Rising, Patrick Suskind’s Perfume, and Patricia Grace’s Tu;
• features: The Children of Men, The Departed, Everything is Illuminated, Serenity, and Stranger than Fiction
• television: Burn Notice, Green Wing, Homicide: Life on the Street, The Insiders Guide to Happiness, The Shield, and The Wire.

As for the running, I do it only so that I fit my clothes.

Happy new year.

So many things to post about. So few braincells to spare. Meantime, I give you these wonderful links to enjoy:

• Alan Moore is interviewed about his career and latest work, Lost Girls.

• Jeremy Slater has same cry-out-loud posts (here and here) about Heroes creator Tim Kring. Mm… maybe not for Heroes fans.

• Phill Barron is writing a feature screenplay in one week. The man is insane. Virtual rubber-neckers can follow his progress so far: Day One and Day Two.

• It’s that wonderful time of year when the Vidiots hold their annual Dead Pool competition. They may only be in it to see which newbie show karks it first, but for me it’s a good indicator of what to look forward to in the near future. Pushing Daisies and Dirty Sexy Money seemed to pass muster; here’s hoping The Bionic Woman and the long-silent Josh Friedman’s The Sarah Connor Chronicles do the same.

• Stephen Fry - yes, that Stephen Fry - has a blog. Nuff said, mm?

James Henry’s ruminations on Saturday morning entertainment got me thinking. (ABC Warriors and Nemesis the Warlock would be so coool. And Strontium Dog. And M.A.C.H. One.) (Okay, maybe not M.A.C.H. One.)

Late last year, I finally discovered where they hid the comics at the local library. Giddy with the find, I was adventurous with my choices: X-Men/Phoenix - Endsong, X-Men/Black Panther - Wild Kingdom, Invincible: Perfect Strangers, Batman and the Monster Men, and Hicksville.

Once at home, I tore through them. It was - to those of you who know their comics - a mixed bag.

Even back in The Day, X-Men never really turned my dial. Its exclamation-mark-laden dialogue, descriptions-for-dummies, and the artists’ renditions of breasts that defied gravity and biological reality were quickly tiresome. Almost two decades on,… the dialogue’s more realistic, the minimal description borders on curt - but the breasts, ohhh the breasts. Large juicy breasts encased in spandex, mysteriously free of nipples but full of teen wish-fulfilment. Nope, still not my thing.¹

Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker’s Invincible is a variation on a Superman-like alien protecting the Earth - and proof there’s still life (and fun to be had) in tights and superpowers yet².

Batman and the Monster Men was a disappointing pulpy homage by writer/artist Matt Wagner. Wagner’s critically acclaimed creations, Grendel, which never made much sense to me, and Mage, of which I’ve had but one unforgettable taste, may be his most well-known but it was his brilliant jumpstart of Sandman Mystery Theatre that inspired me most.

And Dylan Horrocks‘ Hicksville. This title really made me reevaluate my attitude to New Zealand comics. An instant favourite - one I’ll have to buy and add to my collection. Fired by the positive experience, I tried Maui: Legends of the Outcast; my comics cultural cringe has blinded me to homegrown comics for too long. I’m collecting Horrocks’ Atlas now, and am following DMC’s New Ground with interest.

As The Goddess never tires of saying: thank gosh for libraries.

Just between you and me? I thank The Goddess.

¹ - I was always more a DC man than a Marvel boy. But I quite enjoyed Ultimate Spider-Man: Silver Sable - due largely to Brian Michael Bendis‘ writing (Bendis being half the creative duo behind the magnificent Powers series, another recent and belated ‘discovery’). Confirmation that when I follow a writer I’ve enjoyed from one title to another, I’m unlikely to be disappointed.

² - Update: Mark Waid’s Superman: Birthright was an unexpected gem for 2007. (Why, I might even try Superman Returns now….)<p

Jed Mercurio, creator of the excellent, visceral, Bodies, wrote this about adapting novels for the screen. What I found most interesting was -

As an audience member, I must confess to a double standard: I want more of the same - but different.

I work hard at trying something completely new though. How else could I have found and sworn by Bodies or The Wire - or even Green Wing or The Insiders Guides to Love and Happiness?

What I admire most about these series is the sheer depth, and complexity of story and character that’s packed into each forty-five minute episode. It didn’t matter if it was a procedural or soap. The writing, directing and acting is so good that the underlying structure is barely noticed.

Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman are my poster boys for giving more of the same… but different. They showed that even the tired superhero, horror and fantasy genres of comicdom - and their audiences - could be treated just as seriously as any other form of ‘real’ literature - with maturity and intelligence.

I returned to comic-reading in the last few years - one could hazard that it was a precursor to my true return to reading. And upon my return I’ve found the pleasures of Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson’s blistering Transmetropolitan, Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s heart- and gut-wrenching Preacher, and David Lapham’s mindblowing Stray Bullets. These - and more - are just proof-positive that, just as the good doctor purred,

(Heads-up courtesy Lee Thomson.)