Update On Some Crap That I'm Working On

*Warning to readers - this blog COULD be just as boring as Jason Armstrong's note on FB*

So Jay threw up a note on Facebook with some updates on his film Bitter the other day, so I figured I should probably do a little blog update on my side of things; for the couple of people that care.

Aside from trying to graduate with my 30,000 dollar piece of useless paper, yes there is a film coming down the pipe on my end of things as well. After the insanity that was 48 Hours in Purgatory, me and Jay figured "what the hey, let's do two films AT THE SAME TIME". So that's what we are doing. The talented Chris Lawson is penning the script called "Abolition", along with myself. Though while Chris is getting the script to a good place, I have been concentrating on the business side of things.

Myself and Jay have made some great contacts in the States which have already helped us immensely on both projects and we hope to continue those relationships into Pre-Production this summer. We plan to shoot the films one after the other in Fall of 2010 with simultaneous post-production schedules, finishing both films 1 month apart by end of March 2011. Not that insane right?

People have asked me "so what are you doing after graduation" and my reply is always "uhh...making movies". Which only makes sense to me; it's what I went to school for, why wouldn't it be what I do afterwords? So as myself, Jay and the other members of the team embark on the next part of the film journey, I will keep those 3 of you that read this up to date with all the latest news on casting, crew and all that jazz. 2010 should get epic; and not the mediocre kind of epic.

MK

O Canada, Glorious and Complacent.

To start this rant I want to say this - I have been frustrated for some time with Canada's system and I truly believe we are not the enlightened nation we think we are - in fact I think we are beneath the States in many respects. I also am not a politician or think I have some new idea that could change the world or something. I am just frustrated.

I will start by saying this: being a Liberal or Conservative should mean you believe different things and have different policies, etc. This, however, is really not the case in Canada from what I can tell - it's just either side bitching and complaining about who's in power and how now they can run it better so then they get voted in, fuck up the country for however many years until Canada is like "oh, yeah we have another side" and then the vote switches.

At least in the States there is a difference. I am sick of the "I hate America" people thinking they are enlightened or something. If you hate them so much, gather a bunch of your America hating friends and burn down the Whitehouse. We have done it before. Or if there is enough of you, change Canada's government into something better. Whatever it is, at least you will be doing something instead of doing what Canadians do best - bitch and whine and sit and talk and get nowhere. We say how great we are when really we are worse then the States because we don't even have a democratic government TO BE corrupted - when we vote, someone is put into power who doesn't even have a "majority" vote (what the fuck, if they win shouldn't they WIN?) and then they can call other elections randomly? Or suspend parliament?!??!

If the Obama election showed us anything it was the importance of the youth vote. Kids in Canada not only don't care about politics but don't understand it. I don't pretend to understand it fully either. And you can blame this on Twilight, video games and other bullshit like that - but it's not that the kids are stupid and are like the fat people in WALL-E. I ask, why should they care? When it's 2 old dudes who if you vote for them, don't do anything anyways, and usually are just saying how the other side is shitty at what they are doing, I don't even care and I WANT to care. I think a lot of kids WANT to care but there's nothing there to care about. Obama gave the American kids hope and they came out in record numbers to vote. Canada could be so much greater then it is but we are like an indecisive, crippled, spoiled rich kid, who thinks we are so much better then other countries because we have gay marriage and lots of immigrants. Both aren't bad things but by no means give us the right to be a "holier then thou" country.

In conclusion, I am not advocating the States as the greatest country in world or whatever. All I am saying here is that, before we make fun of Bush for mixing around his words, we should look at our country and realize that it has it's own, much BIGGER problems. We can point and make fun of the States all we want but bottom line is, when they vote someone gets into power for 4 straight years, make's decisions and leads the country. In Canada we don't even have that.

MK

48 Hours In Purgatory - A Reflection

It is 2:07am on Christmas Eve, 2009 and I haven't seen a bed since Friday the 18th. I have been locked away in 2 rooms with no windows putting the final touches on the epic adventure that has been the film 48 Hours In Purgatory. As I sit here watching the progress bar slowly move closer and closer to 100%, "this is war" by 30 seconds to mars plays in the background, it's hard to picture a better way of ending this chapter.

I don't think up to this point I know a movie better then I know 48. I know most of the lines by heart, I know every single mistake, problem area and things that we wanted but couldn't. What is lost now is the objectivity that the film is actually good. I feel that it's good - even watching the first 20 minutes of the final film it felt, looked and sounded like a real film.

It has been an insane project right from doing pre-production during the final weeks of 2nd year (april 2009) to the epic battle with final cut over the last 24 hours. Film making is not easy, in fact it's actually near impossible. No normal human being would ever put his or herself through this process. I tried to explain to someone earlier tonight what and why I was doing what I was doing and I came across as sounding like a mentally deranged human being. It was funny but also kind of mind blowing - to me it's just what has to be done at this point in time - spend 5 days with 4 dudes in a room with no windows watching the same footage over and over again because the buzz of the warehouse ambience track seemed a little loud and needed to be turned down or a little logo in a shot that is seen over credits for about 5 seconds needs to be moved a little farther to left.

The sad but awesome thing is that gimme a week to recover - and I would just do it again.

What is even more insane is that me and Jay had a conversation about the next film already. Maybe gimme 2 weeks to recover.

During the course of finishing a film on this scale at this point in my life - you really get to know people, really, really, well. Who you can trust, who you can't. Watching Jeremy put the final touches on the mix down in the Hb04 studio was epic to see. A screen shot of the pro tools session should go up in the studio as a reminder to all film students that it can be done, here and now. Then there was Nick - all alone color correcting. He invented a way of modifying 3 computer chairs to a pretty comfy bed. But seriously the look of the film is amazing and his vast knowledge of all things technical was a serious must, not only in this final stage of post-production but also even during production. One of my favorite things was turning to Jay and saying -" you don't know this person, but they watched your movie frame by frame to edit clothing movement". This film is filled with people like that - dedicated to their craft and uber talented.

If all things go well, we will be "shooting lights and being able too" summer 2010 and the process will start all over. Hopefully with a little more money, more experience under our belt and the knowledge that seriously, anything is possible if you realize that giving up is just not an option. A great 20th century philosopher once said " Do or do not, there is no try".

MK

Texas Blog Part 4 - Home.

To those waiting breath bated, for this final blog about Texas - well the wait is over. Did that come across sarcastic? Good. Anyways - I left off Day 7 when we were in the desert. That day we left to Midland and shot some exteriors there and then drove back towards our camp which we stopped to get some epic shots of an oil derek and a moving train - which turned out to be the Ian's favorite shots. We came back to camp exhausted and Sarah and Carlton took a nap. Myself and Brennen after dumping the footage went atop a large sand dune and did some dune jumping which was awesome.

Carlton joined us and we picked the spot where we were going to shoot the sunset. We walked back to our camp site which didn't really seem that far - then we gathered the jib arm, 2 tripods, 2 cameras, a sand bag and 40 pounds of weights. The three of us treked across desert and the hot sand to capture the trips most epic footage - jib shots in the desert at sunrise. The walk then seemed A LOT further.

That night Carlton got the truck stuck - the park ranger the next morning wasn't happy but he pulled us out. Carlton claims that he only got the truck stuck a little bit and me and Brennen did the rest while trying to get it out. After getting our truck out - we packed up everything and left the camp site which had been our home for two days. On Wednesday at 2:45pm, after shooting some more exteriors in Midland, we decided to head home.

Between myself and the two Ian's we each did shifts of 5-6 hours of driving. We drove through the night and after lots of energy drinks, sunflower seeds and coffee we finally arrived back in Canada late Thursday night/Early Friday morning.

The trip as a whole was a fantastic experience and after looking at some of the footage I can't wait to see things come together in the coming months. I shall leave with these words from a song that we listened to over and over on the trip:

"Alabama, Arkansas, I do love my Ma and Pa
Not in the way I love you.
Holy moley me oh my you're the apple of my eye
Girl I never loved one like you.
Home, Let me go home. Home is wherever I'm with you."

MK

Texas Blog Part 3

Alright so I believe I left off at day 4 - so day 5 we woke up after a gnarly night of thunderstorms and noisey crickets to a rainy, over cast day. We packed up all of our wet crap, the Ian's shot some ocean shots and we took off to the Golden Corral for breakfest which is awesome cuz it's buffet style! Then Sarah decided that it was best to trek forward and go to huntsville which is where the Texas Prison Museum is - so we hit that and saw "Ol' Sparky" which is this super old electric chair they used to use for executions. After Huntsville, we cooked it over to Livingston which is where our subject is currently being held - in a maximum security prison - we banged off some awesome exteriors of the place - the prison is MASSIVE and really intimidating.

The same day we drove to Marlin, Texas and grabbed an exterior of a place which we shouldn't have and it was super scary, police and security was involved but we escaped!

We stopped for night around 2am just outside of Dallas - we thought at the time we would head straight to Midland the next day but Sarah added two stops when we got up. We had stopped in West Dallas as to give us a head start to Midland but actually had to head backwards to Longview which we shot some coverage of the town and then booked it over to Eastland where we got some great footage of some important buildings and such.

After which point we were headed to Midland and decided to got to Big Springs, State park to camp but when we got there it was only a day camp, not actually a camp site. SO, with me at the wheel we took off to Monahan's which was about 2 hours away - this was the serious desert.

We camped there last night (day 6) and this morning it felt like we were in a Clint Eastwood Western movie - we saw this CRAZY bug which I filmed on my isight lol. Anyways - we are headed back to Midland today to film and then to Odesa and will end up back at our camp site, Monahan's for tonight. I think the Ian's are getting some great footage but today and tomorrow are very important to the story and to the documentary as a whole so I hope that we can figure things out here! It's HOT!
I will update again in a few days when we are on our way home - hopefully by then we will have everything we needed to get for the doc - so far it's been a fantastic trip - so much to see!

Texas Blog - Part 2

With the Ian's tag teaming the driving during the day on day 2, we arrived in Little Rock, Arkansas in the evening where we stayed at a motel 6 for some much deserved z's. We arrived officially the next morning on day 3. We went to 4 different county's where the subject of the documentary lived and went to school, DANGERfield, Avinger, Jefferson City and Mount Pleasant. The Ian's came up with a cool idea to film this which was to mount the camera on top of the truck and drive up, through and around each of the places. The footage looks amazing!

We headed to Lake Bob Sandlin State Park which is about 15 minutes away from Mount Pleasant to camp for the night. Me and Sarah forged some food (went to a HUGE walmart) and the Ian's set up shelter. We had awesome steaks for dinner. We all got up when it was still dark to set up an epic sunrise dolly shot which turned out amazing, the sun over the lake was incredible and after a hearty breakfest we were off to one more county, Ore, and then to Jamica Beach (near Glaveston).

The idea was to get some footage of the gulph of mexico but it was raining when we got there and things weren't looking good. Also, it was HOT and muggy. The bugs were insane since we were camping right on the beach. After forging for wood and setting up the tents, we all decided to go swimming and it was fantastic! The water was warm and the waves were huge! It was very refreshing, we then made some chili after we made a fire (not east with wet driftwood) and headed to bed.

I am writing this inside the truck with the window open and can hear the ocean, crashing away. Though we haven't filmed anything yet here, we hope too later on this morning, this place was still awesome and great stop on our trip! Also, SUPER windy last night, seriously, SUPER windy.

MK

Texas Blog - Part 1

It is Day 2 on our journey to Texas which started yesterday, the 30th, as Ian Brennen, Sarah and myself departed from Mississauga and headed to PS to meet Mike Krasney who hooked us up with awesome gear. After which we headed to Kingston with Ian Brennen at the wheel, to pick up the fourth member of our crew, Ian Carlton and also to drop off a weiner dog, Euie at Sarah's grandparents place.

Then a re-arrange of the truck and a changing of the drivers to Ian Carlton, we headed to the border where we registered all of our equipment and I took over as Captain of our V8 awesome truck to get us through to the U.S. We crossed over at around 10pm and Ian Carlton drove until 12:15am where we stopped at Tim's. I took over with a large coffee, energy drink in hand and Journey blasting, I drove until 7am the next morning where we were about 40 km's outside of Columbus, Ohio.

My playlist for the night included, Monolith, Toto, Journey, Avantasia and Pat Benatar. Nothing super exciting has happened as of yet, just tons of driving and talk of the desert. Oh and Sarah bought a sheriff's badge when we stopped in Kentucky. "I Shot the Sheriff" was playing on the radio at the time. True Story.

MK