My Shorts

Been a while since I've made a movie, '03 to be exact. And that's just fine. I like just writing for now, maybe someday in the future I'll get the bug again, but after shooting 3.5 features and some shorts - all of which went nowhere after lots of hard work by most involved - I have no plans to get back on that horse.

I was going over the list of shorts in my mind today, and here they are:

The Passenger - My Senior Thesis project. What a wasted opportunity. I had access to cameras, film & editing equipment, and I blew it on a lame concept/plot:

Guy is driving home from college, passes broken-down motorists, then he breaks down, starts to walk. Calls home, hangs up on stoner brother, gets beat up by broken-down motorists he passed earlier, then keeps walking.

What did it mean? Was it a metaphor for his life? Beats the shit out of me.

Neil - In class project, the only one I didn't direct. I acted as a newscaster who delcares his love for the weatherman while Neil Diamond's "Today" blasts in the background.

N2 - No budget horror: A group of friends is stalked and killed in a house during a night of nothing happening. At the end, after the last person is killed outside, we see the killer - It's a film camera, who comes back inside the house and sits in front of the TV to watch Neil Diamon sing "Sweet Caroline."

Short - Actually pretty good. Story of 2 homeless guys trying to make ends meet. Very little dialogue, mostly stark images & music mixed in with flashes of their past (via old home movies).

FeedMeBack - Non-sensical film class project, basically I just slapped a bunch of images together (including funky feedback of a video camera taping its own images from a TV screen - trippy). Teacher loved it for its meaning. Damned if I knew its meaning, I just thought it looked cool. Got me an A! Yeah, boooyyy!!

The Family Dog - The most successful. Played a few minor fests and made some cash off the internet (back when Hypnotic, Ifilm and Atom websites were popular). Shot on Super 16. Sweet.

The Reappearance Of Homer Pitts - I liked this one. Story of a kid who feels left out and turns invisible. When he realizes he family indeed loves him, he reappears.

The Disintegration Of A Boy Band: Made before bashing boybands was popular. Ended with a "where are they now" sequence. One was lost in a forest, one cleaned trash of the streets, one was homeless, and the last was a stock boy.

George Clooney as Michael Clayton

Damn! A must-see. One of the best of the year (My tops of the year list is now Sunshine, Michael Clayton and The Lookout).

Clooney is just amazing in it. He really is. A very layered, incredible performance. He lays it all out there. Tilda Swinton is as good as always. Tom Wilkinson and Sidney Pollack rock out in their supporting parts.

Tony Gilroy's writing and directing are so perfect, it blew me away. Not a scene is wasted.

One of my faves was the sequence at a birthday party (at Clayton's childhood home), including the scene with his son in the car afterwards. Any scene with Clayton and his brothers were perfectly done. Gilroy knows mood & tone, and he pulls it all off. Brilliant.

And there is a scene about mid-way through that will rock you. It was so creepy, so freaking disturbing, it easily blows away any junk-gore torture porn bullshit you'll see in Hostel or Saw 9: Buzzsaw!

Check it out.

UNION - Done.

Still polishing my newest baby (UNION), but for the most part, it's complete. And I love it. Can't wait to get a nice, sleep logline together, when I have one I'm pleased with I'll post it and see what y'all think. It clocks in at 102 pages.

Have been editing LAID with some notes from my managers, so although I have a decent version I can send out, it's not officially out of the oven. It's like I put it back in because the middle was gooey....or another way to look at it is they gave me some killer notes and I decided to work on it further.

I just don't have enough freakin' time to write. Between work, wife, kids, and awesome TV like Reaper, Chuck, & 30 Rock, it's hard to get more writing done. Two scripts this year is decent (Laid & Union plus 2 re-writes of 2 older scripts) but I've got about 9837 more ideas I want to write, and easily 100 saved files on my cpu that are either partial scripts or a bunch of scenes that I've been dying to get to.

I'm itching to work on something dramatic next, so I might get to my Dakota idea, or my horror epic. If I feel comedic then I'll jump back into the Stand-In (already at page 60, I just put it aside to simmer) or Temp'd (I'm into act 2) or my mini-golf comedy I started 2 years ago, or Rollin' Thunda, another comedy. Jesus, see?!

For tonight, I'll polish Union. It's a damn good script, I just know it. It's sorta not too commercial, but then again, kinda is.

Oh well, I'll listen to the new Radiohead while I edit. I downloaded the new album. Amazing. As Tommy Cruise once said while manning a machine gun in TAPS: "It's fucking beautiful, man!!!"

Perry Does It Again

Box Office:
Why Did I Get Married: 21.7 million - Damn!
Game Plan: 11 million
We Own The Night: 10.8
Clayton: 10.4
Heartbreak Kid: 7.3 (ouch)
Lizzy 2: 6.2
Da Kingdom: 4.6
Across the Universe: 3.8
RE:3: 2.6
Seeker: 2.2
Final Season: 664,351 (Jesus Christ)

I'm gonna try to see Clayton this week, would love to check out Darjeeling & Yuma, too. Is it just me or does 30 Days Of Night look bad ass?

Damn!

Man, those Rockies handed our asses to us. I almost feel like the Mets....oh, wait, no I don't. We beat the piss out of the Mets all season and skipped past them to win the Division.

Tough loss for the Phillies, but it's their own fault, they just didn't hit.

So, Redsox vs. Rockies? That's what I'm thinking. If so, it's the Redsox in 5.

j o y d i v i s i o n

Please check out this trailer for the Anton Corbijn film, CONTROL, about the life (and death) of Ian Curtis, lead singer for Joy Division (who, after his suicide, became New Order). The film looks amazing, love the crisp black & white, and the actor playing Ian looks JUST freaking like him. Can't wait for this.

IRON MAN

Go, Ben!

I saw this on the movie-bytes.com website:

Newcomer Ben Frahm, who had been working as a special-needs teacher at a middle school, has sold his comedy spec Dr. Sensitive to Universal in a deal valued in the mid-six figures. Shady Acres will produce. The script, in the vein of Liar, Liar, is about a doctor with the world's worst bedside manner who undergoes a transformative experience that makes him overly empathetic. The screenplay was discovered by Frahm's reps at Underground Films through a query letter, and was developed for a year prior to going Shady Acres, where it was developed further.

The thing that caught my eye was that it was initially discovered via a query letter. Whoa. Somebody actually read one of those things? Anyways, good for Ben.

Funny Games Poster

Kudos to the marketing people for this film. Actually, there have been some pretty cool posters coming around lately. Can't stand the typical "headshot" posters Hollywood usually slaps together. Anyway, check this out........

Phillies Phever!!!

Congrats to our Fighting Phils, who came from 7 games back only a short time ago to the champs of their division. Certainly, it helped that the Mets completely C H O K E D, but the Phillies kicked all kinds of ass to win their division. Sweet! Jimmy Rollins - MVP!

Before The Devil.........

I need to add this to my list of "must-sees," this is the new film from Sidney Lumet. Sweet poster.

Also, the Wes Anderson short film (prequel to Darjeeling) called Hotel Chevalier is a FREE download on itunes (co-stars Natalie Portman (she gets nekkid!!!). Check it out.

"Union" countdown - I'm into the 80s, I should have an updated page count for my next post.

Go Phils! Goodbye, Mets.

Script countdown - UNION

Finally finishing this one. Been creeping and crawling around my head for a few years, got it started last year but put it on the backburner while I did other scripts.

It's called Union, and is a sorta comedy/drama about a family, set around Christmas. I won't divulge the rest yet, the actual plot is pretty high god damn concept.

I'm on Page 74 now, and plan to wrap it up within the next week.

TV

Some cool stuff coming up this season. The shows I'm looking forward to most are Chuck & Reaper, and the return of Lost, Weeds, Dexter and Heroes. Californication is holding my interest, but Tell Me You Love Me is a snooze. It's supposed to be so "real." Try lame. Bunch of whiners.

It'll be interesting to see where Heroes goes after their limp finale - some showdown. They should have just had a rock/paper/scissor battle royale. But it's a good show that should get better.

Thought the first K-Ville was decent, although I'm not sure that an escaped convict could join the Army & be a cop, just because records were lost in New Orleans from Katrina. Wouldn't his social security number come into play?

Bionic Woman could go either way, but I think it'll be decent. Can't promise I'll watch though. I'll check out Pushing Daisies, at least it sounds different.

What will get canceled? Hmm, there's no way Life will make it past a few epdisodes. It's a so-so premise, and too much other stuff on for people to care. Big Shots will probably have a big premiere then die. Journeyman looks blah - people didn't dig Daybreak and that had Taye Diggs. And Dirty Sexy Money might make it, but it's got a shit title and a lesser Baldwin.

What will U be watching??????

Can't Wait To See This

Hot Veggie

Back 2 Work

Thanks, team, for all of your condolences. It means a lot. Some day I'll meet y'all and buy you many drinks.

Been a rough week, but the services are over, things are slowly getting back to normal. It's a pretty horrible feeling I'm left with though, thinking I could've done more - even though I did the most really. But I just hope my mom is in a good place - a place without fear, pain, and lame remakes. Maybe Heaven is a constant Coen Bros, Weir, Spielberg and Scorcese marathon. Could be!

I'm slowly getting back to writing. I'm working with my manager on my Laid re-write. Need to re-work the beginning (to similar to Superbad - how was I to know 4 months ago when I wrote the beginning!!!???) and get some character work done.

Other than that I'm going to work on some stuff that aren't comedies, namely my horror script Route 66, my crime drama called Dakota, and another new idea callled Rollin' Thunda.

Just trying to keep busy, and finally sell one of these puppies.

K.R. 1944-2007

So, my Mom died yesterday at around noon. She had been a heavy smoker most of her life, and had battled horrific emphysema for many years.

(Hey kids - Stop smoking - Yes, it will KILL you. Chew some fucking gum.)

The real tragedy of this was the life she led. I'm won't get into specifics too much (this is a LONG story), but I'll say it involved her deteriorating health (mentally & physically), which began when I was young, at a time when people who suffered from mental health problems were labeled as simply "nuts."

The main thing she suffered from was depression, which I think began as a form of post-partum depression that went un-noticed, then spread into other things as a lack of understanding & frustration from her family basically made her an outcast. Her disintegrating marriage couldn't have helped, either. She had been diagnosed as bi-polar, with psychosis n.s., depression, and schizophrenia.

Yeah, that's a pretty bad hand to be dealt.

Note: When someone is suffering from depression, get them help (!).

I'm sure some relatives attempted to help at first, but it certainly wasn't enough, so it was left up to me. But by the time I got her the help she needed, it was too late really. Like I said, this is a long story, this only scratches the surface.

And even though 90% of childhood was a living hell, I knew that deep down she was still a good person and a loving mother, and I made my peace with her before she died. But seeing her get worse as the days passed was heart-wrenching, and although her passing has hit me like a ton of bricks, I am glad she is finally at peace. The last 30+ years of her life sucked.

She was 63.

Austin Newz

My family comedy, That's How We Roll, made it into the 2nd round of the Adult/Family portion of the Austin Screenplay Competition, but did not make the Semi cut.

Still, they say 2nd rounders are in the top 10-12 %, so I can't complain.

What Summer?

Damn, that was fast. My oldest heads back to school on Wednesday, I feel bad because his Summer was lightning quick. I hope his year goes fast, and I hope by the end of it I've got a script sold and in production.

On that end of things, there are some rumblings. My Agent pitched my family comedy A Couple Of Joes to a producer who liked the idea and wanted to read it, so we sent it to him before Labor Day. And my Manager and I went over Laid and I've been tweaking it over this past week, and am almost done Draft #2.

For music fans: Check out recent releases from The National, Editors, The Bravery, and Interpol. Good music to write to.

Late!

PS - Pic is from Hotel Chevalier, the short film that will play before The Darjeeling Limited, and stars Jason Schwartzman (as his Darjeeling character) and Natalie Portman. Super cool. Can't wait to see this!

Wait A Minute - Stills

Back in 2003 we were in production of a no-budget epic I wrote called WAIT A MINUTE. My wife and I were self-producing, and I directed and was DP, also.

Things were going pretty smoothly, and then I pulled the plug. The main concern I had was that we were wasting our time. It had a crap budget, and looked like a crap budget, and even if we finished it, NO ONE would EVER distribute it. NO ONE. It was just this scrappy little movie that would never sell.

Plus, the actors were nailing it. They all rocked. If Philly has anything, they've got a kick-ass pool of talent.

It was my own fault for ushering it into production without a real budget, but as I learned from my other past projects, it would'nt have gone anywhere. Some stills I took in '03: