DAY 19
Sunday, August 30, 1998

Final Day of Primary Shooting - and Beyond

Seattle Academy
September 14
2:25 PM
Jesse P. Howard, Director

"The Recipe"

And evreyone breathed a comfortable and collective, Phew! A sigh of relief that was to set the tone for a whole rhythm of breathing for months to come. The sigh was well-earned, deserved, and most enjoyable, BUT...

I am here to say that we breathed as a unit, but it was premature. Not to worry, we can still do something about it. It is just that we need to realize that after we exercised our deepest commitment to the project and gave until there was nothing left to give, there is still more to do. But now we have something that we didn't have before. We have the knowledge that we are extraordinary. We have found ourselves to have extraordinary abilities, tolerences, and shortcomings. (Because if you're going to have shortcomings, you might as well have extraordinary ones, right?)

This coming weekend we mount the horse again. It will seem strangely familiar and yet the worn-in saddle will need a little oil and we'll remind ourselves how we learned to make a film in three weeks and hope our short-term memories are not exhausted of their dust. There will be a feeling of, "Oh, yeah..." at the familiar tasks and, "Oh, no..." at the all-too-well remembered problems that have a way of cropping up. This bizarre mix will, strangely enough, be a comfort. What was, only a month ago, a difficult nearly impossible task sits now in my mind as a hope to return to the familiar as the real world seems strangely movie-like. This unnatural existence on the set of a film can become natural if you've the right mix of ingredients. Gotta have enough of just the right things...

The Recipe:

1 Script (Must be ripe)
2 Cups sheer will
1 Cup sheer stubbornness
1 Cup Passion (Can be passion for anything, not just filmmaking)

Mix. (Allow any passions for un-movie-related things to sit on set for three days before mixing. Watch how the film steals those passions and turns them all into passion for the movie.) Beat thouroughly until all traces of real world disappear.

In a seperate bowl blend the following:

2 Tbsp. Orginization (If available, use "Cassy Soden" brand)
2 Tbsp. Talent
2 Tbsp. Integrity (Many films don't bother with this costly ingredient, but it is essential)
4 Tbsp. Insanity (Please only use "Utter and complete" as "Partial Insanity" has been known to sour the batter.)
2 Tbsp. Experience (This can be replaced with a pinch of "Fake it til you make it.")
4 Tsp. Wonder of a child (If you are a child, be sure you still have this as others will look to you for it.)
27 Cups "Hell-u-va" Crew (Just keep piling it in. Too much is never enough.)

This recipe calls for sleep, relaxation, and time, but they are in such small quantities that there are no systems yet invented to measure them. Assume for now they are not needed.

Blend for several weeks before shooting. A dusting of "Inspiration and Vision Complex" should be added for cohesion.

Once batter is well mixed, set it in a well-greased palm (Prefferably greased with highly spendable cash in large quantities, but the illusion of cash will suffice for the first couple of days) Place on a hot, intense, fast-moving, freaked out, wild, yet motivated and ready film set for at least three weeks. If the batter starts to burn, apply sunscreen and umbrellas five times an hour.

You'll know it's done when the director says so. If he does not say so within two years, have him commited and ask the producer. (If the producer is still alive) If the producer is not available, ask the Unit Production Manager. (She is the only one who REALLY seems to know what's going on.)

Should yeild one serving of unique, original, beautiful film. If it does not...

...well... bummer. try again.

There are variations of course, but this is the basic recipe. THE LAST the end followed this recipe pretty close and I am here to say that we are on our way to the expected yeild. We are not there yet, but so far, we are, well... cookin'!

I truly have a deep respect for all who are willing to make a film and am completely grateful to those who made THIS film. You can only imagine how good it is going to taste.

Jesse P. Howard

"The Creek", Snohomish, WA
6:30 AM
Cassy Soden, Unit Production Manager

Today is the last shoot day of our grueling 3-week schedule. It's incredible how people and a place can take root in you so quickly and become so familiar. I'm at "The Creek" and the fog has returned. It reminds me of our first week of shooting except now I feel calm and relaxed.

I am asked what my job actually is. Jesse Howard's comment to me the other night says a lot. He said whenever he saw me he felt the need to look at his watch. I'll take it as a compliment. The scheduling and logistics of this project have definitely been ambitious and challenging. Shooting this much film in so many locations has felt insane at time...much of the time! But the insanity is definitely worth it! We have an amazing film and story to look forward to seeing on the big screen!

There have been many logistical nightmares. The biggest one...transportation. Moving too many people and equipment amongst multiple locations, all in one day? Insane! Todd & I joked how a line item for transportation goes into the next budget. There is still a small schedule to put together for the pick-up days in September. I think the challenge then will be keeping the fire burning. We won't have the momentum of day-after-day shooting to keep us moving. But everyone seems very committed to completing the filming.

There have been times when I thought the Howard Boys underestimated the power of this project and its effect on people who have not known them up to this point. I have definitely grown close to this project and the people and will be sad when it no longer consumes my thoughts. You definitely can get addicted to the intensity of working on a project like this.

My first order of business tonight when our shoot is complete...to take off my watch!!!

-Cassy

My office at Cornish College of the Arts, Seattle
Wednesday, 9/2/98
6:53 PM
Paul Westfall, Audio Designer

"What I Did This Summer"
       OR
"Sloth goes to Wonderland"

Beyond all conception and belief, there lies within each of us an inherent understanding of the contiuous nature of that which we are meant to do. It haunts us, in our waking hours, as that nagging feeling like we missed an appointment somewhere. It follows us in our sleep, pulls us from our slumber and we wake up, some distance between a hair's breadth and infinity from our prone bodies, just in time to fall backwards , landing like a mountain into a feather bed, not certain what it was that had hold on our soul, where it took us, or even if we have yet returned for certain. In those twilight hours before dawn comes, as we try to catch up with the sandman, we are left with a nagging doubt as to the reality of everything around us, a certain vauge realization of something greater than ourselves catches at the edges of our peripheral inner vision. It can make us nervous. Or drive us to the bathroom, to the notepad, to the word processor, to the piano, to the cemetery, to the end of our ropes.

But what is it that I am responsible to? Who is it that decided what I was meant for and what I could leave alone? It could be me. It could be some deity somewhere, and I've turned that one around and around and as near as I can tell it makes no real difference, cause the feeling persists regardless of my understanding of the source.

Perhaps if I were to somehow release myself from the bonds of the understanding of that continutiy, I could slip away, and that would be it: the end. There is that within me which craves that release from responsibility. It is that which can turn a diamond in to a cheap piece of glass, a beautiful tale into cheap cliche, dreams into a few scribbled notes. This feeling, this sloth, also lives within me, and it has a continuity which persists around my creative endeavors, like the after image left behind by a bright light in the darkness.

I have chased this part of myself, fought it at every turn for the last year while this project has been under way. Let me tell you a little story.

During pre-production for TLTE, we would start each meeting with a breif tonal chant, followed by a directed visualization. Each week a different Home Movies partner would lead the visualization. One weekend in July, as we were nearing production and still had no money, we were asked to visualize ourselves walking through a forest, then up onto a hill, where we met a future version of ourselves. We were to ask them, "How did we do it? How did we make the money to make this film? How did we make it happen?"

My peers came away from the journey with tales of hope and home, dreams of connections and serendipity which we had no concept of at the time, and which would actually manifest in the coming weeks.

But my experience was different. With great trepidation I related my story to the group. I had gone to the hill, met my future self, asked him how we did it. "You didn't", he said flatly and with great assurance. He seemed to leave no doubt in my mind that what I was trying to do was doomed to failure, and he even convinced me that failure would be one of the best things that could ever happen to our group at this time. He said that it would actually bring us closer together, that the experience would make us stronger.

He also said that not finding the money now would give us a better movie next year. "You'll find actors that are even more ideally suited to their roles. Having had more time to plan, the whole experience will be better organized, and things will be accomplished with an ease that you cannot afford now. You wait and see. You will look back on this experience and be so glad that you had to wait another year." All his words were merely the literal expression of all the nagging doubts and fears I had been wrestling with for months.

At the time, these words gave me great comfort, frightening as they were to share with my friends. They gave me a convincing way out. A way to justify my failures past and present. It was a great excuse. Having gone through the last month, I can say with great clarity that I can no longer even relate to those feelings. I am certain that if we had indeed failed to go into production, then we would have used that to our best advantage, and perhaps we would have even shared the view of my man on the hill. But the success of our filming thus far has given us strength and courage that no amount of failure could ever match. Instead of having been united by tragedy, my friends are now bonded by the utter beauty of the experience that we have created.

I remember telling Jesse Howard once during pre-production that missing our down-time this summer would be no big deal: sure, it seems like we are giving up a lot of our lesiure time now, but if I had the weeks of August off, and were to look back on them a year from now, I probably would not remember much of what had happened. Having just made a film, I have an experience which I will remember probably until the day I die.

But more than that, I feel that I have taken part in something that has altered the course of my life. I have faced my sloth and proven it's inadequacy, exposed it's lies. That is a gift I have given myself that I hope will empower me for years to come. Not only that, but making this movie has opened new doors of knowledge, given me new skills to sell, made many new contacts for me. Who knows what waters this ship my ply?

One night, during the last few days of production, as I lay in my tent listening to Snohomish sleep, I re-visited that hill, somewhere in the forest of my doubts and dreams. I found him there, still confident and self-assured. I climbed the hill slowly, looking into his eyes the whole time as we grew closer. Finally, as the space between us was less than a hand's-breadth, I spoke. Just three words:
Ha.
Ha.
Ha.

-Paul

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