Remember this video I put on YouTube last week?:
It was mentioned in The Globe and Mail about three quarters of the way down the page in this article is says:
You’re a star
Congratulations to Sean McCormick. You’re posted on YouTube under the headline “Sportsnet F-Bomb,” with video and audio showing you using the f-word during a Rogers Sportsnet telecast. When the picture disappeared for a few seconds, McCormick, a Sportsnet anchor, obviously thought the audio also was off.
A spokesman said the network received two complaints.
The video has had over 1000 views just today.
In September of 2005 I went to the Vancouver International Film Centre theatre to hear Ray Liotta, star of Goodfellas, talk about acting and the movie business at The Film and Television Trade Forum. I took some photos, one of which I posted, and video there and pretty much forgot about it until now. Flash video, YouTube in particular, were still the wave of the future and not nearly as ubiquitous as they are now so I had no real practical way of sharing what I saw. Well here it is. A clip of Ray Liotta speaking candidly about his experience with the casting process of the iconic mobster film, Goodfellas. Enjoy:
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Although small, it looks and sounds okay considering I shot it on my digital camera and not a video camera. Editing was an experience but it turned out acceptably. Not everyone can say they've done a film starring Ray Liotta. I should put it on my résumé.
UPDATE: I popped the video up on YouTube as well. It should get a few views.
Check out the website celebrating the Dutch artist’s life and work:
Rembrandt 400
Check out this 101 list from the Writers Guild of America. There are some great films on the list. The order could have been different in a few cases, however it is a fairly comprehensive list of some of the greatest scripts in American film history.
The top 10 list:
1. Casablanca
2. The Godfather
3. Chinatown
4. Citizen Kane
5. All About Eve
6. Annie Hall
7. Sunset Boulevard
8. Network
9. Some Like It Hot
10. The Godfather II
Here’s the CBC story the link was snagged from.
This is bad… really, really, really bad. Footage from a horrible martial arts film called Cui hua kuang mo (that’s Undfeatable to those of you who don’t speak Cantonese). Enjoy, if you possibly can:
[click to continue…]
I woke up feeling like I was stuck again. One of the characters was driving me nuts as were a couple of the opening scences. They been reworked to contain stronger story elements. Necessary exposition is dealt with in a far more interesting (read less boring) manner.
Quote of the day from one of my heroes, George A Romero:
“I like the idea that the monster is in us… somewhere in there. That’s why I think I prefer all this sort of transformation monsters, that grow out of humans rather than beasts that are spawned in a septic tank. But, I suppose in a way that’d be human waste, too.”
Speaking of zombies, I started reading Stephen King’s Cell. So far: yikes! Of particular interest, it’s being made into a film with Eli Roth of Hostel and Cabin Fever fame at the helm.
Added a little progress bar to the site on the right. It will measure this current writing project and those subsequent. It might be cool to show one through the actual production of a film too. Finding the time might be slightly difficult then with 18 hour days. The idea was baltantly stolen from another screenwriter’s blog – Man Bytes Hollywood – he ‘borrowed’ it from someone else who did likewise and so on. NucleusCMS had a plugin all ready for uploading to my site. Nice!
Lots of screenwriters with blogs, even Vancouverites. Like Jeff O’Brien’s Magnificent Iguana Productions. Clicking links on Jeff’s site brought some odd information to light. Jeff was born on August 5th (see his IMDb listing). Me too (mine).
As it turns out there are other people who have August 5th birthdays on IMDb as well. For example: Bob Clark – director of such films as Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things, Porky’s and of course, A Christmas Story. Three favourites for sure. Word on the street is Mr Clark will be remaking Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things here in Vancouver. Oh to play a shambling un-dead dude in a remake of such a genre classic. Dare to dream. He’ll be receiving an email shortly. Hopefully the project is still a go.
Strangely, Chuck Campbell, an actor working on Stargate here in Vancouver of late was born on August 5th, 1969… where? Halifax, Nova Scotia! Perhaps we were in the same nursery at the Grace Maternity. Weird.
From the look of this list we could put together quite the cast and crew of August the 5th babies.
There’s even a porn star. Although some were rather amusing I’m not going to quote the names of any of her films. Ew!
Although it looks like two pages it’s actually about 6 as some re-writing got done today. Friday was a “day off” as I needed time to think about some story problems. Some other things needed attention. Websites, for example:
Neither are anywhere near finished, especially Red Critter but they’ve been started all the same. I’ve also started bashing around some ideas for promotional sites for Zone 63.
Creativity Tip 1: When you’re having trouble coming up with a solution to a creative problem do something mundane and mindless: Go for a walk in the fresh air. Have a shower (A lot of problem solving seems to occur for me in the shower). Fold laundry (don’t tell Carol about this one). Just taking one’s attention away from the pressure of the actual creative project, even for a little while, allows a person to work through some things you can’t seem to get through otherwise.
Fox Searchlight is blogging the making of 28 Days Later and Trainspotting director Danny Boyle’s next project Sunshine. There are even photos from the making of Sunhine on Flikr.
More films will be doing this for nerds like us. It appears to be catching on although slowly. There are some, like Jason Reitman’s blog. He’s the director of Thank You for Smoking due to hit theatres on March 17th. That movie looks kind of fun.
Check out director Wim Wenders 50 golden rules of fimmaking in in MovieMaker Magazine’s issue #61 My Golden Rules. I was going to type them out after reading them in the past month’s issue, but found them already online. Funny stuff, but educational at the same time. This one is a favourite:
12. Don’t shoot a western if you hate horses. (But it’s okay to not be fond of cows.)
