Methodfest

We have good and bad news to report today. While we sent off our film to yet another film festival, Methodfest, we also received word from Sundance that we had not been selected this year. I can't say that I'm surprised, and I'm not letting this discourage me as I don't believe that Sundance values the independent film as do some other festivals. So we are trudging forward and looking forward to hearing back from other festivals we've submitted to and future ones we will be submitting to.

Tribecca

Last week we submitted to our 4th film festival - Tribecca. Unlike the other festivals we've previously applied to, they required us to submitt our press kit with our application. So at 2am Friday morning after working 14 hours on One Tree Hill, I rushed around trying to put our press kit together. The upside is that now, I have all my press kits together for any future needs.

Cinequest

We submitted to our 3rd film festival this week - Cinequest.

Cinequest takes place Feb. 27 - March 9, 2008 in San Jose, CA.

Altared Premiere

On Sat, Oct. 20th, approximately 70 people filled King Auditorium on the campus of UNCW, anxiously awaiting the first ever screening of the film Altared. The free screening was part of UNCW's Frugal Filmmaker series and involved a Q&A session afterwards with first time writer/director Kara Still. Throughout the film the audience laughed at the one liners, cringed at the medieval/voodoo references, bopped along to the fantastic soundtrack, and shuttered at the fight scenes.


The Q&A afterwards and the comment cards we received exhibited great feedback. People were amazed at the calibur of acting and the quality of the cinematography and sound in such a low budget film. Special kuddos went out to Aerli, Laurel, Mick, Virginia and Chris for their performances. The audience hated "the bad girl" Lucy and some even asked if Aerli was really like that. Nope not at all...she's just that great of an actor. They also found the "weird girl" Zoey (played by Virginia) to be a welcomed comic relief that came at precisely the right moment. Lots of comments were also made as to how great a job Chris did at letting his character Carl change from serious to a more playful character when introduced to Zoey. It showed the true nature of people being influenced by other people to behave a certain way and in this case people saw Carl behaving more like himself around Zoey than he did around his wife, Lucy.


Some questioned me about the autobiographical nature of the film. As most of you are aware, a lot of the film and characters are autobiographical but most of the situations created with the characters are not. The film is, however, meant to register familiar in some compacity with most people (male and female) that have had a serious relationship and then for some reason lost that relationship.


The audience did catch on to the color palette used in the film and questioned me, specifically about what the purple in the film meant. They loved the soundtrack and even wanted to know where they could get a copy of it. Overall, they thought it was one of the better independent films they had seen and was sure that this would be a "good calling card" for us.


All in all the screening was a tremendous success. Afterwards, the party moved back to my house for drinks and snacks. We had a fire going out back that burned until 3am when the last partygoer left. It was a good chance for all the cast and friends to celebrate a job well done and mingle. The investors were both in attendance and very pleased with what they saw. In fact, we've already started discussing our next film.

"Unofficial" Premiere in Wilmington

It's official...or rather "unofficial" that we will be holding a premiere screening of Altared in Wilmington. The screening is set for Saturday, Oct. 20th at 7:30pm. The film is part of UNCW's filmmaker series so it will screen at King Auditorium on the Campus of UNCW. Invitations and flyers were sent out via email, but if anyone is still lacking pertinent info or directions, please don't hesitate to contact me. And, of course, tell all your friends (as I'm sure you've already done). The auditorium holds 160, but make sure to come early to ensure you get a good seat. See you all there!

Slamdance

We've officially submitted to two festivals now, Sundance and Slamdance. Our hope is that if we don't make the cut at Sundance that we'll manage to make our way in to Slamdance. For those of you unaware of Slamdance, it's a festival that was designed to do what Sundance sought out to do in the beginning - find the unknown and introduce them to the world. Slamdance runs in January, the same time Sundance runs and while it has different venues than Sundance, they are all strategically located in Park City, Utah. Ergo, we can capitalize off the Sundance attendees since we'll be screening in the same town during the same time. So our fingers are crossed that we'll premiere the film at one of these two festivals...of course we have to wait until December to find out.

Sun Dancing

As of 10:30 am pacific time Altared was officially submitted to its first film festival - Sundance. Twelve days of shooting, 7 days of ADR, and 2 years of editing and it's just getting started. Amazing what time, energy, money and research goes in to making a movie...especially an independent one. While we realize that Sundance (being the most competitive film festival internationally), is a bit of a long shot, there was still a reason to dance out of the Fedex office yesterday afternoon.

September 15th - it was the deadline we've had all along to have the film finished by and while the date (also being the Sundance deadline date) might not prove fruitful for our festival ventures, it is a marker in the progress of this film. Although we are still perfecting and tweaking the film (and probably will do until a distributor takes it away from us), we finally at long last have a very good, viewable copy of the film.

So, of course our first impulse is - let's show it to somebody! Last Sunday we did just that. We had a small, select screening with the investors, a One Tree Hill actress, and a few other film and nonfilm types that knew little or nothing about the film. And the feedback off the screening proved to be tremendously helpful. Unanimously, they LOVED the music, cringed at the cum scene and laughed at the old men in the shed. They differed on what story lines they were confused by, which characters they loved, and which ones they didn't. Overall, we made some changes based upon this feedback that we think has cleared up some confusing story lines, added tension to confrontations and fights, and tightened up a few awkward transitions.

While there are some editorial decisions that were made that were not my preferred choice, they were done out of necessity, for I was often forced to edit around continuity problems within scenes. My concern about some of these less than desirable choices was eased after the screening as I questioned the attendees specifically about these instances. Some of the instances are less noticeable as the scene hasn't changed dramatically due to the continuity mishaps, I've simply had to cut to a shot I had not originally intended to at that point. In other instances, we've resulted to utilizing flashbacks during the scene to allow us to cut around continuity errors. In the end, I'm happy with the results it just required a lot more work since we didn't have the luxury of reshoots.

In addition, we sent the film to producer Gill Holland in NY upon his request to screen it. His comments were:
"it is solid, well-made , will be good calling card" . . . "So glad I got to see it...it is at times sexy and fresh and there are some
interesting new viewpoints." He suggested we submit to women's festivals like madcat, in addition to Cannes, SXSW, Tribeca, Mill Valley, Seattle, Palm Springs, Florida, Genart...and oh yeah, Slamdance...

And so our next deadline looms upon us...October 9th - Slamdance.

Until then we'll continue to tweak the sound, play with the fantasy effects, and gather and prepare our press kit info. So for those of you actors that still haven't submitted your headshots and bios as requested...hurry up! Just remember the press kit is a way for YOU to get more exposure, so it would behoove you to send me your stuff.

We're also making plans to have a screening of the film in the near future. We're looking in to places so if anyone has suggestions (especially cheap ones!) we'd love to hear them.

If you want to check out any of our music choices, there's some links below. We received CDs from bands all over the US, Canada and Europe and Gill Holland and sonaBLAST gave us the rights to use any of their artists' music. The bands/artists we've used are: Mark Geary, Kelley McRae, BLOCK, The Old Ceremony, Tom Rhodes, Jared Booth, Puritan Rodeo, Da Howlies and piano music by Melinda Harper.

http://www.myspace.com/puritanrodeo
www.puritanrodeo.com

http://www.myspace.com/tomrhodes
www.tomrhodesmusic.com

http://www.myspace.com/jaredboothmusic
www.jaredbooth.com

http://www.myspace.com/kelleymcrae
www.kelleymcrae.com

http://www.myspace.com/markgeary
www.markgeary.com

http://www.myspace.com/theoldceremony
www.theoldceremony.com

http://www.myspace.com/howlies
www.dahowlies.com

You can also check out the bands on our film website:
http://www.myspace.com/themoviealtared

Marsh test

Happy Birthday Marshall!

Foot Detox

To cleanse one's body there's this device known as an aqua chi. It sends a harmless, electrical current into a tub of salt water that we put our feet in. Otherwise, known as a foot detox. The results are colorful - orange, brown, green, black, rust, metallic flakes, bubbles and pools of lard. All of this oozing out of our feet makes us feel healthy and better. It cleanses our body of impurtities, thus making us mentally feel better about all the crap we put into our body. And so we go back a week or two later and the colors start to fade. The ultimate goal - clear water. A fresh start. A chance to renew our bodies and start again, hopefully choosing more wisely this time about what we put in or expose our bodies to. The ideal would be all organic and no toxins. Now if only cleansing our soul and wiping the slate clean was as easy.

How wonderful would it be to detox your soul of all the misdeeds you'd done, all the heartache from lovers who weren't worth it anyway, all the bad decisions that are still slapping you in the face every time you turn a corner? If only the aqua chi renewed our souls the way it does our bodies, there would be a lot less depression and anxiety and stress, and people as a whole would be happier. For as great as a foot detox is, it can't mend a broken soul or even repair a bruised one. The key to strengthening one's soul is one of the hardest things to learn how to do. We're always looking for the quick fix and then promising to do better next time.