One of the constants in this business is; Am I gonna actually get to make this movie?". They say actors get the most rejections and this is evident in the speeches they make at any award ceremony. You'd think they found a cure for cancer.
And after that it could arguably be writers, given that their pitches and outlines and screenplays are more than often turned down than made. And sometimes even when the script is bought or optioned, it never gets made.
At least writers get turned down because of their writing, actors get turned down because of the way they look. For example I remember Melissa Leo (who won Best Supporting this year) from a series called Homicide back in 1993 and said to myself, she's not pretty but she's pretty damn good as an actor. And finally it paid off but it took years.
My friends are saying this Ghostkeeper windfall that seems to come to me without me even asking, is the fruit of the many years I've put into this business. And I admit it feels good to get some attention although Ghostkeeper isn't the story I'm burning to tell. You know that it's Emperor of Mars.
But somehow I feel I owe it to the old Ghostkeeper, because that movie led me to a pretty good 30 years, up and down to be sure, but always moving forward.
So why am I so worried that it'll all fall down.
Because that's the general rule.
Even now, as I write the new proposal (which I'll post soon), there are moments when I wonder if it will really happen. That Catholic school part of me says that just when everything is going good... "you're gonna die". Or something like that.
And a director friend doesn't help when he says "Be careful crossing streets".
Age is definitely a factor, when I was 22 I would take any dare and expect to win every time. But years and a few accidents on mountain bikes and bad TV shows made me a little more mortal. Not to mention losing both parents over the last 10 years.
As someone once said, "you're next".
I have to admit that this Ghostkeeper remake is probably the most confident project I've had in years, the pieces are falling together faster than I can keep count. So what else can I worry about?
Well, what if one or more of the actors still alive, don't want to be in the movie or we can't find them anymore? The answer is simply "change the script". But one of the corners I'm putting myself in is this; if only one element changes, I could be stuck.
What can happen?
1. One or more of the actors can't/won't be in it. Having the 4 original actors in the movie is crucial.
2. The hotel decides not to give us the permission to film there.
3. There's no snow in that window of 6 weeks when the hotel closes for awhile.
4. We can't find all the funding in time.
Also I have written and directed 3 movies, and had complete freedom on all of them. Now, if we have a funding distributor, they're gonna want to be on set standing behind me all the time and watching those damn monitors.
But for now, I guess I am moving forward, because that's the only thing I know, never go backwards, you just tend to fall alot.
(Mon: new details)
Showing posts with label Ghostkeeper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ghostkeeper. Show all posts
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Monday, February 7, 2011
Changes in attitude...
It normally takes me a few days to get into a screenplay, sort of like dating; some dancing around, some flirting, some insight and finally you dive in, damn the consequences, it totally inhales you.
I started writing last Monday, after looking for anything I could do instead of writing. As I've said before, rather than getting easy for me after 30 years of screenwriting (excluding the other years of writing commercials and documentaries) it gets harder.
Why? Because I'm competing with myself and also I know too much about the process (and thus know the shortcuts, the easy outs and the best way to avoid writing).
And a main problem of this screenplay is that I am writing the real actors rather than made-up characters.
A word on "made up characters" first. When I began writing, way back in the early years, I would fill out the script guru's requirements for a character, what's his name, how far did he go in school, what's his pet peeve and many more useless things. Those of you who write knew what this is.
But I found my characters lacked... well... character. They were one dimensional and each character spoke like the same person. There was no individual voice to the separate characters.
This thing took me a long time to figure out, at least 3 years to a point, but my best character driven script came almost 10 years after my first screenplay. And that was Emperor of Mars, arguably my best screenplay. And never made. Yet!
What I learned was to borrow characters; in other words use people I knew or people I've watched in cafes or parties or wherever. Like Sunday morning, riding on Venice Beach with my usual group of ex-pat Canadians, I passed a couple walking from a cafe and noticed the man mimicking a waiter inside, he made faces and spoke in what was the waiter's voice.
In that instant, and that's how long it took, my memory froze that image of the man and his imitation and his wife's reaction. I could suddenly see a character based on what I witnessed for maybe 30-40 seconds.
It only took me 30 years to learn how to do this.
Okay, less than that, but I always marvel at how I can be doing one thing and then something in my brain catches something else, a man or a woman or a child doing something unique. And it automatically files itself into my hard drive corner in my mind.
After Emperor I began using real people as a basis for characters, people like the development exec who was an alcoholic and swore like a sailor and whom I still respect in terms of her ability to come up with great notes. Based loosely on her and a woman who had a great first name, Kylie, and a bit of my ex, who was and is a terrific woman and the total opposite of Kylie, but my ex's upbringing in Oregon helped me with the feel of the town Kylie came from. I began to assemble a character that was real.
She was a bourbon-drinking ex druggie who burned out in L.A. and made her way back to the Pacific northwest to confront her father for screwing up her life. I still love the title; "Secrets of the Salmon" after an article I read about how salmon have a homing device, returning to where they were born. Anyone for metaphors?
So real that Jody Foster's company couldn't believe a man wrote it but also wanted to know who the woman was. I said she was "Kylie" and left it at that. I also have a great way to write women's parts so much that they really like them. More on that later.
And this method has worked for me since then. But Ghostkeeper was different.
Now I was writing actual living characters, in the sense that the actors from the original Ghostkeeper (1980) were playing themselves in the Ghostkeeper remake. So I was now faced with writing dialog not based on people, but the actual people.
And you know what? They all sounded the same. Why? Because I didn't want to insult, hurt or make fun of them, after all they are my friends and I was treating them like royalty, no swearing, no anger, no confusion... no conflict.
No conflict is death. Without conflict there is no story, no drama.
So I tried something else; I tried to use gossip instead, you know "That Murray, sometimes he's a real pain". Well, I made Murray be a real pain for a scene. And for someone else, "she tells her husband when to sit, where to sit and how to sit", and I used that attitude for another one of the actors.
And by Friday the characters had taken their own direction, becoming real fictional characters who were moving in the direction they wanted, not necessarily what I wanted. And when that happens to me, I know they are coming alive.
A lot of people don't understand that phenomenon whereby characters begin to leap off the page and become different things. It really does happen and after awhile I feel like I'm just the typist and they are telling me what to do.
And believe me, it doesn't always happen this easily. Of course the main advantage here is that I am writing the screenplay as a spec, sort of, and I don't have to listen to development execs give me notes every week for 6 weeks or longer.
I'll finish this first draft by the end of the week, I hope.
(Thurs: Reality vs Myth - the Windigo)
I started writing last Monday, after looking for anything I could do instead of writing. As I've said before, rather than getting easy for me after 30 years of screenwriting (excluding the other years of writing commercials and documentaries) it gets harder.
Why? Because I'm competing with myself and also I know too much about the process (and thus know the shortcuts, the easy outs and the best way to avoid writing).
And a main problem of this screenplay is that I am writing the real actors rather than made-up characters.
A word on "made up characters" first. When I began writing, way back in the early years, I would fill out the script guru's requirements for a character, what's his name, how far did he go in school, what's his pet peeve and many more useless things. Those of you who write knew what this is.
But I found my characters lacked... well... character. They were one dimensional and each character spoke like the same person. There was no individual voice to the separate characters.
This thing took me a long time to figure out, at least 3 years to a point, but my best character driven script came almost 10 years after my first screenplay. And that was Emperor of Mars, arguably my best screenplay. And never made. Yet!
What I learned was to borrow characters; in other words use people I knew or people I've watched in cafes or parties or wherever. Like Sunday morning, riding on Venice Beach with my usual group of ex-pat Canadians, I passed a couple walking from a cafe and noticed the man mimicking a waiter inside, he made faces and spoke in what was the waiter's voice.
In that instant, and that's how long it took, my memory froze that image of the man and his imitation and his wife's reaction. I could suddenly see a character based on what I witnessed for maybe 30-40 seconds.
It only took me 30 years to learn how to do this.
Okay, less than that, but I always marvel at how I can be doing one thing and then something in my brain catches something else, a man or a woman or a child doing something unique. And it automatically files itself into my hard drive corner in my mind.
After Emperor I began using real people as a basis for characters, people like the development exec who was an alcoholic and swore like a sailor and whom I still respect in terms of her ability to come up with great notes. Based loosely on her and a woman who had a great first name, Kylie, and a bit of my ex, who was and is a terrific woman and the total opposite of Kylie, but my ex's upbringing in Oregon helped me with the feel of the town Kylie came from. I began to assemble a character that was real.
She was a bourbon-drinking ex druggie who burned out in L.A. and made her way back to the Pacific northwest to confront her father for screwing up her life. I still love the title; "Secrets of the Salmon" after an article I read about how salmon have a homing device, returning to where they were born. Anyone for metaphors?
So real that Jody Foster's company couldn't believe a man wrote it but also wanted to know who the woman was. I said she was "Kylie" and left it at that. I also have a great way to write women's parts so much that they really like them. More on that later.
And this method has worked for me since then. But Ghostkeeper was different.
Now I was writing actual living characters, in the sense that the actors from the original Ghostkeeper (1980) were playing themselves in the Ghostkeeper remake. So I was now faced with writing dialog not based on people, but the actual people.
And you know what? They all sounded the same. Why? Because I didn't want to insult, hurt or make fun of them, after all they are my friends and I was treating them like royalty, no swearing, no anger, no confusion... no conflict.
No conflict is death. Without conflict there is no story, no drama.
So I tried something else; I tried to use gossip instead, you know "That Murray, sometimes he's a real pain". Well, I made Murray be a real pain for a scene. And for someone else, "she tells her husband when to sit, where to sit and how to sit", and I used that attitude for another one of the actors.
And by Friday the characters had taken their own direction, becoming real fictional characters who were moving in the direction they wanted, not necessarily what I wanted. And when that happens to me, I know they are coming alive.
A lot of people don't understand that phenomenon whereby characters begin to leap off the page and become different things. It really does happen and after awhile I feel like I'm just the typist and they are telling me what to do.
And believe me, it doesn't always happen this easily. Of course the main advantage here is that I am writing the screenplay as a spec, sort of, and I don't have to listen to development execs give me notes every week for 6 weeks or longer.
I'll finish this first draft by the end of the week, I hope.
(Thurs: Reality vs Myth - the Windigo)
Monday, January 24, 2011
What you need to write
Sometime today I will begin to write the sequel to Ghostkeeper. My writing schedule has always been morning. And I usually write for no more than two hours. Today though, I have to write the blog first, which usually is around 8 am and takes me around 30 minutes or so.
There is a danger in writing so early, at least for me. You see, I like to be fresh, nothing should stand in the way of my writing. I don't want to listen to music, I don't have a coffee on my desk and I don't want phone calls.
What happens if the phone rings? Or if coffee is reachable?
Then I will find an excuse not to write for a few minutes.
There are at least 300 books on screenwriting and most of them have their own theories as to how to write the great script. Yet, last Friday I listened to Ben Affleck at a screening talking about how he co-wrote The Town and how hard it was to find a great script. I am not Ben's greatest fan, but that's another story.
The obvious question here is that, with all the screenwriters in the world running to Los Angeles and with 10,000 WGA writers already here... why aren't there a lot of good screenplays then?
A friend of mine and I have a theory, we realized that between us, we've probably seen every kind of genre, every twist, every surprise ending and every type of character there ever was. So what's left?
For a start, it helps to have lived a curious life, meaning that it helps if you are curious. About everything. Some of the best characters and dialog I've ever written was basically borrowed from watching real people living real life.
And life experience is essential if you want to write, or act or direct.
For example, take Tom Selleck and Mark Harmon. As younger actors, they were considered "pretty boys", handsome in that Sears catalog kind of way but with little talent. But I watched a bit of their respective TV shows recently, NCIS and Blue Blood and I noticed something curious...
Whenever either of them were not in the scene, the scene felt empty. I've long said that the supporting casts of the procedural TV shows like CSI and NCIS are so bland that they could change shows and nobody would know the difference.
But Selleck and Harmon stood out. And I began to realize why.
They were older. Their faces had wrinkles. And they were relaxed and enjoying themselves because they had the comfort of confidence as well as years of experience and the access to options that they didn't have when they were younger.
They were easy to watch and comforting to an audience, and that's what made them interesting to watch.
The same thing goes for writing, the more you have lived, the more you have to write about. There are exceptions of course, but those are the talented ones. I've told you before that I'm not particularly talented, but I am stubborn has hell. It took me a long time to learn how to write good, maybe 6 years of writing bad scripts.
I'm still not good on story, my characters are colorful and believable and my dialog is pretty damn good. But stories are not the easiest thing for me. If they were I would have sold the 34 specs I currently still own.
Why haven't they sold? Well, because so far nobody likes them enough. Does that mean I'm a bad writer? No, it means that nobody's come along who likes them.
It's kind of like decorating your home; some friends will like it, some will be ambivolent and some will dislike it.
And like Tom and Mark, I am comfortable in my abilities. I'm never sure if anyone will like my screenplays, but like those two guys, I don't really care. With having written and/or rewritten 18 produced movies and having worked on at least 30 unproduced movies I know that I have accomplished my initial goal.
To be a working writer in Hollywood.
Now, I am forcing myself like crazy to end the blog and start writing. Maybe I should have a coffee first though?
(Thurs: Progress?)
There is a danger in writing so early, at least for me. You see, I like to be fresh, nothing should stand in the way of my writing. I don't want to listen to music, I don't have a coffee on my desk and I don't want phone calls.
What happens if the phone rings? Or if coffee is reachable?
Then I will find an excuse not to write for a few minutes.
There are at least 300 books on screenwriting and most of them have their own theories as to how to write the great script. Yet, last Friday I listened to Ben Affleck at a screening talking about how he co-wrote The Town and how hard it was to find a great script. I am not Ben's greatest fan, but that's another story.
The obvious question here is that, with all the screenwriters in the world running to Los Angeles and with 10,000 WGA writers already here... why aren't there a lot of good screenplays then?
A friend of mine and I have a theory, we realized that between us, we've probably seen every kind of genre, every twist, every surprise ending and every type of character there ever was. So what's left?
For a start, it helps to have lived a curious life, meaning that it helps if you are curious. About everything. Some of the best characters and dialog I've ever written was basically borrowed from watching real people living real life.
And life experience is essential if you want to write, or act or direct.
For example, take Tom Selleck and Mark Harmon. As younger actors, they were considered "pretty boys", handsome in that Sears catalog kind of way but with little talent. But I watched a bit of their respective TV shows recently, NCIS and Blue Blood and I noticed something curious...
Whenever either of them were not in the scene, the scene felt empty. I've long said that the supporting casts of the procedural TV shows like CSI and NCIS are so bland that they could change shows and nobody would know the difference.
But Selleck and Harmon stood out. And I began to realize why.
They were older. Their faces had wrinkles. And they were relaxed and enjoying themselves because they had the comfort of confidence as well as years of experience and the access to options that they didn't have when they were younger.
They were easy to watch and comforting to an audience, and that's what made them interesting to watch.
The same thing goes for writing, the more you have lived, the more you have to write about. There are exceptions of course, but those are the talented ones. I've told you before that I'm not particularly talented, but I am stubborn has hell. It took me a long time to learn how to write good, maybe 6 years of writing bad scripts.
I'm still not good on story, my characters are colorful and believable and my dialog is pretty damn good. But stories are not the easiest thing for me. If they were I would have sold the 34 specs I currently still own.
Why haven't they sold? Well, because so far nobody likes them enough. Does that mean I'm a bad writer? No, it means that nobody's come along who likes them.
It's kind of like decorating your home; some friends will like it, some will be ambivolent and some will dislike it.
And like Tom and Mark, I am comfortable in my abilities. I'm never sure if anyone will like my screenplays, but like those two guys, I don't really care. With having written and/or rewritten 18 produced movies and having worked on at least 30 unproduced movies I know that I have accomplished my initial goal.
To be a working writer in Hollywood.
Now, I am forcing myself like crazy to end the blog and start writing. Maybe I should have a coffee first though?
(Thurs: Progress?)
Monday, January 17, 2011
Moving along with the Ghostkeeper
After a week of indecision, apprehension and just not wanting to write, I finally settled on what has to be done first.
And that's Ghostkeeper, which, if you read the last blog is almost as sure as a sure thing can be. At the very least, Ghostkeeper 1980 will be re-released by late summer, maybe in time for the Deer Lodge hotel reunion which the hotel managed told me about, wherein every living employee who ever worked there were expected to attend.
And my cast, crew and myself were also invited.
If it seems odd to attend a reunion where I made a horror film, remember, I didn't ask, they offered. And truthfully, Ghostkeeper is more cerebral than gory.
So today, Monday, I officially started the Ghostkeeper project which includes the following:
1. Sign and mail the distribution contract for Gkpr 1.
2. Notify the British horror magazine writers who wrote great reviews of Gkpr 1 as well as interviews with me.
3. Began writing an outline for Gkpr 2 to be followed almost immediately with the screenplay.
4. Begin looking for funding partners in the U.S. along with tax credits and/or incentives from Canada.
So here's what a few people thought of Gkpr 1:
"Ghostkeeper is one of those gems that are hard to come by but rewarding when discovered"
"The acting is solid and the atmosphere of fear and total isolation is well-captured."
"A film I recommend to all true horror buffs"
"One of the better 80's horror films; the storyline is original and the atmosphere is creepy."
"There's a feeling of dread so thick you could cut it's bloodied heart out with a knife".
"The imagery wedges it's way under your skin and sets up camp there."
How's that for compliments? And I do agree with the creepiness of Gkpr 1, but admit the screenplay was not great, my first one, as well as having to compromise the ending due to budget constraints.
But then there's also these reviews:
"I don't know what this movie is about because there is hardly any story... even at the very end you don't have a single clue what was going on there."
"Quite possibly the worst film I've ever seen."
"This has to be possibly the worst-acted film I've ever seen."
"The whole film is a long build-up to nothing."
"An awful screenplay, laughable performances and a copious lack of flesh, a sorry piece of trash that should be avoided at all costs."
See what I'm up against?
The best thing is that the good reviews are quite long and detailed, while most of the bad ones are a few sentences. And I'm going to use all the criticisms as my guide to the new screenplay for Gkpr 2, even incorporate them into the dialog in some instances.
In this way I can not only come up with something that has suspense and a sense of humor but also write a way better screenplay than I did 30 years ago. And this time I won't be forced to cut back the ending due to lack of money.
While I am going ahead with Gkpr 2, at the same time, I will do short 3-page outlines for my two series ideas as well as the same for the two Christmas stories. Once the Gkpr screenplay is finished I will throw myself into both Christmas stories in order to have them ready to show by the end of March or April. Just in time to hopefully sell one or the other in time to film in late summer.
In the same way as Town that Christmas Forgot was filmed, in the heat of August yet when viewed you'd think they filmed in December.
What I hope to illustrate here is the randomness of screenwriting, the ability to turn your world around and force you to choose a direction that came up unexpectedly, even if it might be harder and to leave behind that which isn't as solid. And even if it might have been the wrong choice.
So hang around a little more, see what happens in the next 2 months.
(Thurs: The new Ghostkeeper)
And that's Ghostkeeper, which, if you read the last blog is almost as sure as a sure thing can be. At the very least, Ghostkeeper 1980 will be re-released by late summer, maybe in time for the Deer Lodge hotel reunion which the hotel managed told me about, wherein every living employee who ever worked there were expected to attend.
And my cast, crew and myself were also invited.
If it seems odd to attend a reunion where I made a horror film, remember, I didn't ask, they offered. And truthfully, Ghostkeeper is more cerebral than gory.
So today, Monday, I officially started the Ghostkeeper project which includes the following:
1. Sign and mail the distribution contract for Gkpr 1.
2. Notify the British horror magazine writers who wrote great reviews of Gkpr 1 as well as interviews with me.
3. Began writing an outline for Gkpr 2 to be followed almost immediately with the screenplay.
4. Begin looking for funding partners in the U.S. along with tax credits and/or incentives from Canada.
So here's what a few people thought of Gkpr 1:
"Ghostkeeper is one of those gems that are hard to come by but rewarding when discovered"
"The acting is solid and the atmosphere of fear and total isolation is well-captured."
"A film I recommend to all true horror buffs"
"One of the better 80's horror films; the storyline is original and the atmosphere is creepy."
"There's a feeling of dread so thick you could cut it's bloodied heart out with a knife".
"The imagery wedges it's way under your skin and sets up camp there."
How's that for compliments? And I do agree with the creepiness of Gkpr 1, but admit the screenplay was not great, my first one, as well as having to compromise the ending due to budget constraints.
But then there's also these reviews:
"I don't know what this movie is about because there is hardly any story... even at the very end you don't have a single clue what was going on there."
"Quite possibly the worst film I've ever seen."
"This has to be possibly the worst-acted film I've ever seen."
"The whole film is a long build-up to nothing."
"An awful screenplay, laughable performances and a copious lack of flesh, a sorry piece of trash that should be avoided at all costs."
See what I'm up against?
The best thing is that the good reviews are quite long and detailed, while most of the bad ones are a few sentences. And I'm going to use all the criticisms as my guide to the new screenplay for Gkpr 2, even incorporate them into the dialog in some instances.
In this way I can not only come up with something that has suspense and a sense of humor but also write a way better screenplay than I did 30 years ago. And this time I won't be forced to cut back the ending due to lack of money.
While I am going ahead with Gkpr 2, at the same time, I will do short 3-page outlines for my two series ideas as well as the same for the two Christmas stories. Once the Gkpr screenplay is finished I will throw myself into both Christmas stories in order to have them ready to show by the end of March or April. Just in time to hopefully sell one or the other in time to film in late summer.
In the same way as Town that Christmas Forgot was filmed, in the heat of August yet when viewed you'd think they filmed in December.
What I hope to illustrate here is the randomness of screenwriting, the ability to turn your world around and force you to choose a direction that came up unexpectedly, even if it might be harder and to leave behind that which isn't as solid. And even if it might have been the wrong choice.
So hang around a little more, see what happens in the next 2 months.
(Thurs: The new Ghostkeeper)
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Thanksgiving, the lost week & Ghostkeeper
It just goes to show that it's really true that if you wait long enough, someone will say something nice about you.
- Ghostkeeper is a pretty creepy and atmospheric horror film which will keep you guessing until the end. The acting is solid and the atmosphere of fear and total isolation is well-captured.
- Ghostkeeper is one of those unknown horror gems that are hard to come by, but rewarding when discovered.
- There's a very odd eeriness here that keeps it worthwhile and better production values than most other films of it's calibre makes it a film I recommend to true horror films.
- An underrated horror gem and one of the better early 80's horrors.
- A remarkably eerie and very atmospheric horror film... a pretty top notch 80's horror flick.
Well, those reviews made me feel almost ready for a Manhattan on the rocks. But I'm not accepting the award yet...
- "The Shining" for dummies.
- Ghostkeeper is not as good as others would have you believe.
- I simply don't know what this movie is about because there is hardly any story in this film, even at the very end you don't have a single clue to what was going on.
- Dull, derivative and unmemorable.
Well, you can't win everyone.
You can read these and more on www.imdb.com and just enter Ghostkeeper in the Search box and scroll down.
Given that most of these people saw a badly aged video with poor color and, to my taste, barely watchable. I figured the least I could do is give them a decent copy of the movie, even to the ones who steal it. More on this as it happens.
So to my American relative and friends, have a safe and happy Thanksgiving, I plan to indulge in as much food as I possibly can with my friends with a promised warm 82F day.
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