C+

I can't look at myself on screen.

Imagine watching yourself making the same mistakes over and over again, and your helpless to do anything about it. Now imagine a room full of people watching this with you.

They're not really mistakes though, let me explain.

Have you ever come out of an exam and thought "Damn! I should have done that question this way!" and you go over it endlessly till your pretty sure you flunked the whole exam. And it's obviously to late to go back and change anything cos it's in the editor..err, examiners hands now. Well, that's how I feel after a scene has been shot, except my paper is gonna be shown to as many people as possible. However, they won't see these 'mistakes'. Thankfully, these mistakes are only for me to bear, as my mind plays out all the different things I could have (should have?) done to improve my character.

We are almost at the end of the film.

I don't think anyone will ever know the lesson in expectations this sentence has come to symbolise for us. As a producer I feel tired. Weary. But I smile as I see to the completion of this production I helped create.

As an actor I quickly turn away from it, and try my best to forget it, till the report card comes in.

Neil

The Calm Before The Storm....

Hey again,

Just woke up, its like 7am, we have filming in like two hours. Today a very very big scene and also very important. We got around seven actors, acting together, so we expecting quite a confusion. Hopefully not!

Anyways yesterday Neil, James and I went to Chris to arrange the room, there was quite a mess and I mean a mess, around 3cm of dust all around the room, including on the chairs and tables. We cleaned the room, and made it look more like a “Meeting Scene”, we added maps and blueprints to the table, stuck up lots of cutouts on the walls, added some computers to the table…etc. It came very good I must say.

We also did a run through of our lines, and went over the script. Hopefully well enough for today.

Anyways time is running out… I gotta go. Hopefully the scene will come good today. We will let you know how things went later on.

That’s it for now :)

Well It's Not Just Bad News...

So, I haven’t written here in quite a while. At the moment things seem to be very tense, we have a lot of very important scenes to film in the coming days. Also to add to the tension Charlotte is leaving Malta in two weeks, so we have got to try and finish all her scenes before she goes.

I just got back from James. We discussed and planned a few things regarding the upcoming scenes. Now tomorrow we are going to Ann to discuss her scene with her. Basically the scene we are going to be doing at her house this coming Saturday.

Anyways…..today I spoke to someone regarding the film, and whether it will be possible to go on one of the programs on television to speak about the film, the company, what we are planning to do etc. Maybe even show a few scenes…who knows. Although nothing is for certain, he still needs to give me a reply.

Also some more good news….I think we might have found a possible location to use for the Film premier, although it’s not the ideal place, I think it could still be used.

Im off for now, I'll post again soon :)

It's All About The Long Term

It's been one hectic week for me and a whole lot of problems for the studio seem to be getting ready to dump themselves on us weeks in adavance! It's ok, I can take it ... I can take it.

Well, I won't offload the details of the problems, I'll leave that luxery to James. But the hill looks very steep from where I'm standing. What with school and a few dozen assignments, personal projects and life in general. I can only imagine how busy the other actors are right now. Most of them attend University, all are in some kind of school. Since the start of the film the team has lost touch. I always end up feeling awkward asking an actor if they can film or not on some date because a) They are doing it for free and b) I'm not thier closest friend, I don't have much right (read none) asking them to film. But, we will all benefit from this, and hopefully, if this studio works out, the benefit will be long term for all of us.

I was wondering if any other Independent film makers or actors read this blog the other day, if you are one, drop us a comment, we'd love to discuss any aspect of independent film making and acting. Even if your not a film maker or actor really.

Sigh Of Relief.....

Hey,

Just got back from Alan's house....phew, seems like we managed to film everything we had planned.
My lesson finished at 6.30pm, it was in Sliema by the way, I rushed to Swieqi in 7 minutes and we filmed mine and Neil's part. Hope it came good!

So....Trying to arrange whats happenin tonight. Have no idea yet.

Regarding this weekend, so far we dont have anythin really planned, most probably we gonna try to do the Begger scene if Aaron can.

Anyways I gotta go, I'll post again soon...

It's Only Making a Film

Another week gone by. Actually since we're talking in filming terms here, weekEND, since those are the only days most actors are able to film. Very, very soon we're going to have a teaser/trailer up!! It's a teaser really because apparently we didn't have enough footage to make a proper trailer (...we've only been filming for 14 months, you see?).

Today we might have made a contact within the local public TV sector. We're all a bit excited about it but trying to tell ourselves that we won't be millionaires by this coming Wednesday. Especially since today is almost over.

Last night we were discussing starting a new film, but decided to stick with our current project and our plans for its sequel. Our current project is really just that, a project we started to teach ourselves all about filming a movie. Well...ok, we didn't initially set out to teach ourselves (back then we knew it all already). But along the way we've learnt how to act (or at least the meaning of it), work with a camera, edit footage, write scripts, manage schedules, time and people. We've learnt what constitutes a problem to shooting a scene (everything!), that six hours filming to three minutes edited footage is a good ratio. And we now understand the value of inspiration, dedication, motivation and hard work. [James' Note: We still have to learn the meaning of deadline.]

We won't stop learning the meaning of creativity and we will never forget the feeling of expressing it.

Later

Hey again.....

Hey.

Exhausted; just got back from gym...thought I'd post something. So... we didn't film anything this weekend - hopefully next weekend we'll do another two scenes. Maybe at Alan, I hope. Speaking about this another problem just cropped up... I spoke to Alan this morning and just found out his uncle moved out most of the furniture from his house. Just great! We've gotta see how we're gonna film the scene now.

Finally saw the scene of Sean and Sydney (the conversation in my garden). It came very good, though there are a few lines we might have to arrange here and there. There are one or two pictures of this scene in James' post for ya to see.

Just saw a few more scenes from the film... It's coming really good. I uploaded two pictures taken from "The introduction scene", you can take a look at them below.

Anyways that's it for now. I'll post again soon =)

A Word From Sean....

Hey,

So this is my first blog.....First of all I'm sure you are wondering, who is Sean? Well Sean is the character I play in the film. He is basically the head, leader, boss.. whatever you want to call him, of a gang. He is asked to put a team togther to steal a painting..a very expensive one I might add. I think that's about all I'll say for now; don't wanna reveal too much....

Anyways... Filming was ok on Thursday, I mean apart from almost 1 million problems... well more like 2 or 3, we eventually managed to film it. Charlotte was in one of her moods, as usual, but from what I saw it came good...I hope. I still have to see the scene, most probably I'll go to James' house some time today to see it.

We didn't manage to film at Alan's today, as usual, some problem cropped up.

Film is coming great so far, especially the new scenes. We should be finished very soon.
I think thats about it for now, I'll post again soon.

Enjoy,

Adam