previously, on "he loved him some movies"...

I've been stranded on a tropical island with a polar bear.

No, wait, that isn't it...

Lemme find my notes...

Here we go:

Yellow: The big news here is that v2 was read by our super-secret Contact in the Industry, and she liked it! Hooray! She had a number of very good notes for us, and Martin and I are going to spend the next few weeks incorporating said notes and (hopefully) skinny it up a bit. If v3 passes muster, Our Contact may pass it on to other people in the Bidness to read. (Our Contact has a production company, but specializes in movies that don't involve people being crushed by art installations.) Baby steps, to be sure, but I'm incredibly excited.

The Somnambulist: A little background: Back in 2002, my friend and artist extraordinaire came back to Seattle from the U.K. to visit, and brought with her a BAFTA-winning cinematographer with her. She had the crazy idea to shoot a short film (not video, either, but film), and wanted me to write something to shoot. I came up with a modest story about a guy who keeps waking up in the trunk of his car every morning with no memory of the nights before. So money was raised and the film was shot. Unfortunately, one person in our crew was a jackass and a number of shots were unusable because of her. (The work of the BAFTA guy was impeccable, though; it looked fantastic.) It was pretty much impossible to put the film together the way it was written, and that was pretty much that. Or so I thought.

Mary is much more tenacious than me, though, and kept working on it. Because the U.K. is so much cooler when it comes to these things, she's gotten a whole lot of money to finish it in a new way: as a generative film, meaning a film that changes its narrative structure with each viewing, through some kind of random element.

So, these past few weeks, I've been working on the footage with Mary in an attempt to make it work. It's going to be silent (oh, let's not get started about what happened to the soundtrack), with intertitles written by me and a music provided by Laurence Collyer, the Diamond Family Archive. It's a bit like reconstructive surgery, and while the end result may not be conventionally pretty, it'll work, dammit.

Anyway, the point is, there's money in the budget to bring my wife and me over to England to (a) finish the work, (b) premiere the work [see below], and (c) start work on the next project, which looks to be a full-length version of The Somnambulist, in both traditional narrative and generative forms. We'll be gone for a couple weeks in November. (Cue Spinal Tap's "Stonehenge".)

The new version of The Somnambulist will premiere at the By Hand Festival in Brighton. If you're interested in submitting a film or video, check out the press release:

The BY HAND FESTIVAL is seeking submissions for its short film/video festival in Brighton, England.

We welcome submission of short films, videos, animations, experiments, thoughts or ideas on miniDV, DVD or PAL VHS. (miniDV or DVD preferred).

WE ARE MOST INTERESTED IN SHORT SILENT FILMS.
By "silent films" we simply mean films without a soundtrack. The reason being that we commission local bands and composers to create and perform a soundtrack to your silent films. Those performances are recorded (and a copy of the tape or music can be provided if your work is accepted).

There is no submission fee but, as a result, we cannot return materials submitted. So, if you would like your materials returned, you will have to send a self-adressed envelope along with £5 or $10 to cover postage from the UK.

Send all submissions to:

By-Hand Festival
PO BOX 455
Brighton BN1 3ZY
England

For more information
Email: info@byhandproductions.com

More about what we are looking for:
The byHand Festival exhibits independent and experimental short films and videos from around the world (often presented with original scores composed and performed live by local bands). We accept all genres of film and video but particularly welcome silent or un-scored short films and videos.

Our primary emphasis is our "New Talkies" initiative (where local musicians, bands and composers create and perform soundtracks for films submitted as silent works). We welcome experiments, thoughts, re-edits and even fragments for that scheme. If you are interested and have questions, email us.

Work can be produced in any year.

TiVo: I am TiVomandias; look upon my digitally-taped movies and TV shows, ye mighty, and despair!

And just like Alexander, it may send me to an early grave. Hopefully, I'll find time to say something about all the stuff I've been watching before my demise, other than (number)(number). [Go here for said (number)(number).]

Where we saw it: general | We deign to rate it: outta 100
Posted by kza at 11:30 AM | Comments (4)