Stream of Consciousness on Learning at the U

Boxed in:  That's how I feel a lot of the time when it comes to assignments and courses in general here at university.  It's just the same, old, repackaged gruel over and over and over again, no matter which course you take.  At first, one might offer something more interesting or stimulating than another, but, as it wears on and you juggle it with every other task that is set before you with every other class, it all blends together into the same tasteless sludge you've been gobbling up for the last four years (at least some course content can qualify as salt, giving some taste to the everyday potato porridge).  I'm sick of the structure of this place; it's not conducive to really learning.  All we're doing here is absorbing and regurgitating, again and again.  Yes, I know we learn things here...yes, I've learned things here... but how much of what we are taught do we actually retain and cherish and use.  What I have learned here is how to survive, how to get just the right amount of work done, how to stay under the radar, how to think in just the right way.  None of these are things that instructors taught me... I'm paying thousands of dollars to teach myself.  Sure, the instructors have been useful, they've been resources through which I have taught myself, but, except for a few superb examples, they don't directly influence my real learning process.  The subject matter -- what they actively teach me -- I could learn in books, probably easier and faster than I do in class.  It's the experience of how you do it, how you adapt and teach yourself, that is the really valuable stuff that university gives you.  If they really wanted to teach subject matter they'd condense it... make it fast, make it difficult, make it intense and focused.  Just do one or two course at a time at a highly accelerated rate, that's how to get people to engage and really learn, otherwise it's just a routine.  See, that little slip of paper we get that says "Bachelor of the Arts" doesn't mean we know any material, because we really don't.  As undergrads, we're not experts in anything but what we have actively pursued by ourselves.  What that slip of paper means is that we've gone through this experience and, hopefully, come out the other side wiser.  That's it.  Ten's of thousands of dollars for a a certificate of completion for a challenge that you may or may not have gleaned any useful wisdom from.  But, you have to have it, so here we are.  Maybe some of us still think we're here for certain subject matter, and in some majors, like the sciences or fine arts, we are.  But most of us are here to learn how to learn, and that's something you really have to teach yourself.  Get that through your head and you might actually get out of here without too much hassle and with something to show.  But if you're relying on trying to remember what that particular piece of subject matter was... well, good luck, but that won't take you much of anywhere.

Indiana, Elton, and the Dark Side

In watching the "Making of" documentary for Raiders of the Lost Ark, I was struck by some of the similarities in the creation process between such a blockbuster hit and our own films, Finals Week and Yo, Julio!, as well as our current project, Tempted by the Dark Side.  Like Finals Week, Raiders took shape out of a set of ideas.  Stephen Spielberg, George Lucas, and their screenwriter sat down for three days and tossed around ideas for what they wanted in the movie, after which the screenwriter built a script that could frame all of the individual pieces that they had come up with.  When we wrote Finals Week, it was very similar in terms of the process involved... we sat down and just pitched ideas, words, anything that we knew and could form a story from.  George Lucas, of course, had a far more collected idea of what he wanted before he ever set foot into that room; however, looking back at our own process, we had a clear cut idea of our main character all along, and the basic gist of the plot was formed very early on.  After that, it was a matter of adding in details and concepts and then building a script to fit it all.

The writers of Yo Julio! took a somewhat similar approach, with even less idea of what they really wanted.  I believe the only central component that founded the entire formation of that screenplay was a random text message about shoes.  Everything else seems to have been thrown in at random with only the loosest of plot and script devices to hold it all together.  We had to do some major revision work in order to get that story back on track.  When we finally started production, it was a rather hairy experience up until the day of shooting; then, it seemed like everything just fell into place.  In the piece on Raiders, Lucas and Spielberg talk about the process of casting the film and the trials that led to the selection of Harrison Ford.  Originally, Lucas had rejected the idea of using Ford because he had already had major roles in two of Lucas's other films.  After trying out several actors, Tom Selleck was the first choice for the part of Indiana Jones, and he likely would have had the part had his prior contract for Magnum P.I. not interfered suddenly and prevented him from taking the role.  After losing Selleck, Lucas and Spielberg took another look at Ford and decided that he was great for the part.  More troubles were had in casting the part of Sallah, who was originally supposed to be performed by Danny DeVito.  Again, TV contracts foiled the plan, and John Rhys-Davies was selected instead.

In the production of Yo, Julio!, we encountered similar troubles with our casting.  Originally we had several actors picked out who had agreed to play the roles; however, days before shooting, some of our actors, who were also involved in stage productions, found themselves unable to shoot because of interference with their rehearsal schedules.  The morning we started shooting, we made some last minute casting decisions, shifting parts around and grabbing any available bodies.  For the most part, this turned out really well; Jake played Elton more perfectly than I could have ever hoped for, and our Shady Character was fitted just-right for his part, despite what looked like a mean hangover.  The only one I was dissappointed with was the part of "Man."  He pulls off the awkward, but just doesn't get it right for the camera.

Another striking part of the story behind Raiders, is its connection with Lucas and, in turn, back to Star Wars.  Even though Raiders is so different from Lucas's space story, the two shared a lot of common "genetic material."  Lucas came up with the first ideas for both stories nearly simultaneously, though the Indy film was put on hold for years while Star Wars took up Lucas's time.  When it came time to shoot Raiders, it seems that Lucas and his production team stuck with the familiar in a lot of ways, using the same studios, soundstages, and even on-site locations that were used in Star Wars.  Working in these familiar environments gave Lucas and Spielberg a few advantages in terms of being able to anticipate challenges and utilize known assests for the production.

The team that shot Tempted by the Dark Side, while being first-time filmmakers, were able to utilize a similar strategy of employing the familiar.  Their entire film was shot in their residence hall and place of work, allowing them access to resources that would otherwise have been far more difficult to obtain.  While it didn't result in a problem-free production, it likely did save time so that the necessary reshoots could be accomplished.  Tempted had problems with microphones and Raiders had to deal with mass food poisoning in Tunisia, but the familiarity of the surroundings in both cases provided an environment where shooting quickly and making up time was far easier.

It seems that the story of filmmaking follows roughly similar patterns across different films, even if the story told by those films are completely dissimilar.  The common threads of urgency, innovation, and making-do appear in each of the stories.  Amateur or professional, the same basic problems have to be faced and dealt with in whatever ways creativity allows; the difference is all in the tools available and the experience from which to draw.  The basic plot of the "Making of" is going to very similar in almost every case; though the tales we tell are not so well thought out or pretty to look at, our own stories, as students, are not all that different from the 'heroes' behind some of our favorite Hollywood films.

Ross: The Man, The Myth, The Legend

It's a Tuesday evening, long after the rest of the creative team has left the building, but the lights are still burning in the editing lab.   An amiable looking man sits at a computer, his face fluctuating between consternation, thoughtful reflection, and flashes of brilliant inspiration.  It's been like this for the last five hours, during which time his hair has progressively gotten bigger and messier as his hands search through its curly strands to find the answers he is looking for.  Ross Swanson is man who knows there are answers; there is a 'best' way to put this film together.  It's not something you can just throw together in any halfway artful way; what would work just fine for most people is just not quite there for him.  He's like the sculptor who sees a pre-existing work in the stone, there before the first chip is chiseled away, waiting to be unveiled.  There is a right way to edit this film, and Ross will get it there, chip by chip, frame by frame until the final work is revealed.

Ross is a bit of an outsider in the community, not conforming to the norms of the cinematic elite.  He has the artistic vision, the appreciation for the deeper things in film, but his approach to movies and film also has a blue-collar air to it.  Unlike so many in his line of work, Ross doesn't sneer at the less erudite, less sophisticated, either in film or in life.  He is decidedly down-to-earth, and mocks the holier-than-thou film critics and connoisseurs for their "douchey" sensibilities.  But for all that, Ross has a complex and refined artistic vision, and the work ethic to tease it out of every work he creates.  Perhaps that is why he such a force in the community, acting, as only he can, as both a shotgun blast and a scalpel incision, a delightfully contradictory mixture of reckless inclusiveness and precise exclusivity that combine in his own work to find the 'right' form.

The Myth of Lucas

Rubin describes Lucas in his article a drifting, freedom oriented, tinkerer who just happened upon film nearly by chance.  Rubin's Lucas is a rebellious, rule-breaking, artistic man with a vision for the film itself and the forms it takes.  This contrasts with the public's general conception of George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, the founder of Lucasfilm, etc.  What the public wants to see and hear about Lucas is that he is immersed in a highly technological, fantastical world, filled with Wookiees and droids; they see a man whose dream is Star Wars, with a little Indiana Jones thrown in as well.  Rubin's article begins to unravel that idea a little bit.  Lucas wasn't necessarily obsessed with the story of Star Wars or its worlds, rather he was obsessed by the process of filmmaking and the ways in which he could manipulate the physical parts of the process.  For him, it was about the story, yes, but it wasn't all about the story like some might suppose; the story was a medium through which he could edit and create, which was likely more important to him than ever was the details of every little alien floating around the galaxy of Star Wars.

Big Fish

I watched Tim Burton's Big Fish tonight for my master class assignment.  It was an excellent movie.  The story is one about, well, stories.  It is about the way we all tell our own stories, how our lives come to be narratives for someone else, and how there is always a little bit of adventure and magic behind some of the more mundane parts of life.  This movie is about that magic.  Burton highlights the distinction between the father, a story telling man who lives in his created world of intrigue and fairy tale adventure, and his son, a practical, no-nonsense man bitter with his father's compulsory elaboration.  It is interesting to note the difference in lighting between different segments of the movie, the flashbacks to the father's tales shown in a very surreal, soft, vividly colored light, while the scenes in the 'real world' are of a more muted, normal tone.  In a way, it gives the story scenes an almost heightened realism, giving them a depth and emotional character far greater than the normalcy of the other parts of the film.  This aids in blurring the line between story and real when approaching the question of importance or significance.  It attaches us closer to the stories, but grounds us in the reality, dividing our attention between the conflicting worlds until the reconciliation at the end, the son entering into the bright, fantasy-lighted world and understanding his father.  A somewhat in-between level rounds out the finish of the film, maintaining the brightness, but removing some of the softness, revealing a melding of story and reality, finally compatible, within the son's life.

Three Words Redux

As we enter the filmmaking phase, it again becomes time to revisit the three words chosen at the beginning of the semester to define my creative process:  Vivid, Detailed, Ideals.  The question now is how to apply these to the process of putting a story on film, especially for my specific duties of light and sound. I'm not quite sure how to transfer ideals through those mediums, however, I think both light and sound contribute much to creating the vividness and detailed appearance of any film.  Both light and sound, though far from the focus of the film, are absolutely vital to creating depth, intrigue, and believability.  The human mind is incredibly well tuned, subconsciously, to the variability in the way light plays off of objects and interacts with different things and to the subtleties of our audio surroundings.  The manipulation of these factors can covertly influence the emotional and mental state of the viewer.  Conversely, errors involving light and sound can predispose an audience against a film, giving it a simply 'wrong' feel.  Paying attention to detail will certainly aid in reducing these issues and aid in creating the proper feel.  Creating vividness will also aid in drawing the viewer in and connecting them with the story and the ideals it presents, if that is the film's aim.

Our Movie

Ok, I'm thinking we really need to have Elton find the people he's looking for.  It just doesn't sit well to have him have this anti-climactic sort-of connection with a fellow lonely person at the end.  All the current ending does is affirm Elton's lonely state.  He doesn't grow as a person and he doesn't develop any relation with anyone.  All the old man represents is a downward spiral of mutual enabling of the lonely lifestyle.  What we need is for Elton to find this Freddy, who he fears because throughout the film he has come to expect a tough-guy drug dealer or some such thing; but Freddy needs to turn out to be someone who can broaden Elton's horizons.  Additionally, we need to set up the rest of Elton's journey so that it's obvious that he is coming out of his shell and becoming more confident as he approaches people to enlist their aid in finding the originator of the text.  Furthermore, on the subject of the text, I really think the shoes thing has got to go.  We need something that more immediately creates intrigue and adventure, something that might actually entice Elton to want to find out what's really going on.  "Yo Julio, I got the goods... the show is on"  I don't know, something more interesting.  Is it a drug deal, is it a robbery, is it a murder... some crime of some sort.  As the story climaxes and Elton believes he's going to have to do something heroic and selfless, he discovers his quarry is actaully quite benign and has much to offer in friendship.  On a slight tangent, why is Elton lonely to begin with?  Is it because he is awkward socially, or perhaps he's a snob, or a an anti-social, or some other something where the root cause is his own deep desire not to be liked for some reason.  Maybe he goes out of his way to make sure no one likes him or remembers him and he discovers some self-worth and can allow himself to let people know him.  Sorry for rambling.  Specific Ideas aren't coming together too well at the moment.