DW Days 6 & 7

It's probably needless to say that I'm a bit tired. We've been going at it steadily since Saturday. We got out of the loft location and hit the streets. No permits, no lockdowns -- we threw ourselves at the mercy of the public. It didn't turn out too bad. I really should give Marcus Aurelius an associate producer credit on this one. Every time something goes "wrong" it brings up a new perspective that helps serve the film. On Memorial Day we were in front of Stumptown on Belmont. Thanks to Stumptown for sure. They let us do whatever we wanted without a peep of complaint or interruption. Our takes are on the longish side as we are shooting most of this film in one-ers. We would get almost there, passersby walking through the frame unaware of the camera giving us free atmosphere and then they would notice the camera and do a huge triple take into the lens. We ran one scene 25 times or so. That was my first scene as a bit player in the film, written the day before, so I was all too happy to get warmed up and tweak the dialogue as we did it. Next up we had a more important scene. We ran that one about forty times. I was stressed out for the first fifteen takes, worried we wouldn't make our day if civilians kept ruining our takes. I talked to Dennis and said let's not worry about scene 3 today, let's just get out of the scenes involving Stumptown and our day-playing actress Maura. That took the pressure off of the next twenty-five takes. In doing so we realized the scene was bogging down in the middle. We adjusted. We did the scene so many times that the actors just talked to each other, assuming the take would be no good anyway. Furthermore by dropping Scene 3 from the day we realized that it wasn't needed as Scene 4 got us right into the story better. Deciding that allows us to look at a later scene relating to Sc 3 that was bothering me anyway. So we can take both of them off of our advance schedule and the story and our schedule are better for it.
Day 7 went well up until the sun dipped behind the West Hills during the second take of our coverage last night. Aurelius speaks again. I was going to shoot coverage on that scene because a very brutal murder takes place. I thought I would let the most violent part of it play just out of frame. But I think after seeing it in the master that I will stick with my avoidance of coverage in this film and let the brutality show. Anybody recall the cabbie strangulation in the Dekalogue? We scouted yesterday's location in the morning. I took a look at my scouting photos today and realized that when we go back it should be in the AM. We should reshoot the entire sequence rather than just the end. Not only is the light better, but the time of day is better for the story and in the rush of last night I compromised on some of our angles. Now that the actors have done it, we can shoot out of sequence and get our important bits up front.
Anything that happens at all, happens as it should. Almost makes me believe in God.

!Viva!
Signore Direttore