One Would Think...

... that having a family would ground me and make my life more regular.  Pshaw.  I have to get up at 5:15 tomorrow.  I was winding down around 9.  A couple of paragraphs of Adam Gopnik's piece in this week's New Yorker was going to do the trick.  But.  (Not very surprising that there's a but as it's now just past midnight and I'm blogging rather than sleeping.)  But our four-year-old decided that she had to cuddle daddy in his bed.  Then she couldn't fall asleep.  Not through all of the Gopnik article.  Or the Roddy Doyle story.  Not even through the interminable piece on Afghanistan.  I finally gave up on the article with more "Taliban's" in it than all the articles I've read since 2001 combined.  I find reading about modern conflicts stultifying.  I was an avid reader of war stories and histories as a kid.  I love the military, political and social histories of all the American wars, including Vietnam and Iraq.  But for some reason stories of the Middle East bore the hell out of me.  Same went for Bosnia and all the Nicaraguan and El Salvadoran stuff.  Though Joan Didion's book Salvador was pretty readable.  Maybe what I find intolerable about those regions is the hopeless futility of their conflicts.
Anyway, I'm at war with the clock.  I have a long day of shooting tomorrow and I'm dog tired but wide awake.  There's a little redhead sprawled in the middle of our bed and I couldn't lie there wide awake any longer.
I went to look at bikes today.  The Guzzi is out.  Too small for me.  I fell in love with a black, white and gold Bonneville T100.  I almost bought it.  I felt that fear creeping up in me - what if they sell it?  Even though he told me they only sell a couple of each Triumph model a year.  Beautiful bike.  More so in person.  I thought I would like the British Racing Green option, but the black and white one jumped out and grabbed me.
Overall, life is really good right now.  I have more and more job prospects coming my way now that I've committed to producing.  Rather than rushing in, I'm taking my time setting up meetings with people to see where the best place for me might be.  I love the freedom of free-lancing but there are a couple of in house gigs coming up that might be a good move for me.
Other than that I'm in search of quality chambray shirts, preparing for trip to Bend to see Band of Horses and She & Him.  I love Matt Ward but I'm not so keen on Zooey Deschanel's voice.  It works on some of their songs.  I'm sure she'll be very charming live. 
I love Bend.  Not so much the town itself, but Central Oregon.  When I was a teenager I had this vision of myself as a lonely dustbowl refugee.  Not so much by style or disposition, but by pedigree in some naive literary fashion.  I loved Fitzgerald and Hemingway and so desperately wanted to be of their ilk - a super combination of urbane Ivy Leaguer and macho adventurer.  I see now how contradictory the two were.  Nonetheless, as much as I was drawn to those expatriates of the Lost Generation I was truly more kin to Steinbeck's disenfranchised Westerners.  I felt a little trapped and resentful by the smallness and the hopelessness of their lot.  Still, the quiet lonesomeness of the high desert and the plaines appeals to me.  More as I get older.
I am really grateful that I'm from Oregon.  It may not be New England or New York City or New Orleans or San Francisco or any of the great American lierary cities and regions, but it sure as hell beats anywhere in the Midwest.  Which is whence both Fitzgerald and Hemingway hailed.
I visited the Finca Vigia in Cuba about ten years ago.  Hemingway may have hailed from the midwest, but he was a citizen of the world.  His place outside of Havana was amazing.  I could easily imagine his presence, both from the property but also from having read everything he wrote several times.  It just made perfect sense.  His writing is very visual for me.  And he's so present in all of it.  I feel almost childish, puerile to be sure, in my appreciation for him.  Though I don't buy the great man, Papa mythos wholesale.  I see the pain and suffering, especially as he aged.  I take pity on him, which is probably what drove him  to take his life in Sun Valley.  My father was born in Idaho.  And lives there again now, last I heard.  My father won't shoot himself though.  More stubborn than proud.  Cowardly and bitter.
So this is one hell of a meander.  I think I'll try to get to sleep now.

The Daily Mind

One day at a time.  Be here now.  These simple mantras can be seen as clichés or as the simple and powerful reminders that to truly live authentic lives, we have to be present.
It doesn't take a lot of analysis to make this happen.  In fact the less thought the better.  For me it takes some simple actions to stay grounded and centered.  It starts with making the bed when I get up.  Ten to fifteen minutes of yoga.  Eight to twenty minutes of meditation.  Some simple and healthy food.  Water.
Straightening up my desk and clothes.  It's not a bid deal.  But it makes all the difference.

Moto Guzzi

I might go for the Guzzi instead of the Triumph.  I think Fellini would approve.  One of my favorite bikes in the past was my 1973 El Dorado, which had the same transverse V-twin engine as this new model.  We'll see when I go look at them soon.  The V7 Special has less power than the Bonneville T100 - about a hundred cc's less displacement.  I'm not really going for speed, but it's something I might need to consider.  I feel like if I need more power,  I can upgrade to another classically styled Italian bike in a few years:

                      

I signed up for my safety course for the weekend of June 10.  I should get my motorcycle endorsement at DMV the next week and be on my new bike by mid-June.  In all my years of riding motorcycles I never had a motorcycle endorsement.  It was never a problem, but I never wore a helmet back then either, so playing by the rules or personal safety weren't the priority that they are now.

For a long time I didn't think I wanted to ever ride a bike again.  It crossed my mind a couple of times, but I always dismissed it as not a good idea for a man with three young children.  Statistically it probably isn't.  But I talked to my wife about it and she didn't see a problem, she liked the idea actually.  Her father is huge enthusiast, still racing The Isle of Man and other European classic races on his Nortons or his many other vintage bikes, including a Vincent.

Last week I took my Japanese clients to Langlitz for a visit.  I tried on some jackets as I don't imagine the Langlitz Cascade that I practically lived in during the late 80s and early 90s will ever fit me again.  As part of the fitting they had me sit on a motorcycle seat.  It felt really good and started to work on me over the weekend.  

I should think about it longer than that; right?  Nah.  What is there to think about when making a decision to buy something so impractical?

Dysrhythmia

Before I went to work on the photo shoot, I had a nice little rhythm going.  Not perfect or anything, but it was easy to get up and make my bed.  And I was getting to bed at fairly consistent time with a little reading time before lights out.
Now my body and mind are out of sorts.  Instead of words on a page before bed, I want to be in front of a screen.  Instead of waking in the morning and reading a short story before rising and making my bed, I stumble across the hall from my bedroom to my study and check my email.  This morning's emails were not to be missed, I tell you.  There was something from MacWeekly about passwords and such.  An alert from an Ebay seller that an item had shipped.  A spiritual meditation from a subscription.  And some other trash that I don't remember.  Nothing urgent or validating.  Nothing worth sacrificing for more grounded routines and rituals.
We did go to the beach yesterday.  Cape Lookout.  We met some friends that had camped out the previous night.  The sea air was wonderful.  I played a game with my son and one of his friends that involved drawing targets in the sand and throwing large rocks.  Then we built castles and played a territory game that my son invented.  After that I laid on the sand until a storm came in and we drove home.
Ive been super negligent on my fitness commitment lately.  My clothes are starting to feel uncomfortable.  Yet somehow the simple act of walking out the door and taking a walk is overwhelming me.  I'm overthinking it.  Getting ahead of myself.  Trying to take some action today.
Thinking about getting a motorcycle again.  It's been a long time.  1995.  I'm going to take a safety course for a refresher if I pursue it.  I've got my eye on a new Triumph Bonneville T100.  Vintage styling without all the wrenching.  I don't have the time or the desire to be working on a motorcycle.

Rules For My Unborn Son

 I don't agree with all of the rules in this award-winning blog, but there are some winners to be sure.

Two Week Whirlwind

I've been very busy the past couple of weeks working on a photo shoot.  It was a very rewarding experience.  I liked all the people that I worked with and felt like I helped them achieve a very successful and economical shoot.  I like producing.  I'm pretty good at gathering resources and bringing things together.  I've most often worked in that capacity for my own projects.  It's a little tough to not be directly and consistently involved in the creative aspects of a project, but I've gained enough humility to accept my role.  I find that by keeping my eyes and ears open I am able to offer support and guidance without taking over or intruding into someone else's process.  It's trickier at some times than others.  Overall it's  lot less demanding than doing it all.  It seems rather easy in fact.  One of the most difficult aspects of the job was coordinating childcare while both my wife and worked last week.
I hope to work with this company again.  There was some talk of Mexico or Cuba, two places that I know well.  Y yo hablo español, casi perfectamente.  Me gustaría ir a Cuba o México para trabajar por un par de semanas.  Claro que sí.  Obviamente, guay.
Now I'm on to a less demanding and somewhat less interesting job next week, however it pays more for three days of work than I earned in two weeks with the Japanese.
At times over the past couple of weeks I felt a little nuts from jumping from one extreme environment to the next.  Hanging in the snow on Mt. Hood for an hour, then off to Warm Springs, then dinner at Jake's and in cool downtown loft to cast models the next morning.  Then off to Bend and Mt Bachelor, stopping in antique stores along the way.  One day we're creating a hippie commune music fest, the next we're in Old Town, then skiing and hanging out in a log cabin.  We ended the week on a trip up the Multnomah channel on an old steel ketch that I chartered.  We had sun for much of Thursday's cruise but at one point dark black clouds rolled over the west hills and pounded us with hail.  All but the captain and I went below deck.  I stood in the bow just behind the bowsprit and absorbed the fresh feeling of being totally alive.

I can't post too many photos from the shoot as they're trying to to keep photos of the clothing off the internet until they publish the photos.  But I took hundreds of really cool behind the scenes photos over the past week.
I'll miss those guys.  I already miss my expense account dinners.  Jakes three times, Ruth Chris, The Oyster Bar ...  More out of town clients, please.

The Master Says 370

Specialization is for insects.

Robert Heinlein

Friday

Beautiful morning.  Just the type of sunny and cool to get me up and going.  I have been sleeping very poorly lately.  We switched from a king to a queen hoping to discourage our daughters from co-sleeping and to reclaim some floor space in our bedroom.  Who likes a bedroom that's all bed?  Not me.
I went to bed about ten last night instead of one.  I didn't crash out straight away, but it was a good idea.  I did some reading.  Bicycling magazine came in the mail yesterday.  I haven't done much riding so far this spring.  One really beautiful ride last week.  I wanted to get up and go out for a ride this morning before work.  But I had to find my bluetooth headset as I'll be in the car much of the day trying to produce a photo shoot.  I cleaned up some stuff in my office but I couldn't find it.  I knew when I bought that thing it was going to be another silly tiny thing to keep tabs on.  First I misplaced its charger in the recent move and by the time I found that I had misplaced the earbud.  Ugh.
I'm pretty ADD sometimes.  I ended up going through some old report cards of mine and my mother's.  I didn't get too deep.  I was surprised to be reminded how shy I was a young child.  My kindergarten teacher wrote that I rarely spoke and was always respectful when I did.   Probably more terrified than polite.
I also pulled up a four-button iPod.  I tried to plug it in, but I think it requires a firewire connection rather than USB.  Goodness knows what mixes are on that device from 2003.  I don't even know if it will take a charge.  A lot of these digital devices, especially hard drives, need to be plugged in  every so often.
I read the final story of Refresh, Refresh last night.  I acclimated to the horror a bit and the stories became less supernaturally creepy.  The last story said it was about a bear, so the suspense as to what was being confronted was minimal.  I didn't get to sleep after Percy so I delved into a T. Coraghessan Boyle story called Modern Love that I'd read before.  Funny and a bit morbid.
I took a walk this morning instead of a ride and thought a bit about Percy.  (I didn't remember reading Boyle until now.)  My thoughts about his writing are faint at the moment.  I'm a bit preoccupied with the work I've been doing.  I'm meeting up with the photographer later this morning.  I'll be showing him around this beautiful city, helping him find places that will help him tell the stories he needs to tell next week.
Life is good.  I am amazed by all the loveliness that surrounds me.

BP* by BP**

  *Beautiful Picture
**Beyond Petroleum nee British Petroleum

Cameras Rolling, Calling Cut, Directing, again

We went and shot some footage yesterday.  It was kind of strange.  Casual.  But not entirely uncommitted.  I was driving as Jordan rolled camera on Portland.  I had a very loose relationship to the outcome.  "You want to see it?"  "No, that's okay.  How did it look?"  or  "Sure, let me pull over."
But it certainly wasn't random.  I definitely directed what we shot both by where I drove and how I asked things to be framed.  It was interesting to be relaxed yet specific.
Portland sure has changed.  I know that, but putting a frame around it really underscores the development the city is undergoing.  Twenty years from now the stuff we shot yesterday could be quite wonderful to have access to.
It's nice to have access to it now.  I'm going to use it for an idea I have for the Dangerous Writing trailer.  And maybe in the film.  I'm not sure.
It felt a little funny to call cut.  I preferred to say, that's good or you can stop now.  But I realized that cut was what Jordan wanted to hear.  For clarity.  Habit.  Comfort.  I don't know.
I woke up with an idea for a short film this morning.  I have this very special friend that is a model and an art historian.  I thought it would be cool to do something with tons of art books and her in a nice bedroom.  With the camera really close to her as she lounges on the bed buried in books and talks about art while wearing glamorous clothes and hair and makeup.   She talks, we cut to the page, we cut back and she's got a new look.  Just let her flow and let the stylists play.  Maybe shoot her while she's getting her hair and makeup done.   Letting the beauty be less constructed.  This is my friend from a long time ago.  I saw this picture of her before I ever met her.

She never really looked like that to my eye or in other photos, but this photo is how I'll always see her.  This is what she really looks like:

I just Googled her for an updated picture and this one on the bed came up.  I've never seen this one before.  Not quite the vibe I was thinking for my video, but kind of an interesting correspondence.

Brady Udall's Letting Loose The Hounds

Udall's collection of short stories has also been on my nightstand for the past week or so.  I've read them more casually than Percy for no other reason than they're less demanding on my nervous system.  I don't really like suspense or horror in general and I suppose it says a lot about Percy that I'm willing to stay with his stories.
Udall is more fun.  They are dark and the characters are definitely from the underbelly of our society.  Some are even from the underbelly of society's underbelly.  They're light and fluid enough to read before bed and I've read two or three in a single sitting.
I found the Ballad of the Ball and Chain the most relevant to some of my current storytelling challenges. I'm working on a story about a woman trying to help her boyfriend that's having a mental  breakdown that I've written in the third person with my authorial stance from the woman's perspective.  Ballad of the Ball and Chain is in first person from the woman who is dealing with a mentally ill boyfriend.  Our stories are quite different other than that, but just reading his use of detail and other elements fired some cylinders for me and inspired several pages of notes about my own story's possibilities.
I liked all of the stories in the collection.   He's imaginative and playful and though his characters encounter serious situations, the pathos is more comic than tragic.  He allows them to laugh at themselves.  Which is a winning consolation that doesn't entirely make up for the lack of redemption Udall deprives them of, but it does make things rich and honest and more complete.
I look forward to reading more Udall.  I have a novel of his on my shelves, but it's not going to replace Letting Loose the Hounds as I'm committed to reading short stories for now.

The Master Says 369

To be alive is power,
Existing in itself,
Without a further function,
Omnipotence enough.

Emily Dickinson

The Master Says 368

I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.

Winston Churchill

Ain't No Olivier

Lust for Life oo1

Analysis of Benjamin Percy's "The Woods" - Part 1

In a word – chilling.  Even read in the bright light of morning.  I don't want to get trapped by describing the story or even offering an oblique critique.  If you plan to read the story you should probably stop reading this entry right now and revisit it after you've read it.  Description is a start, but my reading comprehension and summary skills don't really need work.  I want to know why and how the author achieves "chilling".
So I reread The Woods the following morning to better understand the why and the how.  Right off he vividly recalls an event in the distant past in first person.  He puts us right up close to the narrating character's younger self with short, sharp sentences decribing his experience in sensory detail.

     My father wanted to show me something, but he wouldn't say what.  He only said that I should get my gun, my thirty-aught-six, and follow him.  This happened just outside Bend, Oregon, where we lived in a ranch house surrounded by ten acres of woods.  I was twelve at the time:  old enough to own a gun, young enough to fear the dark.

So he takes us into the woods with him.  He describes a keening sound at once like a woman, otherworldy and grating.  (Women do not fare well in Percy so far.)  They pursue the source of the awful sound until:

     Then, between the trees, I saw the inky gleam of its eyes, and its huge ears drawn flat against its skull, and then I saw its body.  Blood trails oozed along its cinnamon color.
     "Man alive," my father said. 
     It was a four-prong male deer ...


Note that he says "cinnamon" in color.  Not tawny or brown or sable or mahogany.  He uses a more sensory adjective, one that conjures taste and smell to describe how something looks.  Throughout that paragraph, and the many that lead up to it, we don't know what's making the awful sound.  By withholding it, Percy prepares us for the phantom that haunts the main body of the story.  But I forgot about the otherworldly possibility once I got to the later pages because after a few tense paragraphs, the sentence offers a simple explanation of things – It was a four-prong mule deer caught in a barbed-wire fence.
This led me to be believe that there's a simple explanation for things.  I relaxed.  It wasn't a pretty situation, but it seemed normal once explained.  An accident.  The trauma the narrator experienced was not really the discovery of the trapped and wounded deer, it was what his father directed him to do once they found it.
There's another passage of nice detail in the prologue preceding the father's directive:

   I stood behind a clump of rabbitbrush as if to guard myself from the animal.  The bush smelled great.  It smelled sugary.  It smelled like the color yellow ought to smell.  By concentrating on it so deeply, I removed myself from the forest and was thereby able to contain the tears crowding my eyes. 
   Then my father said, "I want you to kill it."

I admire the way he repeated the verb "smelled" three times.  I often avoid using the same simple word in the same paragraph.


The bush smelled great.
It smelled sugary.
It smelled like the color yellow ought to smell.

– – –– –
– –– – – –
– –– – – – –– – – –

That's poetic.  It's got rhythm.   I'm tempted to count the words and even the syllables as I was taught when studying Spanish poetry.  After his father's order, another three word sentence brings the prologue to a close:

Just like that.


I sit here thinking of giving the moment at hand some description.


I'm overwhelmed by the garbage truck sounds in the cul-de-sac.  Is that the compactor or the transmission struggling up the hill?  Gears and crusher blending and then gone revealing a bird's intermittent warbly tweeee and some other more typical sing-song chirps from other birds.  The furnace quietly blows from the register.  A bread bag rustles in the kitchen followed by the closing of a cabinet.  My stomach grumbles.  A feeling of heaviness on my chest.  Constriction across the bridge of my nose, especially the right nostril.  The long husky tweee continues its rhythm.  There should be a Shazam-like iPhone app for bird calls.  My stomach is empty.   Nearly painfully so.

The first thing I notice about my inventory of the moment is that there's a lot going on.  I couldn't even get to the multivalent use of descriptive words like cinnamon.

My sense of sight:  light, white, green    moss on the trees branches outside, cedar.  Soft shadows on the ceiling.  Almost camouflage, everything is white green and brown aside from the two washcloths, one pink, the other orange, dried and stiffly retracting on opposite ends of the towel bar in the bathroom.  There's no bigger towel between them.  I want to put one there.

My phone then rang with a call from a potential employer. (I booked the job today as production coordinator for a fashion photography shoot happening here in Portland by a New York photographer and Japanese client.)  And the morning's notes came to a close.  This blog entry was a transcription.  Is that cheating?  Like when a smack talking caller to a sports radio show scripts his call before calling in?

Two things contribute to this new blogging approach.  One, I've committed to keeping digital out of the bedroom.  When my wife is home and I'm not responsible for making lunches and getting the kids off to school, I've been waking up and reading a story and writing some notes before getting the day started.  Two, I feel like writing for an audience in the blogger.com browser window evokes a different quality of writing than I'm currently interested in.  This is an exercise.  There's no self-promotion aspect to these entries.  I'm not trying to get anywhere on the outside.  That I'm currently aware of at least.

The Caves of Oregon by Benjamin Percy

 I went to bed wide awake last night.  In the past couple of years I would have watched a TV show streamed on Hulu or a movie on Netflix' Watch Instantly, but we've resolved to keep digital devices out of the bedroom in the new house.  Which is great as I've read before going to sleep for most of my life and I'm glad I didn't lose that pleasurable discipline after a long period of succumbing to more passive methods of enjoying stories.
One thing I'll say about Percy is he not a writer to soothe and prepare and his reader for slumber.  I don't want togive away much at all about Refresh, Refresh's second story.  There's a conceit/invention that is truly unique, at once commonplace and absolutely absurd.  Throughout the story, even now, it had me wondering if it could really exist.  I suppose it could.  No, not a chance.  My mind still ping-pongs on the possibilities of that particular detail.
I will give away, as does its title, that the story involves a cave.  Last summer while camping in Tumalo, we visited the Newberry National Volcanic Monument which is home to the longest lava tube in Oregon.  (approximately one mile long, crossing under Hwy 97)  It's cool and dark down there.  You scramble over some craggy sections, wind through others and climb and down steps, some natural and others man-made.  There are portions as wide and as tall as a gymnasium.  I've also visited Carlsbad Caverns.  Newberry's lava tube is much more humble an attraction, but shares with Carlsbad the safe feeling of being in the deep, dark underground with many fellow tourists.  I don't much care for being amongst a group of chattering fools, so I create a safe distance from there compulsive  and inane babbling, but I do like knowing I am not alone down there.
In Percy's story the characters are indeed alone down there.  As I traveled with them I was sometimes driven to nervous distraction wondering if perhaps the rest of his stories might be better read in the morning.


I'm reading Percy for pleasure, to become more familiar with contemporary fiction and to absorb something of his craft for my own writing.  I was so absorbed that I will need to read The Caves of Oregon a few more times to absorb some of the latter.  One thing I notice is that his authorial stance is really really close to the characters even in the third person.  He puts us right in the room and the cave as it were.  And as I mentioned regarding Refresh, Refresh, this would be Stephen King or Peter Straub type stuff were it not for his lyricism.  He's got a very light touch to counterbalance his heavy subjects.  Very worthy of studying.

Refresh, Refresh by Benjamin Percy

There's a cursor arrow under the title on the inside of the book.  Right off it made me think, Of course! The title refers to surfing the web.  Something hip and modern.  But the author is from Tumalo, a very tiny and absolutely unhip little Central Oregon town just outside of which we camped for a week last summer.  I rode my bike every morning on the roads surrounding and passing through it. Logging about a hundred miles or so, I have a pretty good feel for the lay of the land around there.
Ultimately as I sat down to finally read the first story of the same title as the book, I really didn't know what to expect other than something good.  Why good?  It was recommended to me by someone I trust and beyond that it just had that aura about it.

There is indeed a reference to refreshing a web page in the story, however the urgency is much more visceral than trying to get the latest sports score or Facebook updates.  The anxious impatience with technology is but a tiny thing awash in the wake of the raw, desperate violence and pain that drives the story's plot.
Notwithstanding its angry savagery, the sweet humanity of the main character comes through with masterful subtlety without a trace of sentimentality.  Perhaps its the sparse but lyric quality of the prose.  It's a pleasure to read Percy.  And culturally insightful as well –  it's loud and clear why volunteers walk into armed forces recruiting offices in small, lonely towns to sign up in spite of the bleakness of a sure trip to the endless fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I've read but the first of Percy's collection of eleven stories in Refresh, Refresh.  I went back for another read of the first before proceeding further.  If the dense pathos continues in the rest of the stories, as I suspect it will, this book will secure its place on my nightstand for several weeks of patient and gratifying reading.

On the Nightstand oo1

The Master Says 367

All I can do is be me, whoever that is.

Bob Dylan

Dangerous Writing Trailer Test v2.7

Dead Man Trailer

Down By Law Trailer

¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡I'M BACK!!!!!!!!!

FUCK YEAH! I'm fired up and I haven't even fired up the tea kettle yet.
Actually I never really left according to some of my Felliniesque beliefs. The whole "no beginning, no end ..." which bears repeating like a fucking mantra:

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

I've been doing research. Recharging. A sabbatical.
One of the things I realize I'm very guilty of is not being clear. I evade exposition for fear of being a bore. There are other reasons like racebrain, intellectual arrogance/inferiority (which really just an elaboration of the fear diagnosis) and general impatience, but in the end I end up confusing most of the people in my life and feeling defensive about not communicating what I intended. And let's face it, all this jumbled jim-jam confuses the hell out of me, too.
So to be clear - I am back in the sense that I am formally resuming my practice of work as a storyteller. I've no new film projects in mind nor do I intend to resume making films. Actually I do intend to resume making films. I already have. I'm working on Dangerous Writing again, cutting a trailer and making music for it. And I've booked a couple of jobs to produce some mental health training videos.
I realize my attitude toward that is all jacked up. I'm looking at it as a check in the bank account and nothing more, when the fact is I really like the woman doing the presentations and I find the topics interesting. It's really going to help her career and possibly many others. And it's going to provide work for me and a couple of friends. Truth is, just as I want to avoid exposition - which is to say the appearance of making an effort to communicate - I want to avoid the giving the perception that I am making an effort to make money.
Wow.
Okay before I bum myself and start listening to my inner critic (however accurate he may be) I want to get back to the topic of the day - lust for life. Falling in love. One of the things I've accomplished in the past year is finding, buying and renovating a home. It's a perfect structure for our lives. I'll post some pics soon.
Jumping around a bit again. Again? All I've done is jump around. So in short I was working on this New Orleans project in the fall of oo8 and it felt like maybe I could take a giant step forward in my career so I wanted to get in better physical shape both to increase my fitness and to present myself to the world better. So I started a fitness regimen for the umpteenth time and soon realized I had to do something different were I to have any chance at succeeding. Then there was a snow storm and my kids were home everyday and the combination of relating to myself physically and being with my kids so much opened my eyes to some significant realities that I had been avoiding. As I gave myself over to those truths it consumed my energy and interest to the point that I lost interest in pursuing telling stories. I formally said goodbye to this blog eventually. I got pretty involved in lots of physical activities and then went back to school to begin preparing for a career in public health. I took a term off to remodel the new house during which I was very resourceful and design conscious in ways that I hadn't been in some time. It was suggested to me to pursue a career in interior design by some of the contractors working on the remodel. (I appreciated the compliments, but don't find that path interesting.) I continued doing yoga and strength training and working with personal training clients almost all the way through. The last six weeks of the job I was working seven days a week and that seemed to be more than enough activity, so I backed off from some of my fitness commitments. We spent a lot of money on the new house, and while I was happy with the results it was becoming clear to me that I was going to need to start making some money to contribute to the family budget. Going back to school became both less tenable and less interesting. I resolved not to make any decisions until I was finished with the house, because I knew the stress and fatigue were wearing me down considerably.
Nicola had a two-week job in San Francisco and the kids and I drove down for a weekend visit. That drive has always been an interesting window onto myself. And being in downtown SF where I lived when I first moved to the city in 1989 was a good experience on many levels. In short I decided not to worry about school or my waning interest in pursuing a public health career or getting a job. I elected to simply do what was in front of me. Finish Dangerous Writing. Finish settling into the new house. Get back into a routine of meditation and movement. Help my family adjust to our new home and neighborhood while my wife has been out of town for three of the past four weeks. Cook, clean, shop for groceries. And to explore the possibilities of writing prose in a more directed but less ambitious manner.
So that's what I've been up to the past couple of weeks. I don't have it all figured out. But I'm happy to be working on DW again. I happy but a little afraid of the new stories I'm working on with an editor/teacher.
I was on Facebook yesterday and the long tail of the past led me to the blog of a woman I knew in passing many years ago. She looks really happy. I could tell she was in love with life by the way she documented the things in her life. I was inspired.

Independent Film No More

"Sundance unveils complete lineup:
New films directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman, Michael Winterbottom, Nicole Holofcener and Joel Schumacher, and starring such thesps as Ben Affleck, Kristen Stewart, Ryan Reynolds and Adrien Brody, mark the lineups of the Premieres, Midnight and other noncompetitive sections of the 2010 Sundance Film Festival"

This was the headline and intro tag in Variety for the annual Sundance announcement of entrants. Last year I already knew a few days ahead of time that But A Dream didn't get in, so there really isn't any suspense for submitters by Dec 1st, 2nd or 3rd, when the announcement is usually made. This year I was about to check to see if any friends or acquaintances have anything going to Park City. Over the past ten years, I've known at least one such filmmaker every year. I'm always happy for them.
I don't really have a problem with the fact that Sundance has grown over the years. Or that the names mentioned above have films in the festival. What I find troublesome is that Sundance remains the holy grail for indie filmmakers. It ain't what it used to be folks. I was just talking to a friend that does post- down in Austin the other day and he was telling me how he's on hold for a bunch of projects that were waiting to see if they got into Sundance before they hired him to do a final color grade on their projects. Probably better off buying lottery tickets. Unless of course, you're connected and your film gets seen by the people that matter instead of those that view the general population mountain of submissions. It isn't rigged or unfair. It just tends to work out better for submissions when you get that email or call asking you if you have a submission this year than when you send it in at the deadline.
I'm probably more bitter than I'd like to admit. In any case, I'm glad to be out of the game.

Audition for New GVS Film

I got a call from a casting director this week to audition for the new Gus Van Sant film, Restless. I really have no interest in acting anymore. However, I'm willing to make an exception for an opportunity to work with one of the few masters in the industry at the moment.
I didn't really connect to the part at all once I got the sides. It's a big scene for the main character and my guy gets quite an earful. I didn't find anywhere to go either in my preparation or in the room. I showed up and read the lines and tried to take the directions the casting director offered.
I tried to be grateful for the opportunity and to do my best. I was successful at that part. I was up against a lot of the better stage actors in Portland. I'd like to get the part, there's no doubt about that. But I'd also be very happy to see some talented actor like Todd Van Voris or Michael Mendelsohn get a nice part on the big screen.
I was really glad when the audition was over and I could go back to being a non-actor. I like my new life.

I really don't care anymore

Honestly. Truly. I just don't have any interest in artistic process. I don't want to hear actors, directors, writers or producers talk about their work. If it's good I want to see it and be entertained by it. I'm no longer looking for inspiration or to watch someone be good at their craft. I just want to dive in and suspend my disbelief. And if I can't do that, nevermind. Today I had the afternoon to myself for the first time in a while. In the past I would have been at the movies. I checked to see what was playing. Nothing of interest. I want to go and be all in. If I have any suspicion that I might be distracted by artificiality of any sort, forget it.
I saw Inglorious Basterds a few weeks ago. Remind me not to waste my time or money on that dude's films again. Ugh. What a bunch of tedious and gratuitous garbage.
There's a fifth rate television show being filmed in the city where I live. Almost every actor I know has gotten a part on it. They're so thrilled for themselves. I find it really hard to share their enthusiasm. It all strikes me as extremely solipsistic. Who cares? What about that has anything to do with making the world a better place? I'm not talking about saving the world with grand gestures, but more simply the mindfulness to appreciate there's a hell of a lot more going on in the world than one's acting "career". What a joke. The same goes for producers and directors running around talking about their films that no more than a few hundred people will ever see and far fewer will ever like as if they're on par with Spielberg and Scorcese.
Maybe I sound bitter to some. If I'm over it, I'm over it; right? I mean, what's the need to take others down if you're so okay with things? Maybe the answer to that is I've never been okay with this crap, even when I've been guilty of it myself, and I'm very happy to deal with it less and less.

Unsubscribed

I just unsubscribed from indiewire.com. I've been deleting the daily emails for a while now. It's an interesting process giving up something that's been a central part of one's life for so long. I invested so much in film and while I'm not entirely finished, the tools of that trade are becoming increasingly useless artifacts in my current life. There's a nagging voice that says just wait until Dangerous Writing is ready to go out into the world before cutting ties. Which is a big part of why I'm eager to get go of film in the first place - the waiting, the guarding of resources for future use and the overall putting life on hold is something I want no part of any longer.
I love enjoying movies and tv shows as a simple spectator. I love not caring about the other up and comers in the film world. I love not waiting for life to begin.

The Master Says 366

Silence is so accurate.

Mark Rothko

The Master Says 001 Redux

There is no beginning, there is no end; there is only the infinite passion of life.

Federico Fellini

A river derrchee

I've started a new blog that has nothing to do with filmmaking. If you would like to read it, please contact me and I'll send you the URL. I'm keeping it anonymous until I have a better idea of what I intend it to become.
Finding Fellini is just about finished for me. I have nothing more to say about film, either publicly or privately. I didn't plan on it but a switch got flipped early this year.
I'm committed to finishing Dangerous Writing and Made Crooked. The process doesn't move me to blog about it. For now. Should the urge take hold, I can always log in and post something as I don't intend to delete the blog.
Finding Fellini has been a wonderful part of my life for the past four years. I can track my progress as a filmmaker and as a human being reading the nearly one thousand posts. Some of it makes me cringe, much of it makes me proud.
I've changed a lot in this time. I'm grateful to have let go of some of my less appealing character traits and to have become a bit softer, gentler and humblerer.
I bid any remaining readers farewell. Thank you for being part of it. Federico Fellini was a great man. I hope we can all continue to find him.

nc

Happy-Go-Lucky

That's a good film, in'it?
Yeah.

The Visitor

See it.

The Master Says 365

If you try to please audiences, uncritically accepting their tastes, it can
only mean that you have no respect for them: that you simply want to
collect their money.

Andrei Tarkovsky

The Sights, Sounds and Smells of Morning

We're in Carlsbad, California in order to fulfill Henry's three year obsession with going to Legoland. Today's the big day. I woke up early and took a ride up the coast to Oceanside and back, about sixteen miles. Oceanside is the town at the gates of Camp Pendleton. It was a sensational hour, in the truest sense of the word. I heard reveille and saw some porcine military wives showing up for their day at the beauty college. Along the beach I saw surfers catching the morning breaks and retirees taking their morning strolls. I saw a surf betty shedding her wetsuit in the cab of her truck. I smelled the ocean and the beautiful flowers in bloom everywhere. I heard two motorcycle cops chatting as I climbed a hill past them. I saw other cyclists, Mexican gardeners and a man shoveling sand from the sidewalk back onto the beach. Not a lot of sunshine yet, but a beautiful morning nonetheless.

nc

The Master Says 364

In wilderness is the preservation of the world.

Henry David Thoreau

Freedom

I spent much of Saturday night and yesterday driving to California. I've made that journey south on I-5 many, many times in my life. It's always been a passage filled with reflection and memories of the thoughts of journeys past. All of my life seems to have been plagued with ambition and fear, both of which fuel endless musing and the determined resolutions that are made more easily in transit.
Even with a car full of children there was much time to reflect. Aside from a brief discussion of the possibilities of buying a house in Corbett, there was no talk or thought of the future. It's a strange thing for me to be in the moment, but that's kind of how it went. I marveled for a short while on how my ambition to make films has disappeared. My wife thinks it will return. I'm not so sure. I have a strong idea of why it has left, but I'm not ready to articulate it.
My entire life has been a battle royale of and with all the stories rumbling through me, torturing me to find a way to get them out. Suffering, anxious longing, frustration, neuroses, self-loathing, fragmentation, self-dissemblement - lots and lots of self hyphen terms. And now? Not so much. Leaves me feeling slightly confused and empty, but I'm learning it is something much more positive. And I'm enjoying it. That's part of the reason I've lost interest in telling stories.
When we arrived in Monterey I went for a walk along the beach. It was very sunny and beautiful, but also extremely windy. As I walked along I could see gusts of swirling and driving sand ahead. In the past I would see such tempests as things to avoid and signs that things weren't going well. Yesterday I anticipated entering the petite shamals joyfully with the confidence that the stinging grains of sand would be an experience of elemental, natural life -- the life outside of the mind that I've come to embrace. There is suffering involved at times when pushing my body against itself and the elements, but it cannot compare to the mental anguish I've been suffering for most of my life.

nc

(Signing off as Signore Direttore doesn't feel right these days)

Dismal Outlook for Independent Film

There's a Morgan Spurlock quote floating around indiewood that goes something like, "This isn't where we are going to make our money right now. We can't think about paying our rent, but maybe we can pay our phone bills with filmmaking." What about those of us that have yet to make any money at all from our films? I'm not talking about film-related gigs, but the narrative and doc projects we've been self-financing. Where does that leave us? Way outside in the cold unfriendly world riddled with credit card debt. In my case that debt went from zero percent to three and four percent and now my promotional rates have expired. So for a while I was paying around sixteen percent on a couple of cards. Then it turned out the sixteen percent rates were promotional as well and without missing a payment, the rates on two cards jumped to thirty percent. I have a plan and the means to eliminate this abuse very shortly thankfully, but I know that isn't the case for many others.
I came up at a time that many filmmakers built careers financed by credit cards. Robert Townsend and Alison Anders, most notably. It was also a heady time of ten, fifty and two hundred thousand dollar films getting acquired for millions. I made But A Dream for ten thousand dollars, getting another forty in favors. So far it's been rejected by every top tier festival in this country and abroad. Every rejection email encourages me to continue making films. How? Why? Is that encouragement even responsible? Shouldn't there be an asterisk like with the lottery? This game should not be played for investment purposes. It is for entertainment only.
Skiing, pilates and cycling sound better and better.

Ya mero,
Signore Direttore

The Master Says 363

You can observe a lot just by watching.

Yogi Berra

The Importance of Being Earnest

At Portland Center Stage. Thoroughly enjoyable. Laughs and articulate language. Actors with good looks, voices and timing. Oh joy.
Very pleasant night at the theater.

Grazie,
Signore Direttore

My Seeming Life of Leisure

While I am very fortunate and lead a comfortable life, I am not a wealthy man. The areas in my life that seem to be lived on a scale of decadence are balanced by frugality, sacrifice and perhaps even short-sightedness when it comes to personal finance. One thing my wife and I have discovered is that when we both work full-time, our family suffers. Since she makes twice what I make, and likes what she does, she's now the main bread winner. The jobs for which I'm qualified to do other than make films, if I'm even qualified to do that professionally, have a very low net return after paying taxes and babysitters. Not to mention my total lack of connection to that work. I've tried over the years to earn a living in various aspects of the film industry. I really didn't enjoy it. I hate working on commercials and corpo schlock.
So when I'm trying to make films and be a daddy to three small children I feel compromised on both sides much of the time. Whereas now that I've concentrated my focus on home and fit in some cycling and skiing, things are in better balance. One to three hours of hiking or pilates is a complete activity on a daily basis. Getting up to the mountain for a day or two each week, especially when one of my children is with me, feels like a real treat.
With the film stuff, a few hours a few days and one or two full days a week mainly reminds me of how much there is to do rather than accomplishes much. I'm still plugging away, but I've lowered my expectations considerably. And I won't work on more than one project at a time. Nor will I do much of anything entirely on my own anymore.
As my kids grow older and more independent and I get back into my body, things may change, I don't know. But the dream of making it in Hollyweird no longer burns brightly. Nor do I want to scratch and claw through one no-budget project after another. Perhaps a happy medium will emerge in the future. Perhaps not. Either way, I'm going to enjoy my life. My happiness is no longer tethered to success as a filmmaker.

Grazie,
Signore Direttore

Turn On My Heart Light

Do I love making films? No, not really. It's been a colossal struggle. I've labored with the technical side of it, the interpersonal aspect, the financial challenges and the aesthetic demands. Not entirely an uphill battle and certainly not without rewards, but it's been tough. In fact a lot tougher than I realized going through it. I've noticed that while I'm doing something I never feel as if I'm doing enough and then discover later that I did more than plenty. My expectations of myself and others have often been imbalanced and unrealistic. I've gotten much better about such things. Don't get me wrong, there have been great moments that have brought light to my heart and eyes. It does seem like a high price to pay - like dating someone that's a jerk but is pretty and sweet when she wants something. Not a love connection, but your ego holds on for all the wrong reasons.
I feel like DW and MC are the love children of such dysfunctional relations. DW is a mostly healthy child. While MC has some form of fetal alcohol syndrome - lovable but not quite right and certainly challenging to parent. So good things can come out of these relations even though their inception lacked a solid foundation.
So what does make me happy or better yet; what am I happy to do? Lately it's been moving in my body. Cycling on the roads and trails, skiing, running, hiking, doing yoga and pilates. These activities give me great joy before, during and after. I'm not looking so much as to what I'm going to get out of them but what I'm experiencing while doing them. Very unlike filmmaking.
I'm not giving up on making films just yet. I'm going to continue to practice the aforementioned sporting and fitness activities indefinitely while finishing DW and MC. When and if another new project is upon me I will see if my new attitudes allow for a more grounded filmmaking experience. Perhaps it will.
A friend asked how I was affording skiing. Easy. It's a lot cheaper than making films. And for now I'm finding it to be a lot more fun. Maybe I'll switch mentors from Fellini to Warren Miller.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

Fired Up About The Oscars

Let me say it very very LOUD - Danny Boyle is a hack. He's a music video director. I can never forget I'm watching a movie when watching one of his self-conscious creations. I hated Slumdog Millionaire. I knew I was going to hate it, but I really tried based on the recommendation of a friend. Slumdog is a Unicef version of Forrest Gump except it takes itself seriously. It wasn't magical but a load of contrived sentimental rubbish. I mean, what the he'll is it? Melodrama? Fairy tale? Drama? It doesn't know and that makes it shite.
Now on to the smug and no longer attractive Kate Winslet. You won, you droned, now go away. She's awful. And smug. And ugly. In a word -- smugly. That movie was bullshit. Anne Hathaway was far more deserving.
I knew Sean Penn was going to win Best Actor months ago. It was as much of a foregone conclusion as the supporting actor statue going to Hearh Ledger. I have no problem with either of these guys winning. I saw The Life and Times of Harvey Milk doc back in the 80s and My Name Is Sam so there was nothing new there for me. It sucks that so much of America has a big problem with homosexuality. I personally was cheering for Roueke,Langella and Jenkins. Great to see those guys nominated. And very awesome to see my old buddy Mike Shannon nominated. What a brilliant nutjob that guy is.
What the fuck was PSH wearing on his head? Love him, but he needs to go away for awhile. Do a Brando or something. I'm sick of seeing him in five movies a year.
Penelope Cruz is a stunner. Who would have thought she would mature into such a beauiful and talented actress? Not me, but I'm very pleased to see the transformation and the award in her hands.
I don't know if it is ego or true passion, but watching the Academy Awards made me a little hungrier for making movies.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

Sun and Snow

What a lovely combination. I've enjoyed being at high elevations this week on Mountains Hood and Bachelor. Snowshoeing on Sunday and skiing yesterday. I haven't skied in twenty years and I'm not sure why it's been so long now that I've enjoyed it again. Lots of reasons actually, and all well in the past. Looking forward, it will not be more than twenty days before I'm on skis again.
I love Central Oregon. It's a paradise over here. When I was younger I would want to move to wherever I was visiting. I'm largely over that, but being over here always makes me think.
It's especially attractive now that my primary interests in life are my family, cycling, skiing, hiking and being outdoors as often as possible. For so long, film dominated my passion, often compelling me more than even my family. It seems that fire has died down. I think some coals are burning. I'm letting them be. No buckets of water, no piles of paper -- we'll see what happens. I'm quietly stoking the coals regularly seeing Dangerous Writing through and I'm committed to do the same with Made Crooked once DW is finished. I'm not writing anything new and for now I'm not planning on it until I'm inspired to do so. Perhaps inspiration is the domain of amateurs. That's fine with me.
Even though But A Dream has been rejected from five major festivals so far, I was contacted by imbd to submit a title page. That was of some consolation and you can see it via this link.
I'm going for a walk now in the bright sunshine of Sunriver.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

Generation Kill

This HBO mini-series is awesome. I read the book a few years ago and I have to say I liked the show a lot better. Not that the book isn't good, but the actors, writers and directors brought a world that seemed distant on the page up close and personal on the screen. I watched each of the seven parts two to four times this week. It's that good.
I'm really skeptical about David Simon's project set in New Orleans, but after seeing another grand slam from the man I'm getting somewhat optimistic about Treme. Not entirely however as both The Wire and Generation Kill were based on journalistic writing, while Treme is not. I read the script to the pilot and I know one of the cats it's based on. Neither give me much hope.
But if you've finished The Wire and feel lonely and sad, Generation Kill might get feed your good TV jones for another week.

Freaks and Geeks

It took me a long time to get around to the most acclaimed show ever to be canceled after one season on television. It was worth the wait. Which you know if you've seen it. And if you haven't -- believe the hype, this show is fantastic. Perfect, really. I can't think of anything about it that I would change. Except not cancel it.

The Master Says 362

Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer.

Barbara Kingsolver

Anne Hathaway Getting Unlovely

Finally saw Rachel Getting Married tonight. What a wonderfully truthful film. I had stayed away from it based on comparisons to Margot at the Wedding, but it wasn't cruel or calculated and therefore not a valid comparison in my opinion. The acting was incredible. Anne Hathaway, who knew? And Debra f*#cking Winger! She knows how to get out of the way. The writing (by Jenny Lumet, daughter of Sidney and ex-wife of my old buddy Bobby Cannavale) and directing (by the great Jonathon Demme) put me right in the room -- I cried, I squirmed, I smiled ... I related.
Good stuff.

Getting Easier

This morning I cycled to my office to meet a camera rental customer. Usually I work out and then go to the office. Lately there have been a few days that I didn't go to the office at all. Today I decided to combine my exercise with transportation. Part of the reason I don't commute by bike is it only takes about twelve minutes to get to my office. Which isn't at all long enough of a training session. Also I need to get around town most days for meetings, kids and other stuff for which I need a car. I also like to get out of my cycling clothes into something more presentable. I know spandex and fleece are part of the everyday wardrobe in Portland, but I can barely put the stuff on to be active let alone sport it in public.
I arrived at the Steel Bridge in about nine minutes so I decided to take a loop on the Riverfront Esplanade. As I descended the ramp to the eastbank esplanade the view of the city and the river captivated me. There was no place on earth I would have rather been at that moment. I forgot about the loop and rode on past OMSI toward Oaks Park on the Springwater Trail. What a beautiful morning.
At some point I turned around and returned to town and my office for my appointment. I did a little yoga to stretch my hamstrings and hips. When the customer came in we caught up as I got him his stuff. It wasn't that hard to say I hadn't been doing much film-wise.
I'm happier on one of my bikes or in the woods or the pool than I am trying to pursue my career as a filmmaker right now. I haven't dropped all of the work, but shifting the singularity of my focus has been difficult for me to accept.
Maybe it doesn't have to be all or nothing after all. Which is much easier to say than to practice.

Finding Fellini,
Signore Direttore

Still Not Writing

The past week I've been on my own with three kids. One of whom has been ill, as I have been. We are managing, but it takes a tremendous amount of energy to simply keep up with the day to day without losing my mind. The fickle desires of a three year old girl taken literally will break one's spirit. Staying light and loving isn't my strong suit under the best conditions.
I did see some films this week. Paul Blart Mall Cop and The Wrestler on the big screen. The latter was phenomenal. Bleak, but beautifully so. I don't have much else to say. The film met my every expectation.
I also watched the first season of Mad Men again. I think I liked it better the second/third time through. The subtlety of Pete Cambell and Draper's wife really came through. All of the writing revealed its density with another look. The acting is excellent as well. And the art direction and photography. Is this really television? Can't wait for season two.
Also saw Fassbinder's Gods of the Plague. An early, raw effort that confirms my adoration for the true master of independent film. I think part of the reason I haven't been writing is I have been telling myself I need to write more commercially. It's a result of working so many years without compensation. Seeing a Fassbinder film reminds me of the appeal of telling stories from within my purview. The seduction of the New Orleans project has lost its allure for various reasons. Perhaps I need to step away from that one and try my hand at another script for now. I have so little desire to rewrite the NOLA script. It makes me not want to write at all. It seems that if I think about am idea too much it becomes oppressive rather than ingenious. I've written enough at this point of my life to trust what works for me more. There's no doubt that working more by schedule than inspiration is something I need to explore, but there's no sense in mounting a campaign of misery at the same time. What a relief! Forget the NO project for now. Just like that 70s poster with the soft focus blonde chick on the beach tossing a bird up into the sky - If you love something, let it go. If it comes back ...
One thing that continues to be very positive in my life is fitness. I haven't missed a day on '09 of getting at least 45 minutes of exercise. Even when I've been ill or injured I've found some way of getting my body moving. It feels really good. I do have to remind myself of the incredible task it's been to adopt this new habit and acknowledge that some of the energy I would like to me putting into writing is still being sapped by confirming my daily commitment to training my body. Before long those energies will likely synergize, but I don't think I'm there just yet.
Not only am I changing a habit, which is extremely tough for a middle aged man, but I'm learning and relearning a lot of skills such as mountain biking and swimming. Both skills require a combination of physical strength and stamina with patient technique. Charging up a dirt trail, heart rate maxxing, only to come to a tricky portion of the trail that requires balance and concentration is a good thing for me. Just like the key to swimming laps for 45 minutes comes down to steady breathing. Sure my shoulders and legs are burning, but all I have to do is take the next breath in such a way that allows for the following breath without altering my stroke and before you know it my time in the pool is over for the day. Very chi.

Signore Direttore

Steep Trails, Canoes, Movies and Not Writing

My wife leaves for a work trip to Africa tonight. We spent some time hiking the Ridge Trail in Forest Park. It's a thousand plus foot ascent from the debouch of the St. Johns bridge to the top of the mountain. It was foggy at the bottom. The sun began to cut through it about a third of the way up. Shafts of light hundreds of feet long. Trees hundreds of feet tall. Hearts pounding. Silence.
I didn't think about making movies or the movies I've seen lately. I thought of our family and canoes and moving my body. I saw Gran Torino yesterday. Why bring that up? Nothing to say about that film at all. Not sad or angry that I saw it, but I am perplexed as to how it has garnered any favorable reviews or merit for addressing issues of race in America. I saw it on a very big screen, which is always a pleasure. Let's leave it at that.
Today I saw Frost/Nixon. I enjoyed it. I'd see it again and I recommend it. I went to the movies this evening after not working much this afternoon on a screenplay. Today was the day I met with my writing partner to discuss our progress over the past week on our individual projects. I presented my ideas in all their disorganized glory. I found a big hole in my reasoning of the past two months. It seemed like work. I couldn't escape the conclusion that if this seems like work perhaps I would rather be doing some work that provided a salary and benefits. Benefits of health insurance and the act of doing something of benefit to the world.
But thinking too much about the rest of my life is not that great of an idea. I'm going to stick to thoughts of paddling a canoe on the Willamette this spring.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

I'm-Bare-Assed

A friend of mine quotes a famous friend of hers on her blog as saying that if a resolution doesn't embarrass you, it isn't challenging enough. That resonates strongly with me.
I sat down and contemplated writing scripts in a new manner this afternoon. I began adapting the fitness goal template I created and have been following for two weeks into a goal worksheet for writing. I think it's going to work. Two hours of research or 7 pages of writing four days per week and one four hour review session on Thursdays with my writing partner.
My partner and I plan to write two scripts independently and two scripts in collaboration this year. Four polished ready to pitch scripts in a year doesn't embarrass me - that's an attainable, if somewhat slightly immodest, goal. The embarrassment factor is in the ready to pitch part - I don't want to think of doing that. It embarrasses me. I would rather produce the scripts myself than go through that process. So finishing scripts in order to pitch them rather than self-produce them causes some discomfort.
The other thing I'm embarrassed about is that two of the scripts I plan to write are broad comedies. I don't think of myself as a comedy writer. It makes me feel very self-conscious to announce that I will be writing something intended to make people laugh.
Slow and steady. Seven pages a day. No more, no less. Weird.
I resolved to exercise daily in 2008. I didn't get there, but I kept trying so that by December I was able to close out the year with near perfect consistency in the final weeks. I'm 8 for 8 in 2oo9. Maybe 2oo9 will require some fits and starts with regard to daily writing. That's just fine. The efforts made to change and grow are never wasted.

Ciao
Signore Direttore

Now What?

It's been 2009 for about a week now. The sound edit of DW has resumed. Some visual effects work is in progress. I've met with my partner on the New Orleans project. We were both relieved that the other had not been giving it a lot of thought lately. Not because we're no longer interested, it's just time to write the next draft and see where we are once that's in hand.
How to do that? Well, I think it's pretty simple. Apply ass to chair, open Movie Magic and start typing. The difference being that I don't plan to knock out a draft in a weekend this time. Tomorrow I'm going to sit down and map out a schedule to write this in a timely yet very regular manner. I would rather write for two hours a day two hundred days of 2oo9 than ten hours a day for thirty days of the year, which is a fair estimate of my writing output for oo8.
I'm getting tired of beating the hell out of myself to accomplish something. I get a perverse sort of pleasure from it - not unlike sprinting uphill until I vomit. It's as if I'm not doing anything unless I'm bleeding. Hell bent for leather. Or self-flagellation for idleness and lack of manic productivity.
No mas.
It's the easier softer way or the highway.

¡viva!
Signore Direttore

Happy New Year

And I do place emphasis on the happy. I started the year with some hard and fast (for me) running and some yoga. The rest of the day I've spent lounging in my pajamas. I even snuck in a little nap. We've got some surf and turf for dinner. That's about it.
My resolutions are simple - to keep doing what I've been doing. 2008 was a very good year. I'm hoping 2009 is about settling into the changes that were hard won over the last year or two.

I wish you all a year of abundant spirit and joy.

xo
Signore Direttore

Best Films of 2008

I've tried in the past few days to come up with a ten best films of the year list to post. Living in a small market really puts a kink in that - most of the year's critical favorites won't screen here until 2009.
Looking back, I don't recall a lot of happy visits to the theater this year.
Here's a few of the good ones:
Paranoid Park
The Dark Knight
Mongol
Ironman
Milk

Though I wouldn't count Milk as that great aside from Sean Penn's performance. Wall-E is on a lot of lists this year, but I didn't like it that much. Felt like I'd seen it before.
I'm straining to think of anything else. I didn't like Burn After Reading or many other new releases. The thing is I really like seeing films and I enjoy ranking them at year's end. Making a list in February is kind of lame. Do I need to plan a trip to NY or LA at year's end each year to accomplish this? Would that qualify as a business expense? By the letter of the law, yes.

I'm looking forward to The Wrestler, Wendy and Lucy, Frost/Nixon and some others.

I watched a lot of films and tv shows on DVD this year. 2008 was the year of The Wire.
So that's my pick for Best of 2008 - all five seasons of The Wire. The best sixty hours of the year for me in terms of staring at a screen.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

Goal Setting

I've mapped out some fitness goals in a very specific manner this past week. I created a specific, realistic and attainable objective based on my current physical condition. With guidance from a trusted source I will be working toward my ultimate goal systematically over the next twenty-one weeks. It will take longer if I sustain any injuries or lapses in discipline. Easy weeks are built in regularly over the four and half month schedule. I wouldn't have set up the schedule with as much patience on my own. I would push too hard, get hurt, or get frustrated by my lack of herculean progress.
I don't know exactly how this will translate to my work as a filmmaker, but I am getting my head around the possibilities. I think I'm experiencing burnout from taking too much on for so long. I need to find a way to make steady progress without going into all or nothing mode. I have had many goals as a filmmaker. I recognize a pattern of abstraction as well as anxious elasticity and a flip-flopping between grandiosity and timidity in my goal setting. It's time to focus.

Ciao
Signore Direttore

Happy Christmas

Not much blogging lately. No year end best lists from me yet. No progress reports on the various projects. Here's one: Berlin said no to But A Dream. Other than that I've been spending more time at the gym than at my office this week.
Whenever I think of filmmaking right now I don't feel any joy or excitement. I have some quiet contentment about Dangerous Writing. But everything else is better left until the new year. Though Nicola is going to Tanzania for a shoot starting January 15th. Whatever I get going is going to take a hiatus for the second half of January. I'd rather concentrate on running and cycling and feeling good physically.
I'm in better spirits than I sound. I'm excited about everything else in my life. I'm feeling some guilt or fear about the distance I feel from making films. I need to let that go. Im trying to remember that it all matters. It all counts. Riding my mountain bike in foot deep snow on Sunday has as much to do with my career as being on set.

Anyway, Happy Christmas to you my loyal readers and friends.

xo,
Signore Direttore

Let it Snow

Okay, now I'll say we've got some winter going. Though driving is still very easy with snow tires or chains. I took my mountain bike out for some midnight riding last night. It was gorgeous as was the long walk in Forest Park yesterday morning.
I don't remember a single white Christmas growing up in Portland. This year might be in with a chance.

I still don't feel much like talking about film these days, but I am enjoying myself. I'm going to build a fire now and prepare for our dinner party with some families from our neighborhood.

Signore Direttore

Snow Week

An apocalypse of bad weather has overtaken Portland this week - closing schools and wreaking havoc on our fair-weather city. (I've had no trouble driving around with no traction devices, but maybe I have superpowers) As such, my life has been taken over by kids home from school.
I'm losing my mind. Which happens when overexposed to my children and underexposed to work and exercise.
Christmas break starts next week. Hurray! This after two weeks of dealing with my son's school crisis. So I missed my trip to New Orleans, hoping to be around for his transition to a new school only to find myself devoted to caring for my children about 85% of the time in December. I know I sound ungrateful, but without some balance I'm a marginal parent. Whether that's true or not in practice, I sure feel overwhelmed and very far from my work.

Signore Bitter Poppa

Folk Wisdom 041

Moving fast is not the same thing as going somewhere.

The Master Says 361

Eighty percent of success is showing up.

Woody Allen

The Master Says 360

The talent is in the choices.

Robert De Niro

Still from Dangerous Writing

Mala Noche Traler

I saw this film at the Castro Theater in San Francisco back in the 80s with live organ accompaniment. The Castro Theater is featured in Milk, GSV's latest, which brought back memories of seeing his first film way back when.
We've created a theater marquee in the background of one of the scenes in Dangerous Writing in honor of Portland's greatest filmmaker and the Portland of my youth that Gus preserves so beautifully in Mala Noche and Drugstore Cowboy. I'll post a still later today once it's done rendering.

The Master Says 359

It doesn't happen all at once.... You become. It takes a long time.

Margery Williams

Segua quel sogno

I knocked my girlfriend, now wife, up when I was 31. I was just a few months into the transition from my life as a club promoter and band manager to trying to become a filmmaker. I'd been writing and acting off and on for years, but I never let myslef enjoy any sustained pursuit. I was ready to put the other stuff aside and dedicate myself to the silver screen. Because of my past in the visual arts and my friendship with a top tier production designer, I cut my teeth in the art department at first. We worked on high-end stuff - American Express, The Gap, Volkswagen. But as a non-union member of the art department I couldn't do much but hang about the set waiting to go pick something up from a prop house in the art dept. truck. My experience never paid off very directly as anything I worked as an art director later on didn't have a budget that allowed for any elements used in the big budget stuff. It was helpful to be around top commercial directors and DPs and stars like Whoopi Goldberg, Beyonce Knowles and Jerry Seinfeld. I had been around people of such celebrity in the club business, but working on a set with them was much different. In fact that was the type of experience my friend was trying to help me get. When I started talking about getting into Local 52 to become a prop man and earn three times what I was as an assistant, my boss strongly discouraged me from putting on a tool belt of any sort. he knew how much less likely it would have been for me to pursue directing that way. One of the prop guys on our regular crew was John Ashton, formerly the guitarist of The Psychedelic Furs. John had a family and was very pleasant on set, but he didn't love the work as I recall. He certainly didn't urge me to take the test to get into the union. A couple of years later The Furs went on tour. John played the tour and invited us to the show when they played Jones Beach.
I've gone off on an unintended tangent. I was going to talk about how ten years ago I began pursuing a career where success and financial security is elusive. And started a family at the same time. I thought about giving it up then. And while Nicola was pregnant I worked more in the art department than I wrote screenplays. I had some ideas kicking around and did some outlining. I wrote a couple of short stories hanging out in the back of the prop truck. I was making money being around what I wanted to do, but I wasn't doing what I wanted to do or even learning that much about writing or directing. And the money I was earning, while decent, was but a fraction of what I'd earned in the past. Then Henry was born and I thought about law school or something much more practical. It occurred to me that the best thing I could do for my child was to show him how to pursue a dream. I didn't have to succeed, I just had to follow my heart. Even so, I thought if I didn't see some tangible results by the time I was forty I would move on.
I threw myself into learning about film. I started saying no to art department gigs. I started studying acting again. I took classes at SVA and later enrolled at NYU. I bought a 16mm camera and a DV camera and made films and videos. I started teaching acting. I directed some plays. I wrote a script. After a couple of years I tried to find a job I could do to make some money in the industry while working toward directing. I tried editing. Then I went back to the art department. It was obvious to me and others that I needed to be directing. A funny thing was happening - my awareness and knowledge of what was good was growing at a much faster rate than my ability. It was as if a sportscaster suddenly found himself expected to play the game expertly instead of commenting on it expertly. I was becoming a student of and a commentator on the game rather than a player. Not completely, but it was more the case than not. I continuously waited to become. And waited. My posture gaining in sophistication all the while.
I'm now 41. I haven't quit. I've thought about it. I've felt guilty as year after year goes by with more money going out to fuel the dream than comes back. I've done some good work and continue to learn. My good work still isn't out in the world. It's starting to happen. Getting turned down for Sundance called some things into question. I didn't expect to get into Sundance. I don't think I was unfairly rejected. I recognize the many many factors that go into those selections. Yet there's this voice in my head that says, "Hey, if you think you're so goddamned special; why didn't you get in?" Funny that -- "You." I didn't submit me. I submitted But A Dream, which I made, but it isn't me. Made Crooked is closer to me, there's certainly no doubt that the story comes from me, but it still isn't me. Dangerous Writing is the closest thing to me that I've ever made. That and Nora Mae, my first short. That's part of the reason I want to get Made Crooked out there first.
I digress once again. Even as I claim DW is me, were it rejected I might not feel the same self-doubt. What I wanted to accomplish with DW was about telling a story in a certain way. I never expected it to be good or get me anywhere. Whereas with BAD, I thought it was going to be the calling card that green-lighted Original Glory, a script I wrote that had a major agency was packaging. Even with Made Crooked, the expectations and projections were eminent.
Whatever resistance to finishing films that I've been working through is diminishing. Now that that particular struggle is over I find myself exhausted not only by the herculean efforts to get past my fears, but by the endless ardor of working with no money. Right now I'm feeling like I can't put myself through making a film by any means necessary again. The New Orleans project is much bigger. And because it is much bigger, I have much less control over whether it will happen or not. I am determined to follow through and take it as far as I can. Though at the moment I'm not sure where the energy to do so is going to come from.
I saw Quantum of Solace last night. Possible the most boring blockbuster I've ever seen. $224 million! The director Marc Forster started off small less than ten years ago with a stylish indie. I forget the name of it. Then he did Monster's Ball. When I'm reminded of such career arcs, I maintain some hope. Then I see the making of a Britney Spears music video this morning. It reminded me when seeing the elaborate sets just how long that I've been trying to do something with nothing.
I don't have any answers. I'm going to work on finishing these two no-budget features. And I'm going to keep going on the NOLA project. I'd like to say what I'm going to do after that, like if it doesn't work out within eighteen months I'll go back to school to become a ...
But that would be unproductive and disrespectful to the great mystery of life. So for now I think I'll just keep doing what's in front of me, leaving the results up to the powers that be.

Following that dream,
Signore Direttore

The Master Says 358

I mean, the truth of the matter is, I like the failures as much as I like the successes, it's only the world that doesn't like the failures.

Sydney Pollack

Facebook Frenzy

I received yet another invitation to join Facebook this week. I did Friendster when that first came out and had fun setting that up, but I was pretty burnt on such sites by the time MySpace and Facebook came around. We're finishing DW so I thought -- well, why not? We need to do a page to promote the film. But one thing I noticed on MySpace was that many of my friends don't accept invitations from films or filmmakers, so I decided to just do a page for me. The backlog of ignored friend requests got me off to a blazing start toward some satisfying friend whoring.
Otherwise I've had a hellish week full of activities and concerns with my kids' schools. So the video game puzzle of scanning friends' friends for familiar names and faces and entering the dusty archives of names from my brain into the search window has been a joyfully manic distraction. I found folks that I hold dear in my heart and think of often that I'd long lost touch with. Everyone from the guy I opened my first acting studio with in NY to the cocktail waitress from my regular Thursday night spot circa 1988 with whom I flirted and eventually won over for a sloppy night of lust that didn't quite live up to the promise of our months of coy banter. We didn't exchange messages, but it's nice to know she's out there and that she, too, remembers.
Then there's all of you regular friends all gathered in one place in cyperspace - just one social networking pages of billions of ones and zeros floating around. How fucking weird. But kind of cool at the same time.

Ciao,
Signore Direttore

The Master Says 357

We are not going to wake up one day and be good. We have to work for it, and we have to work for it every day. It's not just going to happen.

Brandon Roy