Back to Malawi :: 11.17.06
Welcome to the new website! I'm happy to say that the 'Troubles in Zolokere' is finished and now for sale. With USPS first class shipping (domestic) it's $15.00 on the dot. Each disc sold makes a ten-dollar profit. From that sale $5.00 will go to development projects in the village of Zolokere where my friend, Peace Corps Volunteer Jake Wilson has been hard at work for over two years now. For more info about his projects, check his site out: http://malawijake.honkatonk.com. He has done amazing things, and is now in need of completion funds for construction on a new school in the village. Let's give the guy a hand. All you have to do is buy the film and you effect the lives of the people you see IN the film. It's not a weepy thing that makes you feel like a crumb. It's a look at life in a remote Malawian village that I think will surprise and inform you.
The other five dollars will go toward production of a second, larger, more in depth film about the same community. I'll be in Malawi Nov 27th to start shooting and I'll stay with Jake in Zolokere for the following three months. The film will be about HIV/AIDS and I hope to emphasize the women's side of the story. It will be sold in turn to raise more money for development in Malawi.
I fly out to Munich tomorrow for the Munich International Student Film Fest. I'm excited about it. It's a weeklong and there'll be filmmakers from all over the world to meet. I got an email a couple weeks ago with the itinerary and there'll be a tour of one of the big beer breweries. I love film and all that, but I'm really excited about the brewery. After the festival, I go to Malawi.
Whenever I'm getting ready for these big trips, something crazy always happens right before I leave. Today the neighbor tried to bag my UPS delivery of videotape for the Malawi shoot. I got it back five or six hours later with the box shredded, the invoice gone and my address ripped off the box. He'd opened up one of the tape boxes inside too. Loco. Then I went out to pick up a rain jacket, cause it's Malawi's wet season right now, and on the way back, a hundred yards from home I felt my transmission depressurize and I could hear oil spraying out the bottom of the car. Its actually good luck in a weird way, I got everything done that I had to before it blew, then coasted it in right in front of the house.
So thanks for checking out the new site, I'm really happy with it. I'll update whenever possible from Munich and Malawi. All the posts following this one are transferred over from the Greyhorse Blog, check the dates above the posts so you don't get lost. For the YouTubers, I just uploaded a funky little short about an artist I met at CalArts, check it out at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hX32y7aAf4s
Best to all!
Cy
From Munich International Student Film Fest :: 11.22.06
Can't write much, this system is all screwy. Long story short, the festival is rough. Tons of bad work that lacks emphasis, narrative density and other very depressing things. In the midst of this, looking at my film on a bad projector with bad sound a few lessons finally settled in. Anybody back at CalArts, take this to heart! Make a SHORT film, ten minutes or less. Turns out the world doesn't care about your vision if it isn't disciplined. If its loose, its going to get walked on. I'm taking some heavy shots and I thought I'd done OK. I was wrong. The films that are getting love here are short and too the point. All the spacious, moody films look like junkers next to those.
Glochenspiel :: 11.26.06
King Ludwigs Castle, Bavaria ::
From Munich Int. Student Film Fest, Last Day ::
Major improvements. Thursday was a train toward the Alps to see Ludwig's famous castle. Kitsch as can be, but being there, with dramatic mountain tops above and long green valleys below, and feeling the mass of the stone work, was impressive.
Next day found the little river here in Munich where they surf a standing wave. Hypnotic. They tie an apparatus to the base of the bridge with climbing ropes, jammed by water pressure, it forms a little two/three foot standing wave. Its mostly one at a time, guys and a couple of girls. They were polite and so was the surfing.
The films went from bad to mind blowing. Monday they started with all these slow pace, Eastern European block house stories. Like dentistry to watch. By Thursday they'd screened a couple films that could hang with the pros. 35mm shoots, full crews, name actors, art direction and pretty solid writing and good editing; impressive. All the same, it was much better on the days without any films. Talking to people from all over, without the interference of competition, was nice.
Out of here tomorrow for Malawi. Been waiting for this. Spent a lot of time this week talking with people and thinking about the approach to this next film. Foolish to try and control a doc at this stage, so been trying to get some general ideas on paper before melee hits. Many many challenges. The web of complex problems that fall down with the pull of one little thread. Talking about HIV means talking about gender inequality, polygamy, sex, political corruption and poverty at the least. Heady stuff, and all that in a society so traditional that knee caps are considered too sexy for public. Also concered about hitting the audience too hard with heavy stuff. Hope to find some ideas to give Joe Blow access.
Got some motivation from a film I saw here this week. A doc short about an AIDS orphan in Zambia, poorly shot, poorly cut, from another American who was obviously slumming. It was pretty offensive, straight exploitation of a kid in a terrible situation. A great example of what not to do. The judges lost all their credibility with me and a lot of others by awarding it a 5000 euro prize. I have to wonder if any of that money will get back to Zambia. They should have given the kid the money. Clowns.
Really looking forward to Malawi.
Landing :: 11.27.06
The plane just hit the ground in Lilongue, Malawi. Havent been this happy or excited in a long time. Land looks incredible, hundreds of farm plots with red dirt furrows and everywhere else is deep green. Last time I arrived in the dry season, was red hot dusty.
Rain clouds look like heavy river stones.
The filmmaking part of me now goes into the cloud bank. Perspective and clarity will be hard to come by for a while, for now its all guts and big hopes. Even after so much flying, feel like a million bucks.
This page contains all entries posted in November 2006. They are listed from oldest to newest.
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