Here I come around the mountain
Bah
Balls to big news
The last weeks have been rather busy for this aspiring Player of Games.
What with the house hunting (we may move, we may not, in six months we could rural yeo-people, then again we could be urban sophisticates), the work stress (big changes in the world of civil service). And the strange noises coming from the loft, the unexplained lights hovering around outside and the regular alien bottom-rapings.
So I'll cut to the chase, max the envelope and get some brand muscle on the writing shit.
Balls to big news
The last weeks have been rather busy for this aspiring Player of Games.
What with the house hunting (we may move, we may not, in six months we could rural yeo-people, then again we could be urban sophisticates), the work stress (big changes in the world of civil service). And the strange noises coming from the loft, the unexplained lights hovering around outside and the regular alien bottom-rapings.
So I'll cut to the chase, max the envelope and get some brand muscle on the writing shit.
- Flood
The last time I wrote I had finished a rather substantial re-write of the treatment (now up to about 11 pages and running).
It's still not there yet. But Irascible Tutor #1 dug many elements of it. Enough to send it to his business partner, the development and funding guy for their company.
His response was: it's not ready yet.
But it was ready enough for him to have with him at the Berlin Film Festival.
He got talking to a German production company which had a film in competition. They are raising money to make English language genre films.
He gave them the Flood treatment.
My fingers and toes and anal hairs are crossed. - String
We are supposed to be working on the final touches of the story.
Which of course means a pretty major re-write.
But the Yorkshire Menk has gone off the radar, so I am in a bit of a quandry.
Do I trust her to deliver when she is not doing so? Or do I cut her out and plough on?
The Famous Director is not too fussed about time, as he knows he is getting us to write a virtual script for nowt.
But I am the service provider. And he is a customer - and one with a great deal of power.
If he says take six weeks I want to do it in one.
I think a fight is brewing. - Them cartoons
Henceforth known as City of Dreams on Sea, and World of Chop (Incorporating House of Chop).
I met a man from the Beeb a couple of weeks ago. That was the big news. So not that big really.
I had approached him for advice about who at the Beeb could help us develop a script into a proposal ready for commissioning.
And the dude gave me that very advice. He was also going to give feedback on the script I sent.
That was due a couple of weeks ago, but I am giving it one more week before doing the follow up. - Lillith
This one was at step-outline stage. My tutor was not getting certain key aspects of it.
As in: he thought it was a supernatural tale. Pah! It was a tale about someone going mental dressed up as a supernatural tale.
He got that point, and then came back with some other feedback. At the time I was quite sceptical about it, for the reasons above. But, during the last tutorial session, as I listened to one of my fellow-students slogging through their work, I got it.
He was right.
Too much happened in the final act. Too much was introduced late in the second act. So an intriguing opening led to about half an hour's worth of flatness. Nothing going anywhere.
Deadlines were looming ... so I took the Sunday out and completely re-did it. Introduced a completely new sub-plot, and moved a pivotal point forward, so it became what looked like the inciting incident. (Although in reality, as it's a tale about madness, the inciting incident takes place some time before the story actually starts. Take that!)
Seems to work now. And I am in line for a first. Good boy!
I managed to get the e-mail address of the extremely famous director through a mate of a mate.
I wrote to him asking if he would be my prof. advisor, but I haven't heard anything. Not surprising really.
He has made two films. The first was a cult hit in the UK. The second got him universal praise, interviews with Jonofan Woss, and it opens in the US this summer. And he successfully pitched a new project to one of the major Hollywood studios a couple of months ago.
So he is about six months too stratospheric for me ...
No worries though. I'll end up with some young upstart from Shooting People with a camera and a iMac in his Mum's bedroom. - Mind-fuck book
This was the book I chose for the adaptation segment of the MA. I got the author's permission to do it.
He is supposed to be doing a treatment at some point, but he hasn't got around to it.
So I either (a) do it, can't do anything commercial with it as he has sold the rights based on the treatment, but use it as a calling card; (b) do it, he isn't pursuing the treatment and I get some money folk to approach him with option money.
I have only been working on it a week, but already I am away with the fairies. It one crazy book! - Welcome to my World
I didn't mention this one in my uber list back in the day. It was something I put together for the Film Council's '25 Words or Less' competition.
The genre was 'Stalker'. Examples given included Single White Female, One Hour Photo, Cape Fear - films where the stalker is the bad guy, and the protagonist represents us and our fears about the precariousness of modern life.
The brief was: make your ideas big, fill them with commercial potential.
So I twisted the whole thing on its head, and made the protagonist into the stalker. Made it funny and black. But not commercial.
I got a great rejection letter last week, in which they said 'we loved it, it made it onto the shortlist. But it was not commercial. Finish it and send it in to the usual development channels.'
Now I know a rejection is a rejection, yada yada yada. And shit.
But I would also like to know how much of that rejection is by rote. Two out of the four paragraphs have got 'cut and paste' oozing from every pore.
But two are less obvious.
I need to know if they were written for me and me alone. If so then I have a name at the Film Council I can pursue. If not then I am back amongst the masses.
BUT HOW THE JIMMY DO I FIND THAT OUT???
