John Q. Phats Entertainment

My Writing Process

Carl — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:20:40 +0000

As I find myself writing more and more I find my process changing dramatically. I’ve read a lot of books on writing screen plays and everyone seems to have a different process. So I guess the best thing to do is to sort of cherry pick what you like from each book. I’ll tell you flat out, outlines do not work for me. I end up having this outline with no clue how to translate it in to a script. When I’ve tried, I just end up questioning the outline and trying to go a different direction. It all goes down hill from there. I find myself taking the Stephen King approach more and more. I read a great book by Stephen King, titled “On Writing.” First off, no wonder that guy wrote horror so well. He lived a terrifying life. Second of all, he wrote some amazing books and made an extremely lucrative living off of writing. Thirdly, this book itself is written amazingly well. The points he makes and the things he points out are all reinforced through stories of his experiences as a writer. If you start to tell me a story, I want to know the ending and I’m going to listen. One of the main things I took from that book was something he called “writing with options.” You know what’s going to be the final result, but in the beginning you write things that give you options along the way. For example, lets say you are writing about a burglar breaking in to a house. You would start off with the woman in her house and maybe she starts to boil some water for tea. Does she use the boiling water as a defense against the intruder? I don’t know, but it gives you something to think about. It’s an option. That’s how I write. I just sit down and start to write and see what happens. Think of that first sit down though as just laying out the ground work. I pay attention to detail, but I don’t judge what I’ve written. Not yet anyway. I suppose essentially, my first draft is my outline. Most outlines are roughly a page or two. My outlines are 120 pages. Sue me. After the first draft, I go through it and delete parts that I don’t like or I rewrite them. Then I do that again, then again, then 3 or 4 more times just for good measure. Then again and again. Then I’m done after I go over it a couple more times. Each time I go over it, it goes faster and faster. There are parts that I’m comfortable with that I can start to skip after awhile. The final run through takes me about 20 minutes. Now it’s time to have someone else read it. I get their opinions and this is the tricky part. Finding someone who’s going to be brutally honest and being able to deal with that brutal honesty is not easy. The natural reaction is to defend yourself. But it’s not an attack on you, it’s on your script. Ultimately, it’s to make it better. Whenever I start to feel defensive, I identify it, and I say absolutely nothing. Sometimes I’ll nod and say “Hmmmmm.” This is my alternative. I really try to think about the criticism, rather then immediately defend myself against it. If I can justify it, I’ll discuss it. If the person counters and makes good points that I can’t dispute, I change it. After about 4 or 5 people read it and I make the adjustments I need to, I’m done….. After a couple more rewrites here and there. And that’s my writing process. It works for me, but it’s probably not for everybody.
I saw Shutter Island on Sunday. Kind of predictable, but I liked it all the same. I can’t really think of anything else to say about it. Martin Scorsese is awesome.

Cainestorm

Caine — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 10:41:03 +0000

…just a little late, but never the less… Caine.

Mr. JQP himself has opened up the forum for me to ramble off on whatever comes to mind. Humbly accepted of course. Then I wondered what to write about. I realized that often when I write, I skip around from thought to thought and idea to idea until the start and end are unrecognizable to each other. Sort of like all the parts of an engine each working faster individually than as a whole. I call it a Cainestorm. Usually it happens when I have too much to say. I do the same thing when I’m telling a story. I want to fit in all the little details and side notes so i end up bouncing all over the place. Hard to keep peoples attention with that sort of format. I’m sure everyone knows someone like that. I’m that guy… Until the next

Movie to see: I’m a Cyborg But That’s Ok

Introducing- Caine Crockett

Carl — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:11:43 +0000

Caine Crockett will now be posting here. I’ve pretty much given him the freedom to talk about whatever he wants to. You may have seen him in some of the shorts on the website (Censored, Not Walter, Bad Girlfriend, etc…). He’s mostly an actor. So, it should be interesting to get experiences from an actors perspective on shoots.
Sometimes, as a little treat to myself, I enjoy wallowing in the pits of human existence. Where would I go to do that? YouTube of course. YouTube in this case is sort of like the dealer and sometimes, I need a fix badly. So, I start my search for street fights in the basement of human civilization. Once you wade through the crap where middle schoolers are just trying to get views by staging an obvious fake fight, you get to the good stuff.
“Hmmmm, Skater vs Rollerblader? OK. Punk vs Gangster? Yes please. Two Drunk Girls Fighting?! Hello subscribe button!”
I’m not really looking to see someone get hurt. Well, maybe a little, but really what I’m looking for is awkward situations that I can laugh at. During one of my kicks I came across this gem:

I’m not sure if this is staged or not, I pray that it’s not, because I would really like to believe that life really is this awesome. I don’t know what’s funnier, the fact that a fight breaks out right in the middle of a wedding or the fact that all of the other wedding guests just stand around watching as the bride gets what appears to be sexually assaulted. Of course, I can’t blame them. The only thing I would probably be able to do was lean to the person closest to me and say “Holy shit! This is awesome!” I love how the groom just kind of stands there with a not so bright look on his face as this biker chick just grabs his bride and pulls her off stage to kick the crap out of her. Then there’s the photographer snapping pictures in the background. Because that’s something you would want to remember on your wedding day.
“Hey honey, you remember when that butch chick dragged me off stage and beat the shit out of me in the middle of the ceremony?”
“No, I don’t remember that. Was that our wedding?”
“Yeah, hold on, let me pull out the wedding book, I’ll show you. Better yet, go get your lap top, fire up YouTube.”
Absolutely amazing.

A Movie Script in Under 10 Days

Carl — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:55:48 +0000

I’ve been writing a lot lately. I’ve written 47 pages in roughly 5 days. I had an idea and I just started writing it. I didn’t do an outline or anything like that. Which I’m sure is a mortal sin in the world of script writing, but whatever. I’m really enjoying this so far. It’s kind of fun to lay out the story this way. It’s almost like reading a book. Especially because I’m not sure how this script is going to end yet. Writing an outline seemed to be very detrimental to me in the past. It just made me over think everything. Maybe this is what will work for me. Just writing and then going through to revise later. I wonder if any other writers use that same process. I’m not letting anything stop me either. I always just go with my gut, weather I think it’s bad or not. I figure when I’m done, I’ll go through it a million times and revise it every time. Right now it’s sort of a sci fi action comedy. By the end of my revisions it will probably be a tragedy about pie. Whatever, I like what I’ve written so far. I’ve been telling people the story as I develop it and they seem to genuinely be interested. They’ve been asking me “have you written any more of your script yet? What happened?” I think that’s a good sign. Weather it’s good or not, I’m having a really good time writing it. At first I was averaging about 2 pages a night. Then I started averaging 5 pages a night. Now I’m doing between 8-10 pages a night. If this trend continues, I’ll probably hit about 15 pages a night before I’m done. An average movie script (according to a Google search) is 95 – 125 pages. If my script were going to be 95 pages I’m half a page shy of being half way done. A movie script in less than 10 days isn’t too shabby. Granted, it will be a shitty movie script that needs revision, but still. I think that’s kind of an accomplishment. Not really though. I’m sure anyone could write a shitty script in 10 days. When I finish it, I’m going to enter it in to as many script writing festivals as I can find. Seriously, those are so freaking easy. You sign up, pay the $15 entry fee and then E-Mail them a PDF. I could enter 10 festivals in like 20 minutes. I’ve never entered a script writing festival, only short film festivals. Film festivals are kind of a pain in the ass. You have to sign up online, pay online, and then get the tracking number. Print out a DVD label with the tracking number on it, affix it to the DVD. Then you have to print out a label and put it on the case that the DVD is in. Then you have to print out another label to ship it. I suppose you don’t have to print it, but when I was a programmer, nothing made me more skeptical about a short like a hand written DVD cover that I could barely read. I didn’t even mention the part about burning the DVD and making sure that it’s the right region and that it actually plays correctly. Then there’s the worry that the festival will have a picky DVD player and it won’t even play. Even if I have to ship a script out, it’s already 10 times easier then shipping out a short film. It’s paper, you read it. Not much can go wrong with that. Unless someone spills a cup of coffee on it or something, but that’s hardly my fault.

That’s Surprisingly Bad

Carl — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 20:01:13 +0000

Today on YouTube’s front page they featured some shorts from the Sundance Film Festival. Seeing as how Sundance is supposed to be one of the biggest and best film festivals out there I was kind of curious and half expecting something brilliant. I would think that the only real advantage to showing these is that it would be sort of a marketing tool. Like “look at these great films. Come check out the festival next year, to see more just like it.” This is just my opinion but after looking at these videos, I would not pay to go to Sundance next year. I kind of expected them to put their best foot forward. If this is the best they’ve got, I’m not interested. Sundance shorts I’ve seen in the past have been deep and thought provoking, these are beyond shallow. The one redeeming short out of the four on the main page is a documentary named Mr. Okra. It’s a great story and it’s really nicely shot. I was looking for more of something like that, rather then “look how stupid we are!” comedy. By all means check them out though, this is just my opinion. Sundance has a channel on YouTube. I haven’t checked out some of the other videos yet, but these aren’t much of an incentive to do that. I’m still not sure if this is now the norm of Sundance or if this is an extreme misrepresentation of the short films at Sundance on the part of YouTube. Perhaps I’ve just lost touch with what’s good.
There are some short films out there that are so unbelievable they make me look at what I do and think “I have no clue what I am doing.” That’s what I expect to see when I watch a Sundance short film. That’s not what I got.
Here’s the link to Mr. Okra and here’s the link to the Sundance YouTube page.

Donations?

Carl — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:27:10 +0000

So, starting our next project, we need money. While we are trying different approaches as well, I figured I would give this a shot. I can’t offer you much in return. Just bragging rights if we are ever famous millionaires and our complete and utter appreciation. We all love making films and unfortunately, sometimes our vision simply isn’t possible on a nothing budget. So, here’s the donate link:

Caine, last night came up with a great idea. We are selling cards for $5 dollars each that basically say that if you support us now, we’ll pay you $1000 if we ever make it big. Not a bad deal if you ask me. Will we regret that later? Probably, but what the hell, right? We are also looking in to hosting a sushi night where the actors all make rolls and sell them. Another idea was to host a screening of Do Nice Guys Finish Last and ask for donations there as well. Then there’s my specialty of just plainly selling things. Really what ever I can get my hands on gets a price tag. I’m also selling bread. Wipe that grin off your face. I realized last night that selling bread is pretty damn easy. Especially because I have a bread maker. It takes me about 20 minutes and the damn bread maker does all the rest. I just add the ingredients and hit a button. I’ll keep you guys updated with how everything is going. The showing of Do Nice Guys Finish Last is my favorite option so far. Renting the theater would take most of our profits, but that would be one hell of a night.

Save Us John Cusack!

Carl — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 20:01:22 +0000

So, either we have just 2 years left before the planet destroys itself or like the Y2K hoax nothing is going to happen and life will go on. Either way, there’s nothing I can do about either of those so it’s time to have some fun and get down to business. Unless of course John Cusack picks me up in a limo. Then we can outrun earthquakes and lava. That scene was absolutely ridicules and I loved every God damned second of it. Just turn off your brain for movies like that, you’ll love them. I liked that movie as a mindless action flick. I got exactly what I expected.
With Do Nice Guys Finish Last all set and making its attempt at a festival run, I’m ready for my next project. I plan to start 2010 right. My resolution was to write a script whenever I get an idea. I had way too many ideas last year that I’ve now forgotten because I never wrote them. Sometimes they are entire long short films, other times they are just quick scenes. I actually do really enjoy writing, but the hardest part is getting started. So, no matter how bad or small the idea is, I am going to stop what I’m doing and write a script for it immediately. We’ll see how that goes as I seem to get groups of ideas. Hopefully I can keep up with myself.
Ellen Sandler is doing a seminar on January 23^rd in Los Angeles at The Writers Store. I’m seriously considering going. I really like her book. Only thing holding me back is that it’s $150. I could be spending that cash on my next short film. Who knows though, this class might push me in another direction entirely. For $150 I suppose I could find out. I’ll keep you guys updated. It could be a fun Saturday.

Happy 2010 everyone. Hopefully you all have a good year.

I Lie a Lot

Carl — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 06:54:53 +0000

I said there would be some new footage by now. As you can see there isn’t any. I lie a lot. I did write something though that I’m pretty pleased with.
I just got done watching the finale of Dexter. Ho-ly shit. Words cannot describe how good it was. I’m going to bring this up, because I love Jennifer Carpenter, but that scene with her and Michael C. Hall where they are talking was one of many absolutely amazing scenes. I know I seem to kiss her ass a lot on this blog, but she is fucking phenomenal. I read a tweet by SHO_Dexter that they should just give John Lithgow the Emmy right now. They really should. Everyone who’s seen that show would probably be absolutely fine with that. OK, I’m going to stop. I hate the fact that I have to wait so long for a new season. That ending was an absolute shock. OK, I’m stopping. While I could write a whole page just on Jennifer Carpenter, I think this is enough.
It’s tough for me to concentrate after that show but I’ll do my best. My new script still needs to be revised, but I like it so far. I’m going to try and commit some time to it every day. I hold on to projects for way too long. Or I lose interest or something and start working on something else. See, I’m OCD and ADD at the same time. I’m OCD about film making and stuff and I’m obsessed with it. But my ADD makes it so I constantly get really excited about the next idea. Only I’m not done with the first idea, so it doesn’t really work. I need to focus on one project from now on. Or maybe I just need to write constantly to keep up with myself. I suppose that couldn’t be a bad thing.
In other news, Do Nice Guys Finish Last got a fully operational IMDB page:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1561452/
They listed me as a stunt coordinator. OK, whatever, sure, I’m a stunt coordinator. It’s also listed as being in Post production. Nope, it’s done. Chris is on there and so is Caine. If you go to my IMDB page, I now have two films listed there. I’ve hit the big time now people. It’s all smooth sailing from here. In all seriousness, it’s kind of cool, but that’s about it. It does sort of add to my legitimacy though. I’ve had conversations like this before:
“So, you do short films?”
“Yeah.”
“What kind of short films?”
“Mostly comedies.”
“really?”
“Yeah, I’m on IMDB and everything.”
“O my God! Really?!”
I don’t know why, but that’s sort of how it is. Almost like they thought I lied to them or something. I’m not a liar, it’s bullshit.
Note: See title of blog.

Still Plugging Away

Carl — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 17:05:18 +0000

Still plugging away at the festivals. I’ve sent it out to five so far. The last one was sent to Australia. I thought that was kind of exciting. I sent it to something called The Sexy International Film Festival. A festival that focuses around sex and relationships. I swear to God, they have a festival for every thing. I’ve seen festivals focused around dogs, cats, homosexuality, ethnicity, religion, the environment, racism, sexism, and many other isms. At least a sex theme festival is something that’s generally loved by the public. Who doesn’t like sex of some sort? Since DNGFL had to make a long trek to Australia, that required a visit to the local US Post Office. Could there be a worse run organization without it just completely collapsing on itself? There was this lady there who said they were holding a package for her. Apparently they keep all of the packages in a giant disorganized pile in the back room. Brilliant idea during the holidays by the way. So, the attendant had to go to the back like 4 times to look through everything. Each time she came back she told the lady “It’s not back there.” After the fourth time, she found it and gave it to her, so the line could move forward. I laughed out loud when I saw this. Here’s the scary part about this though. These are all government employees. Essentially these are the same brand of people that RUN OUR COUNTRY. You know how when you walk up to a postal worker behind that little window and they look like they should have committed suicide like a week ago? Just how miserable they are and how much they don’t give shit if you get what you want or not? It’s kind of funny if you really think about it. Despite all of that DNGFL is on it’s way to Australia. The reason I bring this up is that while in the post office I started thinking of a comedy revolving around the Post Office, but it quickly turned in to a drama involving suicide and drug abuse. I bet I could turn that in to a comedy. Overdosing can be funny if you shoot it right. The movie Dear God has kind of an up beat theme to it, but after my experience yesterday I can assure you that it was %100 fiction. It’s about a con man turned postal worker that decides to try and scam people that have written letters to God. He inadvertently ends up helping them and when the other postal employees catch wind of this, they decide they want to help people too. Hilarity ensues from this point on. It’s kind of indication that the post office sucks based on the fact that they need the power of almighty God, just to turn it in to a feel good environment.
All of that aside, this Saturday me, Caine, and possibly Chris are going to get together this weekend to shoot something. So, I might just have some new short films up. Nothing super fancy, but they might be funny. Caine is funny, that’s pretty much all I have working for me right now. Neither of us has written a script or thought anything out at all really. All we know is that we’re going to have a camera, it’s going to be day time, and we are going to shoot something. I’m stealing an idea from Six Finger Fist here, but what ever. If anyone wants to give us a title for this new short film, leave it in the comments, and we’ll base our short film off of that title. Why not, right?

The Festival Frenzy

Carl — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 22:16:55 +0000

I’ve started submitting Do Nice Guys Finish Last to festivals. Maybe it’s just me, but the price of festival submissions has sky rocketed. When I was submitting Censored I would come across an occasional $50 submission fee. Most of them were in the $10-$35 range. After submitting to three festivals it seems like $50 is the new $35. I’ve found a couple that were upwards of $90+. My first question is “Why?” My second question is “What the fuck?!” $90. Do you know what that gets me? Just a marginal chance to screen at a film festival. Actually, I suppose that depends on how good your film is. I do believe that Do Nice Guys Finish Last is at the very least a decent film. It’s just that it’s over 15 minutes long. I’m not very confident that it will screen anywhere. Not because it’s a bad film but it just goes very against the grain. The run time is a big factor and there’s enough cursing in it to make a sailor blush. It’s got a C-Bomb in it. That makes it kind of historical. I believe this is the first film we have completed that has a C-Bomb in it. Great job everyone, really great work. I applaud us. There really aren’t enough C-Bombs in film festivals. It’s found it’s way in to popular cinema though.
“Can I get any of you c***s a drink?”
- Nick Frost in Shaun of the Dead
“Your mother’s c*** stinks like carpet cleaner.”
-Mickey Rourke in Barfly
“Shut that c*** mouth or I’ll come over there and fuck start her head.”
-Ryan Phillippe in The Way of the Gun
“Respect the cock…and tame the c***. Tame it.”
-Tom Cruise in Magnolia

So, I’m not that off base here. If anyone calls me on it, my first response will be “But Tom Cruise said it!”