John Q. Phats Entertainment

I am extremely behind on my entertainment quota for the week. I haven’t watched any movies, seen the new episode of Dexter or really watched or worked on much of anything since my last post. I told myself that I would work on something tonight. But as you can tell from searching the archives, that’s usually a bitter lie. I’m working on a couple of scripts right now and both of them are at sort of exciting stages.
When I last left Red Hood, she was in the tail end of a bloody battle. I always wondered what fight scenes in actual movie scripts looked like. Does the writer describe each punch and kick? Or is there just some sort of text alluding to a fight scene? Or is there something that references another document (maybe a video) that describes the fight scene in detail?
The following is a small passage from a fight scene in Kill Bill:

“INT. HOUSEWIFE’S NICE HOME – DAY
The white woman and the black woman FLY into the center of the living room, CRASHING onto her coffe table in front of the sofa.
These two wildcats go at each other savagely, TUMBLING OVER the couch, clawing and scratching all the way, landing together on the plush carpet.
The HOUSEWIFE
KICKS The Bride, sending her CRASHING backwards into the small table where the phone, a note pad (for messages), and the mail is kept.

The Housewife scrambles up on her feet, but is caught by a

FLYING TACKLE from behind by The Bride that sends them both into……..
An ornamental iron and tempered-glass bookcase that has framed family photos, display toys, some African art, and a collection of painted commemorative plates depicting the negro experience in the American military. Starting with a plate featuring Cripis Atkins in the revolutionary war, negro troops in union blue during the civil war, Buffalo soldiers fighting Indians, the Jim Crow troops of the first world war, the colored troops of world war two, Korea, Vietnam, and finally Colin Powell….The Bride and The Housewife CRASH THROUGH all this reducing everything to rubble.”

I have to admit, the detail in this is kind of intimidating. Tarantino spends more time describing the surroundings then the actual fight itself. It’s sort of a mixture of describing it kick for kick but leaving it very open for interpretation. This is probably the best way of doing this. I’m guessing Tarantino did it this way because he wanted to leave certain aspects of the fight scene open to the imagination of those helping out on the project, maybe a fight coordinator or a stunt person or maybe even the actors. Or perhaps he just didn’t really care that much about certain details and wrote whatever the hell he wanted. He talks about kicks, but doesn’t really go in to much detail about it. What type of kick is it? Where on her body does she get kicked? I suppose these details don’t matter. We know the action and what the result is:

 “The HOUSEWIFE
KICKS The Bride, sending her CRASHING backwards into the small table…”

Perhaps that’s all you need. But I guess every writer has to find their own way of doing things. As I stumble through my Red Hood fight scenes, my only hope is that I can write something that others can read and make sense out of.
All this talk of fight scenes has me thinking about where I left Red Hood. I’ll probably finish writing that scene when I get home.

Often how I write is a little out of order.  Let’s say for example that I’m writing a 100 page movie.  Often times, I’ll get to page 65, and then write something that corresponds with something that happened on page 25 that I haven’t written yet.  So, I go back to page 25 and fill in the gap.  I started doing that last night and realized how ass backwards that is.  As unnatural as it seems, it’s the workflow that seems the most natural.  I’m actually very excited about writing that scene tonight.  I’ve built up a great moment of tension.  My only problem is that I sort of like having these intense moments with no real payoff at the end of the scene.  Nothing really cheesy like a cat jumping out of a trash can or some shit like that.  I’ll give you an example.  There’s a scene when Red Hood has just started becoming a vigilante.  She’s walking through the park when she sees one of the main villains in the movie sitting on a park bench staring intently at a little girl.  Red Hood freezes and isn’t really sure what to do.  I draw it out for a bit of an awkward stare and then the villain just gets up and walks off.  That’s it.  Shit, looking it now, it seems pretty lame.  O well, it’s a first draft.  I guess the payoff is that later on in the movie the two have a big confrontation.  I won’t give it away, but it’s kind of awesome. 
I’m having mixed feelings about what I’ve written so far.  Some scenes I think are amazing and others are beyond horrible.  I’m just going to power through this 1^st draft and hope I can fix the parts I don’t like later.  My page count should pass 80 by the end of tonight.  I can’t confirm this, but I think this is the furthest I’ve gotten on the Red Hood script.  I’m aiming for 120 pages.  So, I’m getting there.  I may send it off to festivals or I may send it off to producers.  There’s a good possibility I’ll do both.  I haven’t really decided what to do with it yet.  I know that I still have a lot of work to do.

This is something that kind of bugs me.  The final episode of True Blood won’t air this weekend because Monday is a holiday.  What the fuck is that shit?  Like the episode has a right to a three day weekend because it works so hard?  I don’t even understand that.  This is not the first time they’ve pulled this shit either.  They did it earlier this season and I was absolutely shocked when I checked my DVR and it wasn’t there.  Here I was thinking “I get a three day weekend and a new episode of True Blood?  This is going to be awesome.”  I’m not sure what airing an episode entails, but I picture it as someone hitting a giant, basketball sized, glowing play button.  It’s probably much more complicated then that, but still, screw this holiday shit.  Jesus HBO, you may as well let the terrorists win.

P.S. Someone recommended that I boycott the final episode.  Obviously, they are fucking stupid.  That show is amazing and I’m sure the wait will be well worth it.

I had a bad dream about one of the villains in Red Hood last night.  This is a great sign.  I want the villains to be memorable and intimidating.  I got stuck on a bit of dialogue last night.  But that’s ok, I’m sure it will come to me.  Strangely, I’m starting to get ideas for Red Hood 2.  Too soon?  I could write it as one long piece and then just split it in half.  Red Hood has a final destination.  I know where she has to end up, I’ve known for awhile.  Since the beginning, Red Hood’s ending has had sort of an open ending, leaving room for a sequel.  So, it’s kind of like I’m writing one four hour movie.  Red Hood would work just fine without a sequel.  But that’s not what I had in mind.  It was important for me to make it work on it’s own.  One script is hard enough to sell.
I’ve come to realize that I really do enjoy writing.  I’ll make an excuse to write anything.  Like anything though it’s tough to get started.  The only advice I can give to someone having this issue is to stop being a pussy and just do it.  Write something terrible, who cares?  You know how many horrible movies have not only been written, but actually made? 
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls-  Tons of money spent making it and I would say it was kind of a dud. 
Contact- You wait the whole fucking movie to see the god damned alien and then it uses some stupid mind shit to appear as her father.  Then in so many words tells her they’re going to send her back with absolutely no proof what so ever of her encounter for no God damned reason.  I so wanted the main character to pull out a gun and shoot her alien father in the head at the end of that movie. 
Death Bed, The Bed That Eats- Granted, this is one of those movies that’s so bad it comes back around in to awesome.  However the fact that someone actually had to sell this movie to a producer and succeeded is un fucking believable to me.  How the hell did that conversation go?
Writer: So, I got this script, it’s about a bed that eats people.
Producer: ……That’s really funny, seriously, what’s your script about?
If you ever need a quick pick me up head over to the IMDB Bottom 100 list.  Rent some of them, you’ll feel much better about what you write from that point on.  Especially considering these were all movies that were funded, produced, and actually made.  Meanwhile you’re just writing, so who cares if you write something terrible?

So, I did it.  I deleted the three crappy pages that I wrote on Red Hood and replaced it with 1.5 pages of awesome.  It wasn’t so bad and I feel like I can move on from here.  I sort of got stuck at the end of this last scene, but at least I left on a good note.  I’m kind of excited, I get in to the really good stuff soon.  It’s hard for me not to write something funny here and there.  That’s ok to do in a horror. 
Right? 
Right, and you know why, because I said so and it’s my script.  I mean, I’m not writing Schindlers List here, it’s an over the top vigilante flick.  Let the audience have a little fun with it.  Either way, I’m having fun writing it.  It’s great to finally get my idea on paper.
On top of my script updates, I would like to talk about the movie Real Genius.  Apparently, they are doing a remake of it.  At least that’s what it looks like via IMDB and various other internet sources.  In celebration of this, I figured I would discuss the classic 1985 version staring Val Kilmer.  Warning, there will be spoilers.    
Mitch Taylor (Gabriel Jarret) is accepted to an insane program for geniuses, focusing around developing some ultimate bad ass laser.  Mitch is all proper and shirt tucked in and shit.  He is partnered with Chris Knight (Val Kilmer) who’s the type of guy that would show up to a math class in a bathrobe.  When asked to do some crazy math shit, would yawn, scratch himself inappropriately, and then lazily stumble to the board and mathematically prove there was no Jesus while sending a text message.  They didn’t have text messages back then, so I don’t know, he would send a Morris code?  Fuck, who cares, you get the point.  Anyway, hilarity ensues.  Now in the beginning of the movie we’re lead to believe that Mitch is smarter than Chris Knight.  We soon find out that this is total bullshit.  While Chris Knight fucks beauticians, Mitch falls in love with some crazy OCD broad that power sands her floor at 3AM.  In fact Chris pretty much does everything better than Mitch and he’s cooler.
Lets move on to Kent.  Kent is the tool of the film and boy is he ever a tool.  The only thing is, he’s not very threatening.  I’ve never been able to take a grown man with braces seriously.  Why nobody punches him in the face is beyond me.  You can tell just by looking at him, he’s a little bitch.  He wouldn’t do anything, he would just run off crying.  Then when you passed him the halls his bottom lip would quiver and he would avoid eye contact.  At one point they put an antenna in this guys mouth and through a microphone convince him they are Jesus.  Here it is revealed that Kent masturbates.  I could have told you that before that scene.  That guy couldn’t get laid if he were a rug.  Still, hilarious all the same though.  After Mitch and Chris build the ultimate bad ass laser, after Kent fucks up their first one, cause he’s a dick.  The bomb is dropped that the laser is actually being developed as a weapon!  No shit?!  I’m sorry, but I assumed it was a weapon from the beginning of the movie.  What the fuck else are you going to do with a laser that blasts through concrete walls and statues and shit?  You’re going to blow shit up with it.  Mainly people.  As you can imagine Chris and Mitch are pretty pissed about this.  So, they hack the Gibson (kudos if you understand this) and use the laser to pop a bunch of popcorn in the main bad guys house to the point where the house splits in half.  Seriously, that’s what happens.  It’s pretty awesome.  
While I’m curious to see how they remake Real Genius, part of me want’s them to leave it alone.  It’s a great movie as is.  Who knows though, maybe the remake will be even better.  It’s old enough and wasn’t popular enough for enough people to remember it.  So, I doubt they’ll piss off much of a fan base if they screw it up.  And really, I wouldn’t care if they screwed it up.  The 1986 version would still be good.

A lot of people have asked me what’s going on with Red Hood.  Well, I got to page 72 about three days ago, but got there via a shitty scene that I’m more then likely going to delete.  This was very frustrating and still is.  So, rather then correcting the problem I’ve been avoiding the script all together, because I’m regretting having to highlight three and a half pages and hitting the delete key.  It just sucks to leave a script on a bad note.  I should have just not slept that night and rewrote it right then and there.  Rather then just leaving it because I was pissed that I wrote a terrible scene.  I’m curious to know how other writers deal with writing something they aren’t happy with.  They probably have a much better process then me.  Any other writers out there have any tips or advice of what to do when you write a scene or anything that you really aren’t happy with?  Comment below. 

Me and Caine have split up the workflow rather nicely.  I have an extremely specific vision in mind.  Here’s the problem though, I’ve really only envisioned the cool shit.  The kill scenes, the action sequences, the dark monologues, and the ending.  Everything in between?  Total blank.  No clue what is going on or even what I’m doing.  So, I stumble through some of the build up and set up.  Caine on the other hand seems to have a crystal clear vision of all the gaps in my story.  I’m not sure how, but he just seems to get it.  He’s written the stuff that makes me stare at my monitor with a “not so bright” look on my face for twenty minutes at a time.  I think that’s working out quite nicely. 

You could say that writing this is part of getting over the discomfort of the task at hand.  I’ll go home tonight, delete the scene and move on.  Mainly because I’ve now looked at the positive and it really doesn’t seem that bad. 

Other then this minor setback, it’s going fairly well.  I’m not thrilled with every scene, but it just a first draft.  My goal for the month is to have the first draft completed.  I think I can pull this off.    

Photograph taken and edited by awesome Alyssa Tucker.

I’m currently writing a horror type film titled Red Hood. So, I’ve been watching things that help inspire me. I rented Paranormal Activity last night and watched it alone in the dark. I’m hardcore like that. I know I’m about a year too late, but it didn’t really interest me when I saw the previews. There was a lot of hype when Blaire Witch came out and I didn’t really care for Blaire Witch. It was different, I’ll give it that. The only problem I can see with mixing the mocumentary and horror genre is at some point someone in the audience is probably going to ask “Why the hell are you still filming you fucking moron?” People tend to get pulled out of a scene if the characters do things that don’t seem real. Especially in a movie that’s trying to look as real as possible. Paranormal Activity had a little bit of that, but it wasn’t to guilty of it too often. It does suffer from the horrible fate that most horror movies suffer from. One of the characters is a complete moron. This character usually inflates his/her chest and then proceeds to have a dick measuring contest with all of the other more rational characters in the movie. This character does not react like real people would. Instead they do the exact opposite of what real people would do.
Most of the time, I’m somewhat satisfied when this character dies. Mainly because they pretty much deserve it. I actually really enjoyed Paranormal Activity though. The character, Mica is that annoying character. You spend most of the movie wondering we he’s such an asshat. A horror movie should put you on the edge of your seat and Paranormal Activity did that pretty well. The dead camera in the room was pretty genius. The fact that the camera doesn’t move just adds to the tension. On top of that, the time lapses were great. Time would speed up and then slow down. When the time slowed down, the audience knew something was going to happen. They had no idea what, but they knew it was going to be something. It was sort of a form of psychological conditioning. After the first scene like that the audience knew that time slowing down to normal speed meant something scary was going to happen. I really liked how time would slow down 10 – 15 seconds before anything actually happened. That just made it all the more suspenseful.
Paranormal Activity did a really good job of inspiring me. I cranked out about 5 pages last night in under an hour. That’s a pretty good pace for me. I find that the deeper I get in to this project the easier it’s getting. Caine is helping me write it. I’m not making things very easy on him though. I have a pretty specific vision in mind and I think it’s tough for him to match that. It would be tough for anybody.

The search for a mascot continues.  Current discussions focused around what exactly the mascot would mean and why I was doing this.  We also discussed squirrels and mice as possible mascots.  Wow, that all sounds so official.  I suppose this is part of me taking a break after finishing filming for Do Nice Guys Finish Last.  I usually do that.  I wish I didn’t have to, but it does make everything more exciting when I start on my next project.  I have been writing here and there, but I haven’t really worked on anything major.  I really want to shoot in HD next.  I keep telling myself that once I get an HD camera that shoots 24 FPS I’ll be good from then on.  I know that’s not the case though.  As I have said in previous posts, I’ll always be chasing some new billion dollar thing that does something better then my current equipment.  I like to consider myself a budget friendly film maker.  I usually make what I have work.  That doesn’t really come out of ingenuity though, it’s more of a necessity.  Like when we built the jib arm for Red Hood.  I could have rented one for $2500, but I didn’t have that kind of budget.  So, I built one for just over $100.  It worked and now I have a jib arm.  Building stuff is always a cheap way out.  Plus, it’s kind of interesting to see what Gabe can come up with.  Or some random guy who posts blue prints on the Internet.  We built a steady cam off of the Internet.  We called it the Raminator.  It worked pretty good.  It’s kind of heavy and weird, but that’s kind of the point.  It’s supposed to add weight to the camera at a lower point to help stabilize it.  It worked for what we wanted to use it for.  Back to my original point, the mascot.  The mascot has to do with changing the name of the company.  Also, I want something kind of fun to put at the end of the credits that people will remember.  That’s pretty much it.  I really thought that there was more to it then that, but I guess not. 
Gabe tells me that the color correction for Do Nice Guys Finish Last is tedious, but he’s making progress.  Once the color correction is done the transitions will be a snap.  The credits are all ready to go.  So, we’re not too far off.  There’s not that much color correction to be done.  For a lot of the scenes, Gabe stuck with one camera.  It just flowed better that way. 
I watched a bunch more of the first season of True Blood last night.  Awesome series, but I stand by my belief that vampires are dicks.  I also got Dexter Season 3 on DVD earlier this week.  I’ve only watched the first episode, but holy shit that show is awesome.  I can’t stand watching shows on TV, I have to wait for them on DVD.  I think it’s the cliff hangers that really aggravate me.  There have been a couple times in True Blood, where if I wasn’t able to go to the next episode immediately, I would have lost my freaking mind.  Same with Dexter, although Dexter usually has a pretty good ending to each episode that leaves you satisfied.  Heroes plays the cliff hanger game a lot.  The worst by though is Lost.  I watched season 1 on DVD and decided to watch season 2 on television.  Every single episode I watched ended with me yelling “Jesus Christ!  What the fuck?!”  I only watched like 4 of them before I finally gave up and just waited for the DVD’s.  The thing with Lost is, is that they show you a preview the week before and you’re excited to see this one thing in the preview, then you watch it, and of course, that one thing is at the end of the episode.  But then that’s all it is.  There’s no explanation of it.  It just sort of happens.  Then you have to wait for an entire week to see every ones reaction to that one thing, which is what you wanted to see last week.  Season 5 comes out in December and I’ve been keeping up with it.  I love that show, I think it’s great, but screw those writers.

We’re done cutting Do Nice Guys Finish Last.  Now it’s on to working out all of the little kinks.  Color correction, audio adjustments, and transitions.  It feel like an accomplishment to have cut it.  It’s come a long way.  From 18 minutes to just under 15.  Me and Chris talked about it this weekend and we’re not expecting it to get in to any festivals.  I think we established that from the beginning though.  It doesn’t make it a bad short film.  I think it’s a great short film.  I should say, it’s going to be a great short film.  There’s still a lot to work on.  I still am very surprised by how much you can get away with in the mockumentary format.  You don’t need a tripod, it doesn’t matter if there are mistakes here and there, and actors can stumble over their lines and get away with it.  It’s a fun format, but I think I’m going to be moving on to the next thing now.  I don’t see another mockumentary in my near future.  Although, it has changed my opinion on hand held camera work.  Even though we didn’t use a tripod we still got some really nice cinematography.  Maybe I’ll open up and use it in my next short film.  My main problem with it was that in short films it became a “style.”  I’ve heard film makers asked why they went hand held on their entire short film and they would say “That’s just my style.”  No, that isn’t you’re style.  %90 of the time it’s because they were either too lazy or low on cash to use a tripod.  I’m totally cool with both of those excuses.  But to cover it up with this rouse of “That’s just my style” is pretty lame.  Call it what it is.  I know low budget films don’t have access to fancy dollies or equipment.  But there are ways around that.  I feel like I’ve put cameras on everything.  Wheel chairs, roller blades, office chairs, at least 3 different home made dollys, carts, ect…  Whatever works.  Am I total hypocrite for shooting Do Nice Guys Finish Last all in hand held?  Probably, but that was my style, so piss off.  In actuality, I wanted to shoot all in hand held, I chose to shoot all in hand held, and I left my very awesome tripod at home on purpose.  Do Nice Guys Finish Last is a mockumentary, which means that it’s essentially a fake documentary.  In this case, I felt like hand held was necessary.  I really tried to think of how an amateur documentary film maker would film something like this and that’s why I chose to go all hand held.  Basically, I was trying to mimic the style of someone who didn’t know what they were doing.  Which actually was a lot of fun.  Kind of like when we built the murder chair for Red Hood.  That was a blast.  We built the entire thing out of wooden pallets.  What was awesome about it was that we got to put our selves in the place of how the main character would build something like this.  It was a total hack and slash job.  When something wasn’t holding we either attached another piece of wood to it with about 6 screws or we just tore it off and started again.  We figured the main character wasn’t a carpenter and she didn’t need it to look pretty.  It was purely functional.  I actually have a picture of it:

It’s not pretty, but it’s functional.  You can sit in it, it will support your weight, but it’s absolutely not comfortable.  This was a chair that the main character used to torture people in, so none of that really mattered.
I kind of strayed from my original point, but whatever.  My point is that sometimes bad camera work or shady craftsmanship is called for in a film.  As long as the audience knows it’s intentional.  With hand held, it’s very difficult to make it look like it was necessary and very easy to make it look like you as a film maker were just lazy.  That’s not to say that I haven’t seen films that were well done all in hand held.  I just feel like that “style” is extremely over used because it’s an easy out.
I saw two movies this week.  District 9 and Ponyo.  I’ll start off with Ponyo.  Ponyo is an anime movie by Studio Ghibli.  A guy named Hayao Miyazaki did Ponyo and he has somewhat of a cult following.  In fact Studio Ghibli itself has somewhat of a cult following.  I went in to the theater not knowing anything about the movie.  All I knew is that my girlfriend really wanted to see it.  I’ve only seen one other anime by Hayao Miyazaki and that was My Neighbor Totoro.  My Neighbor Totoro was an acid trip.  Much like Ponyo, only Ponyo seemed to be catered more for children.  I suppose My Neighbor Totoro was for kids too, but for some reason it seemed darker.  I’m not even going to begin to try and explain the story line to Ponyo.  You probably wouldn’t believe me anyway, if I did.  It’s just one of those things you have to see.  I thought it was great.  If I was a parent, I would roll up a joint, smoke it in the mini van on the way to the theater, buy three packages of milk duds in the lobby, and go away to the land of Ponyo for 4+ hours.  The movie is only 2 hours long but I would be sitting in the theater after the credits rolled either asleep or absolutely out of my freaking mind based on what I had just seen.  It’s probably a good thing I’m not a parent.  Awesome visuals in Ponyo and a story line that made me say out loud “Who the hell thinks of that?”  It’s incredibly imaginative and unique.  But you don’t need to be high to enjoy it.  I enjoyed it and I wasn’t high at all.  If I was high though it probably would have been a life changing experience.  Just know what you’re getting in to.  It’s an anime catered towards children, that’s an acid trip.
District 9 was absolutely awesome.  I loved that freaking movie.  I am totally going to see that in theaters again.  I’m a sucker for the horror sci fi genre, so maybe I can’t give the same opinion as the everyday movie watcher, but I thought it was great.  I was entertained throughout that entire movie.  The actors were all phenomenal in it, the cinematography was great, the special effects were awesome, the story line had me hooked from the very beginning, and the characters development throughout the story was amazing.  If you’re in to this sort of movie, go see it, it’s awesome.

So, I’m putting together the credits for Nice Guys Finish Last.  Holy Jesus, there were a lot of people involved in this thing.  The credits are like 45 seconds long.  Normally, my credits are like 10 seconds long, if even that.  I hate to say it, but I may need to cut them out for the festival cut.  I’m not sure if that’s going to be way too long to add to an already pushing it short film.  Getting a 15+ minute long short film in to a festival isn’t going to be easy.  Maybe I’ll send the judges a version without the credits and when I send them my screener, I’ll send them a version with credits.  That’s pretty shady though.  Maybe I just won’t count the credits as part of the film.  Of course, I could be wrong on the time estimation and the short could turn out to be 9 minutes long.  In which case, I wouldn’t mind adding another minute of credits to it.  Or I could be wrong in the opposite direction and it could turn out to be 19 minutes long and I would be screwed.  That actually happened to a guy in my film school.  Our finals were supposed to be around 10 minutes, his was like 22 without credits.  He wrote us an E-Mail 1 night before it was due at like 2AM that said “I’ve cut my short down as much as possible and it’s still 22 minutes long…….Fuck me.”  Film school was awesome, I made some pretty good friends there and produced Say Something while attending.  Which I consider to be a very polished piece.  I think Nice Guys Finish Last may surpass Say Something in the polish and overall wow sector.  Nice Guys Finish Last has some good production value.  We have a lot of different locations and one of them is a restaurant with extras and all.  I’m kind of an idiot to have sat on NGFL for this long.  I could have been submitting it to festivals months ago.  Apparently, that’s what I do now, I shoot short films and just forget about them.  That’s how I role.
You know, I seem to jump back and forth when it comes to genre.  After I shot Red Hood (horror), I shot Say Something (Romantic Comedy).  Then I went back to Red Hood again and now I’m doing Nice Guys Finish Last, which is a comedy, but I would not in a million years call it romantic.  It’s actually kind of the opposite of romantic.  You know what I’m missing?  Some raunchy comedy.  I haven’t done raunchy in awhile, it might be a bit of an overload.  The last time I did raunchy, was The Train Wreck, which was quite awhile ago.  That might be dangerous actually, it’s probably pretty backed up.  It would all come gushing out in a display of hysterical horribleness.