Thanks Dave. I'm glad you liked it. It was quite possibly the most fun I've had making something since high-school. When we were getting ready to shoot, I started thinking, "why do I do this? Isn't this supposed to be fun? Why am I willingly going to edit like a crazy-man for something that probably will not benefit me or Renée in any way." But once we started shooting, it was so refreshingly creative (without being bogged down with needing to be "good" or "meaningful").
It was written and storyboarded a couple days before Halloween, shot on the Thursday and Monday after, and it was done by Friday. We shot almost entirely on green-screen, or in and just outside our apartment. I started editing in-between shoot days which helped make it more manageable, but there were definitely some all-nighter's pulled. The last day was mostly spent making the music, which was probably my favorite part. Here's some random screen-shots which show how we did a scene with all three actors even though we never had them all together at the same time.
The main point of all of this is not really the movie, but how awesome and patient Renée is. Not only was she patient with all of my crazy hours on this project, but she was really encouraging about it.
Actually, I don't devote enough space in these blogs to Renée, which leads me to "mean teens." Renée teaches music to 6-8th graders at a school here in Brooklyn. It's a relatively good school for these parts, but there's a lot of pressure, and it's resulting in anxiety. We thought that a lot of the problems would get better once the kids got used to her, but it's now November and while many classes have improved, a few seem to have actually gotten worse. We're hoping that a few report cards, and the holiday concert can still help. The older students give her an especially hard time, because she's not the teacher they had last year, whom they apparently loved. That teacher had to leave to go to grad-school, because you have to get a masters in order to keep your teaching certificate; which leads me to "lean means."
It's not really the best title, but it rhymed. Renée has started looking at grad-school, and we think she's found a good option. It would allow her to do most of the course work from home, and it offers the degree she wants. Unfortunately at this point, she's going to have to take courses while teaching, which isn't helping the whole anxiety thing we were talking about earlier. And paying for it will be a strain, but I think with God's help, we can make our lean means mean green.
okay... I really need to stop.
4 comments:
you should make a youtube movie about snotty little mean-teens who made their teacher's life miserable only to find out she has become a famous novelist who has made them the villains in her works. Not only that, but it is required reading for first semester college. Not only that, but they have to give a presentation on "the sources for the immaturity of the villains." When they show up to class, they find that the professor has invited their old teacher--the renowned author--to class. "Hello my favorite mean teens" says the author--"Check it out, you made me mean greens!"
wow, that is a bit too full of vicarious vindictive pleasure. Wonder where that came from!
adam,
as your means lean you and your queen will find less greens in your jeans. Glean: You're not a machine, a Marine, or Wolverine, so lean on the Unseen so he's between you and umpteen ... uh...umpteen ... uhhhhmpteen...
...spleens
(spleens = problems in life)
Sweet! You made top-20!
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