By the way, 20-12 is not an update of the old school 6-12 mosquito  spray.

I am still doing a post-viewing rehash in my head, trying to remember when or even if in recent years I’ve watched a better film than 2012.

District 9 comes to mind, at least as good but a bit hard to call it better.

Great script, a complete story well told in the traditional mode, with a beginning, a middle, and then (surprise!) an end. Quite unlike so much of the crap around these days.

Great director, Roland Emmerich extracted fine performances all around and managed to have a cohesive plot covered (see above) to keep it all on screen. I am sure that if this wasn’t a Sony release, this time the computer (updated from the beautiful black 5300 Powerbook Jeff Goldblum used to save the world in Independence Day) would have been a nice but slightly used Aluminum G4 Powerbook, not a steaming pile of VAIO. Ah, I digress…..

Great acting, John Cusack has to be considered to be a serious contender to jump past Tom Hanks to become the “everyman” of our time frame, as Henry Fonda personified so well in his.

And by the way, as you may have heard, there are at least a few interesting special effects shots on the screen in this film, and they have been done fairly well.

This could possibly be why it’s my new “How the fuck did they do that” said aloud count leader.

It seems that I’m sort of paraphrasing myself here, but as much as I ragged on Paranormal Activity a few days ago, I’m sure that they now owe a debt of thanks to the makers of “The Box” for lifting them off the top (or perhaps that should be off the bottom?) of the list of the worst films of the year?

Possible spoiler, as if it’s possible to spoil a piece of shit…..

I remember reading this story line years ago, wherein someone is given a box with a button on it, and by pushing the button they will cause someone that they’ve never met, somewhere far away,  to die.

If you manage to sit through this floater, I’m sure that by the end you’ll be hoping that there’s a box somewhere with your name on it, and someone you’ve never met has lifted that dome cover off, and now their finger is hovering over the button…….

James Marsden + Cameron Diaz = James Cameron?

Even a much younger and less tired looking Cameron Diaz couldn’t have saved this one, what with her “Serious Acting” and all that.

Oh well, how many days was that before “2012″ opens?

As much as I raved about “District 9” a post or two ago, I have have no choice but to take a different stance with “Paranormal Activity“, a film that’s shot in such a spastic style that it could even make Lars von Trier get seasick.

The true shocker would have been to have a hidden camera when I saw this in the Star Theater when the lights unexpectedly came up, one that would have captured the horror in the faces of the audience to find out that they paid $10.00 to sit through this train wreck, the latest in a long line of recent films that were unable to come up with an ending. Larry the janitor strikes again, I guess.

The major bragging rights for this overhyped video so far have been that it was produced for only $15,000. After watching it I have to assume that most, if not all of that amount was spent on a good caterer that kept the director and two actors (who also seemed to have been working as the co-directors of photography and / or co-camera operators) very well fed.

Especially one of them, but not that there’s anything wrong with that. And that’s a big “butt”.

It seems that there could have been a makeup or wardrobe person involved, but that person should have been able to phone it in, same for the sound and grip and electric department folks, if they existed.

Again, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

My return to Detroit (it used to be called MoTown, now it’s more like NoTown), the land of my birth, or at least it says so on my birth certificate, has been a shock in several ways.

1. The very visible culture shift can be seen as I travel around in the area  that was Dearborn, now it’s Dearbornistan, with Arabic signs in all the store windows and many of the women are wearing the head wrap and long sleeved shirts with ankle length dresses. It’s a bit like when I worked on a film in Goshen, Indiana where the WalMart had hitching posts for the horse and buggys that the Amish rode to go shopping, and how the interior of that store was like being on the set of a western film with extras wearing period wardrobe. But here it’s more like being on the set of “Alienation”, almost normal but something is certainly a bit off kilter. I do have a new description of what’s truly terrorizing, and that would be a 5′1″ tall 93 pound Palestinian woman driving 3 tons of Ford Expedition with her eyes barely able to see over the dashboard to know what’s in front of her. For me, the only thing that could make it more scary would be if there were a few pounds of C-4 bouncing around in the baggage area. I think I’ll pass on inspecting for that. Especially when said SUV is  parked in the lot of  the “Beirut By Night” (the true name) restaurant. There are no IED’s allowed on the premises, or so I hear.

2. The temperature’s also a bit off, at least after living in Los Angeles for a few decades. Oh yeah, that’s off in the colder direction with indications of more of the less (heat) to come soon.

We’re in the mid-season here, caught between summer and winter in what’s known as the season of road repair, indicated by orange barrels every few feet on the freeway expressway.

One Fast Angry Driver + 1 Slow Moving Barrel = True Road Kill!

The trailer car rig shot we did tonight was not exactly a pleasure cruise, since there had been enough rain to flood the picture car (missing window glass in a few places) with about a half inch of water on the floorboards. There would have been more, but this was a true “Detroiter” car with copious amounts of BodyCancerByFisher rust outs that gave the old car the appearance of the crying with big tears flowing out on each turn that we made.

3. The real worry pressing on the crews minds? “Devil’s Night” is approaching, especially since it seems that we will be working on night exterior shots. I’m sure it’s going to be cold enough that the heat from the burning houses will be welcome to us. But to the newly homeless, perhaps not so much.

4. The drivers!!! For a place so full of people that have no where to go, they sure seem to be in a hurry to get there. And the local official sport (perhaps replacing Devil’s night?) now seems to be tailgating, wherein they allow a bit over one car space for every 100 miles per hour they drive. Most of the drivers seem to be agressive angry hostile to whoever is unlucky enough to be blocking the road in front of them, it’s amazing that there aren’t more traffic pile-ups but I guess they’ve learned to deal with it. I hope that I never do that, except for while I’m driving around here in what seems to be the nation’s leader in unemployment where, to paraphrase an old Ford commercial, “Finding A Job Is Job #1″.

These are my questions:

1. Will I ever get back the nearly two hours I wasted watching this dreck?

2. Will I ever get back the $8.50 I spent to see this?

Hmmmmmm,

Sadly, at this time it seems the answers to 1 + 2 above seem to be No, and No.

Perhaps I can find something positive in my mistake if I prevent others from making that same mistake.

Like I’m trying to do here (hint, hint).

What will it take to get the people of the U.S.A. a single payer medical insurance plan that covers everyone for every medical situation, pre-existing or not?

It’s a very simple solution composed of a few very simple answers, yet one that will take some major work.

1. Put an immediate end to the lobbyist system. No more campaign donations*, trips, vacation homes, meals, drinks, limo rides, or what all of what we’ve seen going on in the national and local news. This also means no private visits to an elected officials homes, offices, hotel rooms, or anyone getting anything for seeing our decision makers that isn’t open and transparent.

2. The creation of a government run by people that were actually elected by people, not corporations or vested interests. No more campaign donations over $100.00 will be allowed*, from an individual or from a company. You run for an office, the government pays for your normal election expenses, if you win you’re in office.

3. Term limits. The president, 6 years and then you’re out and back to making a living somewhere else with no return to a public office* or influence peddling (see #1 above) permitted. Similar limits to be defined later to Senators, Congress People, Governors, state and local officials as well.

4. Ethics. If you’re in violation (ex: Google Gale Norton and Shell Oil) of the trust of the American people*, those who put you  in office, you’re banned from holding any public office again or aiding or abetting anyone who does. And jail time is not off the table for you or your co-conspirators.

When the above are in place, and politicians actually serve the people and aren’t occupied* with getting elected, we will have a fully insured population as most of the non-third world countries on the planet do.

* The present system is full of people who placed getting elected as their first priority, getting re-elected as their second priority, and then in their spare time saw to the needs of the country.

And a note to those who choose to listen to the Wicked Bitch Witch of the North, Death Panels already exist, and every day make decisions on who will live and die, they’re usually called the insurance industry.

A few days ago I sold something on eBay that went for about $125.00. And after paying about $4.50 to post the auction and then paying a few more dollars as a percentage of the final sales price, eBay’s wholly owned subsidiary known as “Paypal” (which eBay coerces you to use) took out yet another bite for a few dollars / percentage points out of the amount that was to be paid to me by the auction’s winner.

Are you with me so far?

Here’s where the “add insult to injury” part starts:

“Your Request is Being Processed”

“Your request to withdraw funds to your bank account by electronic funds transfer has been received and is in process.”

“It usually takes 3-4 business days to transfer funds from your PayPal account to your bank account, depending on your bank’s policies.”

Perhaps someone, somewhere could explain to me exactly what a computer’s “business days” are composed of.

I always have felt that since computers don’t get overtime or days off (or health insurance either), and since they are at work 24 / 7 grinding out the electrons, then on which planet is it that a wire transfer of funds take at least 4 days? And trust me that when they say “usually takes 3-4 business days” it’s never going to be 3 days or less, the “usually” part is just there for laughs.

I selected to have the money transferred to my account on September 15th, and a few seconds later I received an email confirming the transfer with these words:

“We estimate that these funds will be deposited in your bank account by Sep. 19, 2009.”

Out of which ass did they pull that “estimate”?

So, WTF?

The obvious answer is that they rake in some serious big money in interest from their bank on the float of those funds, which is to say that every day my money is in their account and combined with the millions that they make each day on all of these transactions, it’s in their (sorry) interest to stall the process and keep that money in play.

And now we see that the woman shown below….…..the one that ran eBay, a one time great place to do things, directly into the ground, now wants to prove that she is perfect for the roll of being the final Terminator, i.e., being the governor of California.

I can hardly wait, but I think I’ll be watching from Nevada…

So, in closing I recommend a visit to:

It’s interesting to see how quick the dynamic of a situation can change once you change the name of one of the participants, one way to frame the issue for debate. Witness the big blowup going on over healthcare being made available for everyone as a right, not just a privilege for a privileged few.

Exactly who are the “conservatives” protecting from what they call rampant socialism?

The right calls them “Private Insurance Companies” and say that the single payer or public option plans will ruin them, drive them out of business as they can’t compete against the government.

However, if you change  the name of the private insurance companies from UnitedHealth Group, Wellpoint, CIGNA Corp, Aetna, Humana, Health Net, Blue Shield, Anthem Blue Cross, Oxford Health Plans, Kaiser Permanente, PacifiCare Systems, WellChoice, etc. to a more relevant one, such as “Blood Sucking Vampires”, perhaps it gets a bit harder to defend them.

Since I’m not looking to get into a hassle with WordPress over obscenity rulings, I’ll just tell you that the name that I call the whole stinking lot of them can be abbreviated to “C-sucking bastards“. Terse, sure, but for me it sets the correct tone and covers all the bases.

I suppose one could argue that the reason there aren’t more large private police (well, other than “Blackwater”) or local Fire Departments is that they couldn’t compete with the government, and as much as it pisses off the shouters at town halls nationwide, you have to say the same for Social Security or the Veterans Hospitals across the nation.

In the search by the pin heads on the right for ways to marginalize President Obama by making him look weak or wrong, those haters on the right will stop at nothing to find some way to make him or any of his programs fail at anything, anywhere, even if it means the slow painful death, or other grief put upon many of their fellow Americans, hence this fight against health care.

So, I’ve taken to calling them out, asking them where they  heard that crap. When I’m somewhere and some moron says how bad things have become since Obama got into office, I ask them to imagine that they’re out in the middle of the ocean dog paddling like mad just to keep afloat, and someone hands them an anchor to hold on to like Bush left for us to deal with.

Bush in search of a new deal.

And you say……….?

Understand that by “Image Conscious”, I meant that this blog today is dedicated to those who love the idea of the visual “image”, be it on video or film, to the extent that their lives are now focused on working behind or in front of the lens in one way or another on movies, films, videos, cartoons, cgi crap, anime, whatever.

Anyway, here are some guidelines, warnings, and other maybe relevant things as well.

1. Understand that deferred pay means you’ll actually never see a penny of payment for your time spent or (if you provided it) equipment you’ve brought to the set. In over 25 years of working on films, videos, t.v. shows I’ve never met anyone that ever actually got paid a deferment, which doesn’t mean that it’s never happened, it’s just never happened with anyone I’ve worked with.

2. Understand that a payment in the form of “copy, credit, and meals” is most likely illegal, as it almost always violates minimum wage laws, as well as promising things that may or may not ever get delivered. i.e.

a. Credits on IMDB, which are never really guaranteed, and could even be deleted after the fact.

b. Domino’s pizza or MickieD’s crap are not really meals.

c. The chances of you getting a copy of the floater project closely approaches “never going to happen”.

3. Understand well the “carrot and stick” concept as it often shows up, i.e. “work with me on this one, I’ve got a big show coming up in the near future and I will make up for your dedication to us”. Well, be assured that if that producer / company somehow does ever make a big project with a real budget at some later date, they will then hire big people and pay them really big salaries. Adding insult to injury, if it’s a really, really much bigger budget project, you will never even be allowed to get close to their set, because you knew them when they were mere piss-ant weasels.

3a. Understand also that the very mention of there being important contacts (who they never actually name so you can vet them) for your future if you’ll work free/cheap is bullshit in its purest form, since the chance that any important person would be involved in such a turd is about the same as Sarah Palin speaking in complete sentences. Yes, it could happen, but I suggest you find a comfortable place to sit as it may be a while.

4. Understand that “An Intern Position” legally means a specific legally defined agreement between an employer and your school, wherein you will receive credit. Be aware that the term “intern” is thrown around a lot by people that see it as a chance to get people to do work and then not have to pay them.

a. You may receive that school credit, but you will never get to work with this company again (see “3″ above).

5. Understand that “It’s not who you know, it’s who you blow” always will take precedence over a film school diploma or the recommendation of your friends or family when it comes to a production position being filled.

6. Understand that no matter how rosy a picture the producer has described the upcoming project to be, you’re actually not curing cancer or solving world hunger, and you’re mostly likely just making a piece of crap that no one outside the director’s immediate family or other investors will ever see.

7. Understand that the term “Producer” is meaningless, as it’s very often given to people that couldn’t produce a shadow on a sunny day if their lives depended on it. When these producers say that there’s no money in the budget, ask them what kind of moron could have made up and approved a budget like this and then given a green light to this floater.  If you’ll ask them why they couldn’t produce the money to do their show correctly, the chance to see the look on their faces is priceless.

8. Understand that when you feel like you’re getting screwed (see “5″ above), you’re probably correct. If you want to go ahead and do the project anyway, you could ask them to at least kiss you first, or buy you flowers when it’s done.

9. Understand that any project touted as having an “award winning”, “very well connected”, or ”up and coming ********”  (writer, director, producer, star, craft service person, key grip…. whatever) really means they have on their staff “a semi-nobody” who perhaps used #5 above, or is at best a burnout from some local tv show.

10. Understand that when a producer says they want someone “bright, hard working, creative, blah blah blah, and who owns their own equipment”, everything that preceded “who owns…..” is meaningless. They only want someone with their own equipment so they don’t have to pay the rental, delivery charges, or insurance for it.

11. Understand that, especially when it’s a posting looking for a sound mixer, their request to “see” a demo reel is a demonstration that the asker has no idea what they’re doing. There’s no way they could know who did the work they’re listening to, much less which show it’s from, if it was true location sound, or it’s the product of massive post production ADR or sweetening.

12. Note their grammar! A posting that’s (other than a typo or two) full of errors in spelling, punctuation, context, etc… should be a warning that you’re going to be  dealing with people that don’t know about due diligence in preparation. For a laugh, ask them what their original language was and compliment them on their progress in learning english.

13.  Also note that  any mention that their project will be submitted to film festivals is not really a bragging point, as tons of them do this each week and seldom receive more than a nice note thanking them for their submission, but no thanks. And those that do get admitted to the “Greater Ypsilanti Film Festival” will find that they are in the running against works of art such as “Elevator Girls In Bondage” or “Is It My Breath?”, and will usually end up losing to one of those two.

They exist! Relating to  Items 2, 3, 3a, 9, 10, and 11 above,  here are several actual quotes related to the above from postings on craigslist, mandy and others. All of the statements below were found with less than a 3 minute search, and all of them help to demonstrate the principles of those warning signs mentioned above. See if you can name the warning……..

“Join our fun and enjoyable crew while we shoot a 6 minute scene in one location.”

“No experience necessary, but desired.”

“Feature shot on Red needs to hire an editor on a deffered payment basis.”

“Editor will recieve compensation when film recieves compensation.”  (Hint: i before e, and we’re never going to pay u)

“We recently completed another short film that is being submitted to festivals, we plan to do the same with this one.”

“We are trying to build a strong and reliable crew to work with us on future projects.”

“No pay, meals and copy of series provided.” (Hint #12 might help in trying to parse that self canceling sentence)

“Learn techniques and gain knowledge from our long working Director of Photographer with industry credits.” (By “long working”, are you talking about the jerk taking endless hours to light a set?)

“Meet and network with industry professionals and TV writers, ALL while helping us making this script come alive.”

“The rate is low, only $100 per day as most of our budget is going to film, processing and telecine.” (N.B. #7)

Little experience or a strong passion to learn would be great!

Students welcome!! Working with highly experienced DP and Production team.

“I am very confident with my script but I need a strong, ambitious, hard working, awesome team of aspiring professional filmmakers with positive attitudes to help me bring the script to life” (Hmmm, I guess CPR is off the table?)

“…… but this has huge potential to turn much more work down the road.”

“The film is being shot on the RED one in LA over 6 days, all crew positions are unpaid, however agreed expenses will be covered, you will be fed properly and part of an extremely experienced team with extensive international work and track records, the film is also notably being supported by Mainframe (VFX) in the UK and Echolab (sound Design) in Ireland.”   (Wow! They’re shooting on the RED? Well, BFD!)

This weeks best pics (from Mandy.com and Craigslist.org)!!!

“No pay but can put project on CV and possible pay for next project once this is completed.”

and

“Despite the low budget, applicants must have a minimum of 5 years experience and 20 features under their belts”. (and applicants should have their names imprinted on the back of their belts so we’ll know who we have bent over a barrel).

Saving the best, which hits almost every note,  for last (10-5-09):

“We have a very limited budget for this video so we’re looking for a small, intimate crew, that are young, enthusiastic and don’t mind working long hours for two days for limited pay! It will be a great shoot, a lot of fun with hugely creative people and a good way to continue making contacts.”

O.K., all of the above are actual quotes, and there’s really a lot more where these ones came from. Feel free to send in a comment and mention your own, and I’ll add them during the next few weeks, with or without giving you credits, copies, or a meal.

Living in Southern California and dealing with the fires that are sweeping our area, it comes to mind that as residents of this land of milk and honeys (not to be confused with milk and honey), we’ve become numb to the plagues that over the years we have had to abide with, i.e.: fires, floods, career ending strikes, earthquakes, poverty, riots, foreclosures, you name it.

Somehow, this one missed California

Yet, every day we can easily see that the results of the “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free” advertising campaign that continues to draw them in, those looking for the streets they heard were paved with gold that will get them that home in Beverly Hills with an ocean view.

Meanwhile, back here on earth, we await the soon to arrive torrential rains of winter, which will bring on the mud slides of the recently burned out mountains, resulting in flooding of the flatlands, which will drive even more people out of their homes and into sleeping in their cars or under freeway bridges.

I’d like to go further with this, but there are issues of greater import, like was Bill O’reilly d’Fox o’really born in Ireland?

Is Bill O’really in possession of his own birth certificate? If so, why hasn’t he shown it yet? Why does Billy hate America?

You’ve got questions, I’ve got lots of time…….