Student Filmmakers - June 2008 - (Page 28) Production Creating On-the-Fly Solutions On Location But There is No Substitution for Pre-Production by Myrl Schreibman The reality in the professional film directing world in which ‘budget, bottom lines, timelines and Murphy’s Law’ bump into ‘creativity, character and story’ is what the production period is all about. Narrative films are made in pre-production. They are executed in production; but made in pre-production. There is no substitution for pre-production before you get to production or pre-visualization for that matter. And that is the toughest thing for a director or producer to learn when they are making a film. Forget the fact that projects should never begin the process without having all the funding in place. Forget the fact that you must always make sure that the atmosphere on the set is as creative as it can be for the director to do his or her work. And, forget the fact that it is important to complete the days’ work on time and on budget. Because without appropriate pre-production, everything will not fall into place. A director must be on top of his or her game when that camera is ready to roll. They must be able to think on their feet and react fast because they have an obligation to complete the days’ work and be creative and true to the story and character while keeping the project on budget. When pre-production falls apart, and the producing team has not done their job, the director must not throw in the towel but be ready to improvise and find solutions since ultimately the director is leading a company of many people to turn out a product that has to be kept on budget and on time. Several years ago I was directing a picture shot entirely on location in Los Angeles. Again, my cinematographer was Tom Denove with whom I had developed a shorthand communication that allowed us to be creative and work fast, especially when the unexpected happens. Shooting on location is always problematic and the unforeseen always shows up. But shooting on location when the producing team doesn’t do their job is almost impossible. On the first day of shooting our schedule called for an exterior sequence on Western Avenue, one of the busiest streets in Los Angeles, which we were to do first thing in the morning. Then move to an interior café a few blocks away some time in the afternoon for a two-page dialogue scene between the two leads in the picture. The morning sequence involved a group of protestors outside a health clinic and a short, police foot-chase down the street – a scene that Tom and I knew would take most of the morning to do. When Tom and I showed up that first day, the first thing we did was walk the street sequence and discuss the staging for the complex scene in front of the health clinic which we would physically rehearse once all the actors, extras and crew people arrived. Just as we had finished discussing the basics of the scene, my AD informed us that the producing staff had failed to provide a place for base camp for the day, and the trucks did not know where to park. At that moment, Tom and I turned to face the street, and we saw our grip/electric truck and the camera and prop caravan pass us and turn the next corner going around the city block. We thought they knew where they were going, but in a few minutes we saw the trucks pass us again…. and then again…. and then again…. By this time, the rest of the crew had joined us on the curb, and we were waving to the trucks as they passed us by. Actors were to arrive shortly, there wasn’t a producer in sight, and I knew that we needed to get the camera rolling. Not knowing where the producer or location manager was – I noticed that we were standing in front of a closed sushi bar that was prepping for their daily lunch crowd. I motioned to Tom to come with me into the restaurant. While I asked if we could shoot in the bar for the next hour or so, Tom was scouting the interior of the restaurant for a visually interesting place to shoot the scene we were scheduled to shoot in the café that afternoon. I told the café owner we would feature the sushi bar quite predominately and use their chefs prepping on camera promising them that when the producer arrived 28 studentfilmmakers June 2008
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