My stay at the European Film College is coming to an end, so I’ve started thinking about what to do next. It’s slowly coming together, I’ve applied for TV and Media Management at ‘Mediehøjskolen’ and Medialogy, so it looks like I’m moving to Copenhagen. I had actually planned moving to Aarhus, but I’ve actually come to like the idea of moving to Copenhagen instead. Also, a lot of the people from the school are moving over there and it would make it easier to stay in touch. Also, I’m getting an apartment with a guy from the school so that’s going to be awesome.
All posts in “School & Work”
Shooting ‘The Nursery’
We’ve finally begun main production on the final project I wrote. It’s a sci-fi horror which centers around a small family; George and Linda Hadley and kids Peter & Wendy, in a distant future, in which almost all everyday tasks have been automated. The children’s room, the nursery, has been replaced by an advanced virtual reality, which will display whatever environment and creature the children wish for. The parents become worried when they realize that the children have become obsessed with an imaginative forest inhabited by dark creatures.
Last week we started building the set, which consists of a futuristic kitchen / living room, bedroom and hallway. Sunday we started shooting some forest scenes and since then we’ve mainly shot on our set. The shooting will be done thursday and then we’ll edit until the 18th. Anyway, here are some pictures:
The basic framework of the set.
The bedroom, ready for shoot. The monitor says ‘SLEEP MODE: ON – OFF’.
We thought of this as the replacement for the newspaper of today. You flick a button and recent news stories appear on your wall. The news stories here are kind of silly (first one being a reference to another final project) but you won’t be able to read any of them in the movie.
This is supposed to control the entire home; food, cleaning, entertainment, everything.
So far it’s been going pretty well, cool actors and we’re on schedule. Looking forward to having everything shot now, the days are long. All behind the scene pictures can be seen here.
Final Project scripts chosen
My stay at the European Film College is coming to an end, and a little over a week ago students could submit scripts for the 15 final projects. 65 scripts were submitted in total, and yesterday the selected scripts were announced, my script was chosen!
THIS IS IT, MY BREAK IS HERE, SCREW YOU, I’M GOING TO HOLLYWOOD, WOOOH… Okay, maybe not, but I’m still very happy. The 15-page script is based on The Veldt, a sci-fi novel from 1950, and I started some early production work today. I’ve gotten most of my crew together, I’ll be 1st Assistant Director, and I’ve found my Director, Production Manager, Editor, Ass. Gaffer and hopefully my Cinematographer and Key Gaffer. It’s going to need a lot of work on set design (and perhaps also visual effects) and finding someone to do sound may be harder than I thought. Anyway, I’m a bit stressed right now, since I’m also writing my application for ‘Den Grafiske Højskole’ in Copenhagen.
Also, six out of the seven students in my writing group at the school had their scripts chosen (including Simon aka. polt, grats!), we’re like totally awesome.
Awesome movies seen at the EFC
Lilja 4-ever (9/10)
"Lilja is 16 years old. Her only friend is the young boy Volodja. They live in Estonia, fantasizing about a better life. One day, Lilja falls in love with Andrej. He is going to Sweden, and invites Lilja to come along and start a new life."
Very strong movie about a young girl struggling to make a living. One of Moodysson’s best.
Living in Oblivion (9/10)
"Film about filmmaking. It takes place during one day on set of non-budget movie. Ultimate tribute to all independent filmmakers."
Great little movie starring Steve Buscemi and Catherine Keener. Buscemi plays a director struggling to finish his movie.
Grbavica (8/10)
"A woman and her daughter struggle to make their way through the aftermath of the Balkan war."
Very emotional, must see.
Reprise (8/10)
"Two competitive friends, fueled by literary aspirations and youthful exuberance, endure the pangs of love, depression and burgeoning careers."
Made by former EFC student Joachim Trier, Reprise is a rather unique movie. The editing is different from what you usually see, but the movie is incredible.
Double Dare (9/10)
"Double Dare is a double-barreled, action-packed documentary about the struggles of two stuntwomen in male-dominated Tinseltown to stay working, stay thin, and stay sane."
Very entertaining documentary about legendary stunt woman Jeannie Epper, and up-and-coming star Zoe Bell, who came, unemployeed, from New Zealand and ended up being Uma Thurman’s stunt double in the two Kill Bill movies. Bell’s story if by far the most interesting, mainly because she is so damn sweet. I saw this twice in two days after purchasing it, something I very rarely do.
RoboCop (9/10)
"In a dystopic & crime ridden Detroit, a terminally wounded cop returns to the force as a powerful cyborg with submerged memories haunting him."
You should all know this movie, and I’ve seen it before coming to the EFC, of course, but after rewatching it here I realized how extremely awesome this movie is. I’m a sucker for dystopian and/or post-apocalyptic movie settings, and the sad, future version of Detroit is incredible.
Garden State (9/10)
"A quietly troubled young man returns home for his mother’s funeral after being estranged from his family for a decade."
Natalie Portman is so fucking cute in this movie. Zach Braff is nice, too.
Primer (8/10)
"Four friends/fledgling entrepreneurs, knowing that there’s something bigger and more innovative than the different error-checking devices they’ve built, wrestle over their new invention."
This is a real low-budget movie, made for only $7.000. The crew shot 80 minutes of film in total, and the movie is 78 minutes long, incredible. It’s about four guys who accidentally creates a time machine, and the movie is one long mindfuck.
Braindead (9/10)
"A young man’s mother is bitten by a Sumatran rat-monkey. She gets sick and dies, at which time she comes back to life, killing and eating dogs, nurses, friends, and neighbors."
Peter Jackson’s zombie classic. I never thought he had actually made a movie I would like more than the Rings trilogy, but this one is amazing, one of the best zombie movies I’ve ever seen.
Nanook of the North
"Documents one year in the life of Nanook, an Eskimo (Inuit) and his family."
Nanook was made in 1922, and is considered one of the first documentaries created, although it’s not really a documentary. It’s still surprisingly entertaining.
Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead (8/10), Day of the Dead (8/10)
The Living Dead trilogy, saw them in a row and they are, of course, among the finest zombie movies ever made.
Internation Film Festival Rotterdam 2008
Hi, I’m back home after visiting the film festival in Rotterdam and hanging out in Amsterdam. We drove down there late Monday and came back this morning, here’s what happened.
Tuesday
We arrived some time before noon, at the Hans Brinker Budget Hotel, a place that is famed for being disgusting but it wasn’t actually that bad. The room was acceptable, although there was no place in the bathroom to hang or put anything. The hotel’s bar was pretty cool and there was happy hour between 17.00 and 18.00 so we didn’t complain much.
When we were settled in we left to take a look at Amsterdam, we quickly realized 
they have a lot of cool cinemas and we ended up ordering tickets for a sneak preview, hoping it was Cloverfield. While waiting for the movie two guys from the school decided to get tattoos (the guy with the "?!" has a Metal Gear Solid tattoo on his shoulder, awesome!).
After eating we moved to the cinema to settle in for the highly anticipated Cloverfield only to realize the movie was Charlie Wilson’s War, a weird, political film with Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman, about the war in Afghanistan. It was rather crappy and Dutch people have no fucking cinema etiquette. People just wouldn’t shut up. After the movie we got drunk.
Wednesday
We got up a little late, but since we were free to do whatever we wanted that didn’t matter much. We started the day off by walking to the Photography Museum Foam, and that was very interesting. The first part of the gallery was beautiful photos that didn’t really make sense until you read the description, e.g. a 
container to cryogenically freeze people, a playboy magazine for blind people, the only legal marijuana farm in the US (government-controlled of course), nuclear waste shining blue in the dark, and an extremely detailed photo of the Death Star II model (the one that’s not completed). The second part of the gallery contained photographs by the famous photographer Weegee. He usually took photos from New York crime scenes in the forties, and they are really stunning. There was also a photo of Stanley Kubrick, on the set of Dr. Strangelove (left).
We then continued on to the center of the city, looking at shops, and I almost bought this, but ended up buying this and this instead.
In the evening we went drinking again, at a cool bar that had the Blues Bros. on the facade (right), and then we went on to the Red Light District. Of course I knew about the district, the famous site of hookers and drug dealers, but still, seeing young girls in lingerie, in almost every window, waving at you, was so surreal. And so sad.
Thursday
The first day of the film festival, we got to Rotterdam around 11.00, and quickly realized how incredibly boring the center of that town is. The first movie I watched was Bootleg Film, a weird Japanese flick about a cop and a yakuza gangster. It was bad. Then I went on to see an Argentinean movie called El Otro, about some guy having a mid-life crisis. That was bad as well. When we drove back to Amsterdam in the evening, we realized that Cloverfield premiered, so, running to the cinema from the bus, me and this guy Mikkel (1st tattoo further up) got two tickets! And it was fucking awesome! A solid action movie, one of the best I’ve seen in a long time, the handheld camera thing worked very well. So, eventually we got to see a great movie that day.
Friday
The last day, first I saw a Brazilian movie, Mutum, and I’m sorry to be such an ass here, but that was god awful as well. Just like El Otro there was no real storyline, no real conflict for the main character, it was very dull. But then we settled in for the 
European premiere of Juno, a movie that was just recently nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Picture category, and it actually lived up to he hype. It was hard not to enjoy it, and it reminded me a little about Garden State. The last thing I did before we went home was buying a 6 GB USB Stick for 30€ (~225 DKK), a pretty good bargain. (The mall also had a huge TV, left)
Over all it was a nice trip, although the film festival isn’t really starting until next week (No Country for Old Men, I’m Not There, The Darjeeling Limited, Q&A with the Coen Bros. etc.) so that kind of sucks. Also, one of our bus drivers was a frickin’ asshole, not wanting to turn off the light in the bus because of "safety issues" (although he suddenly did several hours later), not turning up the heat, whining when we wanted to take a piss and stretch our legs when we had breaks (yeah, he wanted us to stay in the bus) and on the trip home he complained that he had to stay in line behind some of us at a gas station. The other bus driver was cool. Also, Dutch is fucked up.