DVD ing

Oh, fancy that! Another posting as the definitive DVD release is prepared. Completists will note (in about ten days) that the ultimate text differs ever so slightly from this more verbose one. had to cut out 250 words, see, cos i couldnae read it. A chastening thought that one is going blind, ah well. Artwork by Trevor Grassi, who has now graduated and is 18 and moved out and on his own feet. Thanks, Trevor.

End of the Line

So that's that. ALYCE had her final premier last night and we are done and dusted. there will, of course, be repercussions - a sound clean-up; packaging; festival entries and hopefully some commercial interest. All of these developments will be annotated here, but the day by day blog is now... oof... over.
So, what have we learnt? Right now - though I know playing favorites is unseemly - I want to thank everyone who made this project happen as stunningly well as it did happen. Everyone needs that thanks. But I'd like to mention just five young people who really made this project outstanding, for me.
let me be selfish.
In no particular order. Trevor Grassi, in his ultra busy senior year, gave us an accomplished, quirky, and wholly 'trevorian' piece. he also spent hours mentoring younger students in visual arts, photoshop and generally added a sharp and intelligent focus to everything which went on at Indie. It was a pleasure to work alongside him.
Joe Bacci - long known as a 'difficult' student, proved definitively that 'difficult' is in the eye of the beholder. He was, first and foremost, totally reliable, turning up at odd times of day, in the sub-zero temperatures, weaving amazing camera images and always in a great, ironic humor. OK, he does curse a bit, but, so do I. I feel he could walk into any film production now and hold his own. we will try to arrange some of that. Not only his Alyce segment, but also his personal 'samurai' film, 'Aisumasen' and his camerawork on Ian Penman's 'First strike' are visually astonishing. Thanks Joe.
Dan Cayea - even though he frightens little children with his haircuts (and his Mom, too, probably) shot a very controlled scene, went away, and came back with a visual extravaganza. I still do not know how he got those images. Hopefully, next year, we can exploit Dan shamelessly and squeeze his secrets out of him. A star.
Bayla Laks put so much creative effort and first class graphics into Alyce (and other things - like Ultra Terra, her first film proper) that when I had a ream of still photos and was tearing out my hair, I asked for her help. The visual work she did made the opening of Alyce breathtaking. Next year she will be allowed to write on the walls, and we are building a special sleep room for her at indie. Thanks Bayla for all your time, energy and skill.
Finally... there's Will. It's been a privilege to work with him - he does not give up on any problem, he's personally taken half a dozen of his contemporaries under his wing, he solves problems, he is a kick-ass editor and a grade 1 cameraman. His own work this year has been stunning, and he may have invented a new cinema form, the 'beat film'. His work in sound design (hours and hours and hours) for Alyce was so powerful it actually made the film. And he's great to be around. Will's done now, I don't think there's anything we can teach him that he can't teach us. This, surely, is the goal?

So that was that. An amazing experience. But guess what?
Just a beginning.
Watch this space.
Over and out.
R.

Where is me camera?

I'm going to have one welded to me forehead. the premier went off very well (despite a few glitches which only the Indie staff noticed... twitchy as we are... a wonderful atmosphere and five of the six directors present . A charming eight year old girl asked to see Cheshire man, and Will went all soft trying to explain he wasn't really scary. No, said the girl, i wasn't scared. But how did you get all those freckles in the film?
More tomorrow, hopefully with some photos.
Pass the oxy-acetylene torch, Doris.

131 Days

It was supposed to be 100 days but somewhere we slipped synch by a month.
Tomorrow is the Premier of Alyce, edited - or rather strung together and cleaned up this week.
Boiceville is a fine sight at 3 a.m. as we have been finding out.
The photo is one of the last unseen shots from the movie.
Bayla did so much work, that we finally gave her a section of her own: she did the whole intro in photoshopped stills.
More tomorrow after the cautious out-of-town opening in Saugerties (Inquiring Mind Gallery) at 7 p.m. before a wilder shared 'out-of-school' show in Woodstock on Friday at 6 p.m. in the Community Center on the lovelily named 'Rock City Road.
Confused by all those clocks? So were we.

Follow the white rabbit.

Reader's Letters

Who is this man? What does he want to know? Where is this window? Good questions all.
He is a Latvian-American writer. he wants to know when ALYCE will be finished. The finster in question is in Daugavpils or Dvinsk.
Readers with very long attentionspans will remember an old Alyce blog on parkour videos from that very town. Scroll back and see. remarkable - except when you realise that the East European variants of the craft were based not so much on urban disaffection (though plenty of that), nor on simple idle youth (though that aplenty) but on disaffected idle post military trained youth. post Soviet military trained now independent trashcan youth idle in urban disaffection. In Daugavpils.

When? This Wednesday with the World premier as detailed below somewhere on Thursday, June 15th in the rural disaffected Saugerties.
Hi Peteris.

Jolie and Her Geraniums

Just to show that ALYCE is not being neglected despite rockandroll lifestyles.

Sami and Her Sticks

What better way to blow away the fatigue and frustration of a hard week than to... er... go to a concert in the rain on a thundery Friday? But it was the excellent and rarely seen Frankie and... weirdly put on FIRST... oh, at some point I'll rail against Mammon and upstarts, but they delivered a brief and punchy set. An uppercut into the gut of all that. Will was on inventive camera (power cords trailing through mud, baffled locals) great great fun. We will have a good dvd for the lad and lass. Do not miss their concert/shoot on Saturday June 17th. We won't.
P.S. With batteries next time.

The Eye of Bayla

The Laks took these images in hand - all from the opening sequence of ALYCE - and flopped, tinted, blended, layered and generally photoshopped them both. more to come. I think it will work.
Though, mea maxima culpa, I did get a shock this morning when the giant calendar at Indie Towers clicked over to JUNE. WTF!? Meaning we have the World Premier (or Ersteweltanstellung as Goethe would not have said) on the 15th. Better get my collective skates on then.
And moments of regret that the momentum we had built up in March and April trickled out as other projects came online. Something to learn there, surely, about keeping a steady pace with more way-stations and 'events'. Some basic problem with the Prime Directive, in fact. Maybe Kirk was right?
The film will not properly exist without links. And it is looking more and more likely that I will have to take charge of these links. It saddens me in one way, as I have tried to stand back and let ideas come when they come. But an 'interference' at this point is unsatisfactory, as - one would hope - an 'interference' should at least be effective. Well, it's the old battle between the expedient and the wished for. Leaving me feeling a little like Bud Cort's Bond Company stooge in 'Life Aquatic'. So, next week, come hail or high water, these couriers shall not be stayed in the swift completion of their appointed round... and ALYCE will be knitted together, corrected, trimmed and - in one word - edited.
At least we have avoided being too far down the line according to Beckett's maxim that 'works are never finished, they are just abandoned at some point'. I misquote from memory.
It's still going to scare the bejasus out of any little kids coming to see sweetness and light and wabbits, though...