Novena Films

2007-02-21T19:01:00.000-06:00

Weekend Away

Spring has come to Memphis, and the robins in the park are acting weird.

Usually they act like any bird... they flap around and peck in the dirt near the trail until you come near, and then they hop away five or six feet until you've gone safely past. Today, though, they were standing rigid, with their wingtips extended down to the ground, staying still as stone even when you came close. You could see their beady little eyes watching you, but unless you made a move at them, they didn't budge.

Bird sex can take some strange forms. Not much stranger than ours, though, I guess.

Anyway, I'm spending this weekend in Jackson, Mississippi, shooting for the MTC documentary. I have to be honest: at the moment, I'm not looking forward to it. Not because of the teachers or anything; but just because this kind of stuff is so far out of my comfort zone, especially taken four days at a time. I'm a classic introvert -- I find dealing with strangers to be exhausting, and this weekend will be basically nothing but strangers, 24 hours a day. Combined with the pressures of trying to shepherd two teachers and several teenagers through the shooting process, while also maintaining my shooting schedule and running camera and sound and conducting interviews simultaneously -- I mean, it's pretty demanding work, and I admit to feeling daunted. I'm up to it -- I can do whatever needs to be done -- but I'm really, really ready for this part to be over. And it's only just begun.

The most important thing is to try to enter into the shoot with as positive an attitude as possible -- I won't get anywhere if I'm feeling discouraged even before I really get started. So pardon me if I vent a little. I'm trying to get the resistance and negativity out of my system.

It would be so much easier if I just had one familiar person along to help. Oh well.

"Hollandale"

2006-07-31T13:16:00.000-05:00

The short spec film I put together for the Mississippi Teacher Corps, "Hollandale", is available for viewing here. It's still a work in progress, but it should give you some idea of what the larger project will eventually look like. We're forging ahead with the big production -- I've already completed the first round of interviews with five
new first-year teachers -- but we're going to need some cash to see it through. So if anybody would like to help out by sending a few dollars our way, you'll get to see your name in the credits, and I'll be your best friend forever.

You can make a donation here (just make sure you tell them what it's for.) Not only will it help us get the film made, but in the long run it'll also help the Teacher Corps do its much-needed work by helping them recruit new teachers and raise awareness about the situation in the delta and how the MTC can help.

Wilford Brimley* says:

It's the right thing to do, and a tasty way to do it.

*Wilford Brimley is in no way associated with this project, Novena Films, or with the Mississippi Teacher Corps. He actually made this statement in reference to Quaker Instant Oatmeal.

My Other Work

2006-07-14T13:40:00.000-05:00

I spend a lot of time fretting over whether I've chosen the right road regarding my work. This morning was exactly such a time, although not in an unpleasant way. Not knowing exactly what one should be doing because one is Pretty Good (TM) at a couple of different things is a good problem to have (even if both things are impractical and hard to make a living at.)

I re-re-restarted this website as a base of virtual operations for one particular project, but I've always assumed it would expand to include all the other projects I'm working on simultaneously. There are two others upon which I consider myself currently "at work": a video, and a book. The video (assuming all goes well) will be done relatively soon, the book will doubtless be a long time in coming -- years, I expect. For me, the creative dichotomy balances film on one side (my adopted meduim) and writing on the other (the only one win which I might be said to have been born innately talented -- if such a thing actually exists.) The big irony is that, as smoothly as these two things could fit together, the one thing I don't consider myself is a screenwriter.

Music videos are the best thing ever, from a filmmaking perspective. It's the last modern bastion of the avant-garde (and the greatest hope the avant-garde filmmaker has ever enjoyed). It's sort of the opposite of a film score -- rather than creating music to accompany a film, you're creating a film to accompany music. It's a liberating form, in that it's film in its purest state -- no narrative (or none necessary), no dialogue or exposition, no character development; just imagery. The music holds the piece together (since music is actually better at temporal cohesion anyway, being a strictly fourth-dimensional medium) so any further coherence in the piece is optional for the director. All you have to concern yourself with is making the thing visually interesting.

That said, you do need a good visual hook. You still need a structure (though that structure can be a lot more flexible), and the thing still needs to make some kind of internal sense. This one I'm working on now already has its structure and visual hook in place, and I'm happy with them -- I've had the idea in my mind for a few months now, and I still like it, which is generally how I know that something is worth pursuing. I hate 90% of my ideas within a week of having them, so surviving for months is a good sign. But there are still gaps to fill, and that the last, hardest step. The one thing I've learned is not to try to have other people's ideas, but the alternative -- waiting patiently for your own to come -- is the most frustrating thing in the world.

And then there's the book. It's a nonfiction piece on a subject about which obnoxiously little has been written, considering the subject's cultural magnitude -- I'm still waiting for the book I want to write to turn up on a shelf somewhere, already written, because I can't quite believe that nobody has done it yet. I have a feeling I'll be talking about this one for a long, long time, but I'm committed to it, and I feel confident that it will eventually see the light of day. Just last night I formulated a solid thesis and found that it allowed me to understand the subject on a more concrete level. Structure is still a problem, but I think that'll sort itself out as I go. The problem is finding the time and the creative energy to spend on it. There are days when I just want to hole myself up in the corner of some coffee shop or diner somewhere and spend the day pecking away at a keyboard, but I don't have means to do that. It would be even better to have a space of my own in which to work -- a private space, with white walls on which I could tack up notes and sketches knowing that nobody else would see them if I didn't want them to (creative privacy is a big thing for me.) But I don't have any of that yet, and as of this afternoon I don't really know how I might acquire it.

Writing is what everybody tells me I should be doing; they've been telling me that since I was in junior high. I'm reasonably good at it (when I set my mind to it), although I'm still undisciplined about it. When I write I start at the beginning, write straight through to the end, and then go back and clean up the obvious typos and stylistic problems (leaving just as many forgotten.) It's rare that I write a second draft of anything. With an experienced editor behind me, I think I could turn out some damn good work. Enough to get paid? Maybe; I don't know. I'm at a sort of pessimistic place about ever getting paid a living wage for anything right now.

It's funny, in a sad way -- one of the attractions of film originally was that it was something that I might be able to make a real living at, unlike the unending hell of making a living as a writer. Film work is a skill, a trade, and one that's always in demand in the modern world. I've never wanted to get Spielberg rich, but to just, y'know, make enough to live a modest bohemian life. And now that I'm skilled enough to expect payment, I find myself in a place where there's very little steady paying work. And so I turn to thoughts of what I might do to get by during these barren days, and I think about writing -- writing to support my filmmaking habit. I have to laugh for fear of crying.

It's a big problem, though; I find myself with plenty of time to work, but so anxious over being eternally broke that I spend a lot of that time consumed with worry over how much free time I have, which I'm not using properly because I'm so worried. The only thing that saves me from falling into despair is the work.

Project 1 Complete

2006-07-04T16:06:00.000-05:00

I believe I'm finished with the short MTC film, and I have to say I'm relieved about it. Not that I didn't enjoy it; I did, very much. But I'm about done watching this film now. I'll be curious to hear responses to it, since I myself can't see it the way a typical viewer might. My own thought processes are too deeply embedded to be able to tell whether it'll make sense to anyone else.

But for the most part, I'm happy with how it came out. There are a couple of technical problems -- I did one exterior interview, which was great and very effective except for a sound problem. My own lav mic was stolen (along with my last camera) a couple of years ago, so I had to borrow someone else's to do the interview. It's a nice mic, and it did a great job on interviews in controlled settings, but it wasn't quite up to the job on a public street on a breezy day. While I was shooting, the wind noise sounded minimal through my headphones; in the editing room, it was more pronounced. Not enough that it obscures the words of the interviewee, just enough to really annoy the hell out of me.

But there's not much to be done about it under the current circumstances -- no amount of digital fiddling with the audio has accomplished anything helpful, and a high-pass filter only distorted the voice and robbed it of its expressiveness. If we had the money and time, I'd go re-shoot that interview, but we don't. And even if we did, I'd hate to lose the immediacy of that first interview. I think it's best chalked up to experience -- and an indication that I really need to procure a quality radio lavolier microphone of my own.

The only other significant technical annoyance I encountered was a quirk in Final Cut Pro. Towards the end of editing, I devised a design for the credit sequence that was based on still images taken on the trip to Hollandale. I was going to go all Ken Burns on them, which is simple, albeit fiddly, to do. And it looked fantastic, except that I couldn't get the motion control and the widescreen matte to play nicely together -- any attempt to zoom on the image blew out the aspect ratio. So now I've got a credit sequence using still images that are nice, but not as lovely as they were when they had an element of motion. It's always frustrating to see something not live up to what you know is its full potential.

There are at least a dozen other little nitpicky things I'd fix under perfect circumstances, but then, that's always true. Film is made of compromise. I said to a friend yesterday, "I think I'm better at this (documentary)..." as opposed to dramatic work. But thinking about it later, that's not necessarily true. I think this film is better than my previous one; it just happens to be a documentary, and the preceding happened to be drama. I think/hope that my next film will be better than this one, and the one after that, better still. And I always tend to prefer whichever cinematic mode I'm working in at the moment.

Anyway, I'm still wrestling with Compressor to squeeze out a web-worthy mpeg-4 to put up here; I'll post again when it's ready. It would be good to YouTube it as well -- I'll have to ask Ben G. if that's cool. Optimistically, I've got another project coming up imminently which will be a departure from this project and, I think, huge fun to do. And then (actually concurrently) I'll be looking to get dug in to the larger MS Teacher Corps film, hopefully this time at a more measured pace. I think the short came out well, but I can do even better with nine or ten months at my disposal.

PS: I've switched to HaloScan commenting, which is now fully functional. Just so you know.

Rough Cut

2006-06-27T21:53:00.000-05:00

I'm really happy with the way this short spec film is coming along. Editing is almost done -- now I'm at the stage where I'm just moving things around, playing with the arrangement, endlessly fiddling with the details. A single frame here or there can make a big difference, if only to me. Once I'm satisfied -- which basically has to be in the next day or two -- the only thing left will be to whip up some simple titles, render it all out, and compress it. Ta-da.

Spending the week up in midtown has been a big help. Driving back and forth from Mississippi gets a little tiresome (not to mention costly), and it has on a few occasions kept me from going into Memphis to work on the film, or from staying as long as I'd like. One of these days I'll have a dedicated editing machine of my own. I also wouldn't object to getting some decent mics. The one shoot where I had to use the camera mic annoys me on playback -- not that the sound is bad, it's just not as lovely as the sound on all the other footage. And a proper light kit would be good. I've gotten pretty good at lighting with hardware store lights, but you're limited to only the coarsest, most approximate lighting schemes. I'd be lost without my chinaball. Scoop lamps are fine as far as they go, but they leave you no control over your light; light leaks out everywhere, spoiling your hard shadows and making your darks muddy. With only one exception I've shot all of the footage for this film with available light; the sun can be a harsh key light, but it's never "wrong."

The beautiful thing about digital video is that the means of (film) production are finally in the hands of the masses. For less than the cost of a modest new car, I can have a fully-functioning studio capable of producing broadcast-quality film at a cost of maybe $10/hour. I mean, I don't actually have that yet... but I will, eventually. It's a miraculous day when feeding and transporting your cast and crew is your biggest expense.

Anyway, I think Ben and the other MTC folks will be pleased with our results so far. I'm looking forward to sending it off and getting their reaction.

Focus Pull

2006-06-08T14:16:00.000-05:00

Gradually my ideas about this film are coming into sharper focus. I'm actually a little worried, inasmuch as I'm not worried at all about the film. Usually I'd be a nervous wreck at this point, so this sense of general calm about the project ahead of me is a little perplexing. I think it has something to do with the unknowability of the big picture; my ideas about the film are becoming clearer, but the film itself is still mostly a mystery. It's down to the basic difference between dramatic film and documentary -- with a typical narrative film, you write a screenplay and build a very clear vision of the film in your mind, and then set about planning every aspect of the production in painstaking detail. By the time you set out to shoot, the enormity of the undertaking is so clear and present in your mind that it becomes overwhelming -- you can barely focus on the task at hand for the tight ball of anxiety and expectation you're carrying around in your stomach. Documentary, though, releases you from all of that -- since you're dealing with real people living real lives, there's no pre-determined arc, no well-defined image of what's to come. All you have is what's in front of you at any given moment and some loose theories about how it might all fit together. Obviously you have to enter into any film with some plans and expectations, but you're forced to remind yourself along the way that in dealing with the spontenaity of reality, you can't cling to your plans too tightly -- to do so could blind you to events playing out in front of your lens if they don't match your preconceptions. The need to keep the present and immediate future foremost in your mind keeps you from falling into the anxiety trap.

The downside is that it becomes too tempting to forget about the long term structure of the film. To counteract that, I've been spending a lot of time working out structural ideas, playing with my assumptions, and digging into background material. So far that's mostly been about books -- I'm reading a lot about race and class, and doing some research into prominent black writers and artists from the delta. (I'm counting on some as-yet-undetermined delta poet to provide me with a title for this film eventually -- 'cause so far, nobody has any ideas.) I'm digging into the blues more than I have in the past since it's such a major part of the expression of delta culture. And I'm trying to learn more about contemporary equivalents of the blues -- the kids are into rap, so it's time for me to learn more about that, and hopefully isolate some delta-specific examples.

I'm also at the point of deciding upon specifically which of these new teachers I want to focus. The problem, of course, is that by choosing one, I might appear to be rejecting another, which is emphatically not my intention. Every one of these teachers will over the coming year be living a story worth telling. My problem is, I'll only have enough time, money, and tape to tell one or two of those stories, so I have to choose. So far I've narrowed it down to four. Tomorrow I'll be revisiting the teachers as a group with the goal of a) spending some time with them without the camera, because the camera can be as much an obstacle as a tool; and b) confirming my choices in my own mind. Then I'll approach those four and ask them whether they want to participate, and explain what it would mean for them, because it's important that they know what to expect. That in itself has the potential to narrow my choices further; if not, I'll be taking some time to film each of them before paring the group down to one or two -- or three at most. It's going to be a tough choice since they each have something to bring to the project that none of the others can bring. The good thing is that, by adding real people to my ideas about the film, the film itself becomes clearer in my mind. Formulating questions for a specific person is hugely easier than formulating questions for an abstract concept of a teacher.

Meanwhile, I'm also trying to figure out this short spec film we're working on. It's hard because, again, it's a story worth telling, and if I'm going to do it at all I want to do the best job I can of telling it. At the same time, it's not my primary story, and in the time I've alotted to it I can't really expect to do tell it completely. On some level I view it as a dry run -- a chance to work out how to approach the larger project and address any technical or conceptual issues that crop up. On the other hand, if the possibility of pursuing the larger project pivots on the spec film, then it's absolutely necessary to hit my stride as soon as possible so that it's as good a pursuasive tool as possible. It's tricky to take something so seriously when you expect that ultimately it will become peripheral. The alternative, of course, is to assume that it will have its part to play in the main film as well -- as with everything else in documentary, you can't really know what's most important when you begin. You just have to deal with each moment as best you can and trust that it'll all work out in the end.

PS: I still haven't gotten around to fixing those IE issues yet. Sorry. I'll do it over the weekend, probably.

Minor Technical Problems

2006-06-01T13:41:00.000-05:00

I'm still discovering a few technical issues on this blog that I need to deal with. For example, I've discovered that people viewing the page with Internet Explorer are having trouble posting comments -- so I'll be working to sort that problem out later today. I'm currently using Blogger's comments system, but I generally prefer HaloScan's (in spite of occasional service outages), so I might switch. The problem with that, though, is that this blog doesn't seem to like Java much, but I'm not quite Java-savvy enough to understand why. That's why I don't have a site meter or a search function yet. The code chews up the template, but I haven't been able to work out how or why or what to do about it.

But I'm an intrepid blogger and I shall prevail. You may just have to be a little patient while I whack on the code with a hammer a few times. In the meantime, have you considered switching from Explorer to Firefox? It's really much better, and completely free. And it displays this blog perfectly.

Challenge

2006-05-31T14:54:00.000-05:00

I already told Ben G. this joke, but it's the only joke about documentary film I know:

Q: How do you make a small fortune in documentary film?
A: First, you start with a large fortune...

I've been thinking about this since this morning, when I had my first chance to talk (albeit briefly) one-on-one with each of the new teachers. The very first one, a young woman, said straight out that she didn't care to participate and that she hated the "commercialization" of (in this case) the Teacher Corps. That's not a direct quote, but my interpretation of what she said. And there was no hostility in the statement, just a simple rejection of something behind the concept -- her idea of the motive behind it perhaps, or the motive behind film/video/television in general. She referred to negative experiences with the media in the past, and having had plenty of bad experiences with the media myself (from the other end of things, I assume) I can't say I blame her.

The irony was that in telling me she wanted nothing to do with my film, she ensured that I noticed her immediately and liked her right away. She was thoughtful and honest and willing (very, very willing) to challenge people around her. I love that and I want to meet more people who approach the world that way. But it leads me to think that it would be helpful if I discussed briefly my own motives. I spent the morning asking each of these new teachers, "what brought you here? What do you hope to accomplish during your time in the Teacher Corps?" In short, what's your purpose? And it's a question that could equally apply to me, so I'm offering my own answer.

I know this much: I'm not cut out to be a teacher -- or at least, not a public high school teacher in the delta. There was a brief moment when I considered applying to the MTC myself, but the impulse was driven by my desire to be of use to the Corps, not because I particularly wanted to become a teacher. I recognized immediately that an ambivalent teacher would be of no use to the Corps. But I continued to nose through the then-first-year teachers' blogs for the next few months, and one evening, on an impulse, I left a casually supportive comment on one teacher's blog. Within hours I found myself quite unexpectedly pulled into the possibility of making this film. It was not so much a matter of me making a proposal as it was a happy intersection of circumstance. But I discovered that I could be of use to the MTC using skills that I already have in a medium and artfom to which I've already devoted myself, so I was eager to provide whatever service I could.

This film isn't for me, it's for the Teacher Corps. This is their film, not mine. At present, the Corps has left its creation in my hands, but at the end of the day my mission is to serve the larger interests of the MTC before all others. It's not wholly about charity, of course; the project will also (I hope) serve some of my own interests, but they're predominantly intangible. For me, this project is an opportunity to prove my ability to handle a large-scale documentary production, a chance to gain experience and put some of my theories to the test, and above all, to dig deeper into my chosen medium. What it emphatically is not about is money or commercial success. My cinematic roots lie in generations of filmmakers who turned away from the industry and set out to make films of substance, films that generally only a small, dedicated audience would ever see. I'm not interested in some reality-television version of the MTC (sorry, Ben; I know how you love your reality TV), and in spite of some of the language in the release form I don't expect anyone to ever "buy" any part of this film. I do hope that people see it, provided it goes forward; and if people like it, if I find that I've made a film with some narrative or artistic merit, obviously that would make me very, very happy. But foremost I want to produce a film that advocates for the Teacher Corps, and my interest in getting it seen comes from my desire to see it serve the Corps as well as possible. Any concrete benefit that derives from the film belongs completely to the MTC, not to me. All I'm asking for myself is a chance to make a better filmmaker of myself through applied practice, and a chance to use my training and abilities to help and further the MTC's goals in whatever way I can.

I didn't have time to go into any of that this morning, though. I have no desire to push anyone who doesn't want to be involved into participating; this is an inherently intrusive, sometimes tension-filled process that only the willing should undertake. But I hope I get a chance to talk to her again and throughout the year, without the camera if that's what she prefers -- and not just about this film project, but about her experiences. I can tell she's going to have some interesting things to say, and I want to understand her point of view. I need as much honest input as I can get if I'm going to be true to the teacher's experience of the Mississippi Teacher Corps.

As far as on-camera subjects go, though, I think I'm going to be spoiled for choice. This is a very thoughtful, well-spoken group of people embarking on an intensely challenging period of their lives -- it's an innately interesting situation. So much so that I'm having to reconcile myself to the fact that there's going to be more going on than I can reasonably hope to capture. One of the hardest things about documentary, especially at the beginning, is that for all your planning and plotting and tentative ideas about the arc of the story, the film in many ways has its own mind and its own will. Documentary isn't so much about directing as it is about guiding when you can or, more often, just hanging on and keeping an open enough mind to see what's in front of you. But there's no question that in many ways I'm going to be looking to the teachers to help me find a handle, and I want them to feel confident that we're all working towards the same ultimate goal.

Speaking of which, I hope everyone reading this makes note of their ability to post comments and feels free to use it. And if comments don't suit you, I love to get email and I do my best to answer promptly. I want to know what people are thinking -- and by that I mean what they're really thinking. I'm going to trust that nobody is afraid to pose a challenge or to disagree with me and lay out all the reasons why. In fact I am actively inviting you to do so. Thus far, I think it's safe to say we're off to a good start on this point.

PS: Oh, and also, for anyone who uses an RSS feed reader, this blog does have a feed.

Roll Camera

2006-05-29T20:11:00.000-05:00

I was going to write a long post detailing everything that's brought me to this point -- but then all my errands today took longer than I expected, and at the moment I'm only about half an hour away from my optimum bedtime. And there's no way I'm actually going to make that bedtime, but I figure I should at least make the attempt, and writing a thorough background post just isn't part of that plan.

So instead, for the time being, I'll write about the questions and issues that are at the forefront of my mind as I prepare to shoot tomorrow, and come back and fill in the details later on. In a nutshell, though, I'm working on a film about the Mississippi Teacher Corps, about the Mississippi delta students it serves, and about the new class of incoming teachers that begins its two-year course tomorrow.

I've got nearly three hours of footage already, having taken a trip into a typical delta town with the program director, Ben Guest, where I got to meet a lot of people and made a sort of mad dash to understand the key issues and problems facing the teacher corps. I talked to students, I talked to authorities, I talked to teachers who have already finished their first year. I came away, predictably, with many, many more questions than answers. And that's okay -- I don't need to have all the answers at the beginning, if in fact I can ever expect to have them at all. But I do need to know which questions to ask.

The big question, the question above all the other questions, is what the purpose of this film is going to be. Is it meant to promote the MTC, to attract new recruits and more funding, to sell the program to the outside world? Or is it meant to tell the Teacher Corps' story? Hopefully the two will ultimately be one and the same, or at least compatible. There are moments, though, when I'm not certain that they are. The idea of "hope" seems to be very much in doubt; asking people why they teach in the delta has so far only produced non-committal statements of vague, modest purpose. Most of the second-years just seem to want to get through the experience alive and intact. There's very little trace of passionate idealism, although I can't imagine that they all entered the program so jaded. So I'm very eager to get in with the incoming class as soon as possible and ask them why they came and what they hope to accomplish before they become as worn-down as their predecessors. Because, after all, "it's almost hopeless but it's still worth doing" isn't that great a sales pitch for potential recruits and donors.

Having said that, the experience itself has no less value just because it's a difficult one for most. An almost-hopeless story is as worth telling as an almost-hopeless job is worth doing. So I've isolated a few major themes that I find particularly compelling at this early stage, which hopefully make up a synthesis of the underlying issues in the Mississippi Teacher Corps:

Race: certainly not all of the new teachers are white, but generally speaking most of them are. Almost all of the students are black. Thus, many of these teachers will be having their own first minority experience in the delta, so I'm interested to see both how their students react to them and how they react to their new society. Will there be culture shock? And if the ultimate goal of teaching these students to see them graduate and, ideally, go off to college, for many of the students it will mean their first foray out of black society and into a world where they become a social minority for the first time. There's a lot of crossing back-and-forth between two segments of American society implicit in the situation, which is, for most of the people involved, a break from the comfortable status quo.

Class: Being white obviously doesn't necessarily mean that one comes from a privileged or middle-class background; and being black doesn't necessarily mean that one comes from the underclass. But in the delta, race and class are inextricably tied. The general trend in the Corps is of people from fairly comfortable, stable, well-educated backgrounds coming to the aid of people from bad schools and third- and fourth-generation poverty. Some of the teachers will have had first- or second-hand experience with poverty already, but I'm guessing that just as many will not. Of course, those with resources helping those without is the whole idea. But as with race, class is going to be an inherent source of tension.

Students and Teachers: Or more explicitly, which is which? The teachers are themselves students who rely upon their own students to help them learn. The assumed student/teacher dichotomy only tenuously applies in the teacher corps.

And most importantly:

Saviors and the Saved: Not to imply that anyone involved thinks of themselves as a superhero, but the obvious narrative line in cinematic terms would be one of an outsider arriving to help people who, for whatever reason, cannot help themselves. In light of all of the above, this one is frought with problems. How many teachers will attempt to help and find that their help is rejected? How many will find that, regardless of whether their help is accepted, they lack the means to produce much change or make any progress? What would it mean to "save" a student, if such a thing is even possible? What does success look like?

From what I've seen so far, these incoming student-teachers will face three major sources of conflict during the program: their students, other teachers and administrators, and their own disillusionment. I find myself in the happy situation of being able to go through the coming year alongside these new teachers without actually having to do any of the hardest work, and I have the luxury of being able to take an analytical and interpretive approach to their experiences. Since I won't have to deal with the stress and exhaustion and conflict myself, I've settled on a role for myself as the stubborn optimist, relentlessly hanging on to whatever ideals the new teachers express to me in these early days. I'm going to trust their first hopes to guide the development of the film, and use them as a compass to navigate around the obstacles ahead.

All this means that I'm reliant upon them to share their experiences and tell me how it really is for them, the bad parts as well as the good parts. My objective is to make a film on behalf of the teacher corps, but my aim is to do that by letting these new teachers speak as much as possible for themselves. They are the teacher corps, they're the ones who found enough value and enough hope in the idea to promise two years of their young adulthoods to delta kids. I'm betting the success of the film that that'll be all the sales pitch I'll need.

And it's now well past my optimum bedtime -- I'll see you all tomorrow.

Biography

2006-05-28T22:36:00.000-05:00

Amy Frazier is a journeyman filmmaker living and working in Memphis, Tennessee and northern Mississippi. She works in both film production and film education, having spent several years serving as a traffic coordinator and workshop coordinator for the Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute in Hot Springs, Arkansas. She also spent a year working as the workshop coordinator at the Memphis Digital Arts Cooperative, facilitating and teaching workshops on all aspects of film practice and appreciation for the general public. Her wide-ranging film credits as producer, director, DP, camera operator, camera assistant, sound tech, and editor are evidence of her comprehensive, artisanal approach to filmmaking and her belief that the the most interesting films are hand-made by individual artists.

Amy's cinematic values stem in large part from the influence of her teachers and mentors, who include the maverick British director Mike Leigh and the veteran American independent director Jay Craven. Like them, she supports the idea of regionally- and locally-grounded film rooted in the lives and experiences of real people. She counts among her most cherished influences Maya Deren, Albert and David Maysles, Fredrick Wiseman, Jane Campion, Yimou Zhang, Dziga Vertov, and Alejandro Jodorowsky. She's also seen everything David Cronenberg has ever done.

She still hasn't made up her mind whether she prefers working in dramatic or documentary film, so she does a bit of both.

Writing

2006-05-28T22:25:00.000-05:00

Undergraduate Thesis:

A Subversive Art: The New Potential of American Film Culture

Part 1: Title; Thanks; Table of Contents (pdf)
Part 2: Introduction; An Anagram on the Ideas of Maya Deren (pdf)
Part 3: Amos Vogel and the Way Forward (pdf)
Part 4: Interview with Karen Cooper of Film Forum (pdf)

(html versions coming soon)

Essays:

Concepts of Reality in Vertov's Man with a Movie Camera and Rossellini's Rome Open City (pdf)

Resume

2006-05-28T22:04:00.000-05:00

(download as pdf, Word doc)

CAREER OBJECTIVE: film/video production in commercial, industrial, or nonprofit fields

SUMMARY OF QUALIFICATIONS:

- more than five years production experience with crew credits on 18 films
- natural gift for idea development, organization, and collaboration
- committed to continually expanding my skill set; currently studying digital imaging and effects on an independent basis
- dedicated to producing top-quality work while maintaining a high degree of professionalism

TECHNICAL PROFILE:

CAMERA: Arri 16mm BL and 35 I, Panaflex GII, Moviecam Super America
Canon XL1 and XL2, Panasonic AG-DVX100, Sony DSR-250 and DSR-400
OFFLINE EDITING: 16mm and 35mm Steenbeck, Final Cut Pro
CREW: production assistance, boom operation, set construction

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

2005
- Camera Operator and 1st AC, Streaker, Creative Forces, Memphis TN
- 2nd AD, Away(A)wake, Sawed-Off Productions, Memphis TN

2003-2004
- Workshop Instructor and Co-ordinator, Memphis Digital Arts Co-operative, Memphis TN

2002
- Research Assistant, Zero Tolerance, J Bird Productions, Santa Monica CA
- Production Assistant, Denny's #05, "Recess" and "Sharing", Directorz Productions, Dallas TX / Los Angeles
- Sound Recordist, Blue Citrus Hearts, Sawed-Off Productions, Memphis TN

EDUCATION

- B.A. with honors in Film Studies; Marlboro College, Marlboro VT
- Art and Technique of Filmmaking; London Film School, London, United Kingdom

Credits

2006-05-28T21:49:00.000-05:00

FULL CREDITS:

2007-2008

- Co-producer, Camera, Editor; "Delta Year", DV feature (due 2008)

2006

- Producer, Camera, Editor; "Hollandale", DV short
- Producer, Director, Camera, Editor; "Devastortion", DV short

2005

- Producer, Director, Camera Operator, Editor; "Eyes of a Blue Dog", DV short

2004

- Camera Operator, 1st AC; "Streaker", DV feature, Creative Forces Productions, Memphis TN
- 2nd AD; "Away(Awake)", DV feature, Sawed-Off Productions, Memphis TN

2002

- Production Assistant; Denny's #05, "Recess" and "Sharing", 35mm commercials, Directorz Productions,
Los Angeles CA
- Camera operator; "The Churches of Tunica County", DV/multimedia installation, Tunica County Museum,
Tunica MS
- Sound Recordist; "Blue Citrus Hearts", DV feature, Sawed-Off Productions, Memphis TN

2001

- Sound Recordist; "Love's Gone", 35mm short, Inge Fjortoft/LFS
- Assistant Producer; "The One that Got Away", 35mm short, Geli Padberg/LFS
- 1st AC; "Bride and Gloom", 35mm short, Christian Regnadot/LFS
- Producer, Camera Operator; "The Third Hand", 35mm short, Amy Frazier/LFS
- DP; "Apart", 35mm short, Rebecca Finley/LFS

2000

- Co-Producer, DP; "Tattoo Stories", 16mm short, Amy Frazier/Naveed Ahktar/LFS
(screened at 2000 BBC British Short Film Festival)
- Producer, Director, Editor; "The Woodsman and the Devil", 16mm short, Amy Frazier/LFS
- Camera Operator; "We Have Your Friends", 16mm short, Rebecca Finley/LFS
- DP; "Magic Hour", 16mm short, Patricia Watson/LFS

1999

- DP; "Lifeless", 16mm short, James Cotton/LFS

1998

- Producer, Director, Editor; "Consuela", S-VHS short, Amy Frazier/Marlboro College
- Producer, Director, Editor; "The God Hunters", S-VHS short, Amy Frazier/Marlboro College

Clips

2006-05-28T21:48:00.003-05:00

"Devastortion", 5 min.

"Hollandale" part 1, 6 min.

"Hollandale" part 2, 5 min.

Testing

2006-05-25T16:53:00.000-05:00

Nothing here yet. Move along.