Last Night I went to a screening of a friends film. This friend is a one-man band and after three years of working on the film he’s done- finished- kaput. However, I still have some notes for him….. It is a great film, but it could be better, and I believe, reach a much wider audience with a few tweaks.
After the screening I got into a discussion about his film (and the nature of filmmaking). She mentioned that it started to feel a bit long at one point but she realized that she was still interested so it was ok. I felt the same way, except that I would argue for trying to fix it rather than accept it. The film is well paced, the stories are nicely woven together, and it is a wonderful document of a place and time fraught with all kinds of difficulties. However, by tightening even a little bit I think it could connect with a much wider audience.
Over 15 years of working on films, I’ve learned the hard way to get rid of things that don’t move the story forward. When we made our film, “Horns and Halos” we followed an underground publisher as he attempted to re-publish a discredited biography of GW Bush before the 2000 election. For a long time during the editing, it seemed essential to the story to set up how he came to publish books and how he ended up as the super of the building. We had a great scene in which he was fixing a radiator as he gave us his back-story. People really liked the scene, but we realized that every scene in the film had to include at least two of the three main characters: the book, the publisher, and the author. Since this scene only focused on the publisher, it was excised. When we showed it again to the same people who insisted that we keep that scene in, we found that not only did they not miss it, but also that they couldn’t figure out what we’d done to make the film so much better.
Working on the cut of a film is a bit like working on a sculpture out of clay. At first you start with a mass of images and information. As you start to shape it almost any bit of footage seems to work. However, once you find the focus it becomes increasingly clear which bits of footage work and which bits don’t. Once it starts to take on a distinct look, even the smallest changes have a major impact. As the film gets closer to being finished, there will be many scenes where a character says three or four things but its clear that the scene is too long. At first every line seems important because they do different things. Once the focus of the scene is established, and the filmmaker understands what the scene is doing, it becomes clear that only two lines are needed. It is sometimes incredible how much better it makes the scene. With that single line gone, the audience knows what it is expected to walk away from the scene with.
Sometimes it’s hard to get rid of the things that we really like, but in the end it’s essential for filmmakers to find the spine of the story and get rid of everything that doesn’t move it forward. Even if a scene is good, if it doesn’t pay off in the end, raise questions that later get answered, it really needs to go.
Last night my new friend and I argued over the essential nature of story telling. I was trying to explain to her that film is very different than literature. When one reads a book, it is understood that the book will be read in many sittings, and that the reader will likely re-read passages to get back up to speed. There’s a freedom of movement inherent in the form (not so true for short stories- they kind of demand to be read in one sitting). In addition literature is a form that much more open to interpretation on the part of the consumer. A film on the other hand demands direct attention, because it is like a river flowing forward, and it is more clear cut in what it attempts to communicate. Any deviation from that course can have disastrous results.
In this scenario the filmmaker is sort of a river guide. They’ve been down the river possibly hundreds of times and it’s their job to lead the busy vacationers down the river in the clearest most efficient manner. If these “guests” are comfortable with their leader, then they get involved in the ride. However, if in the course of their travels they find that the guide wasn’t paying enough attention and took them down a tributary and they have to row their way back to the main branch, they can get a little bit frustrated. If it happens too often, then they might just give up and walk back. If the guide is ok but not great, they might just kind of stop paying too much attention.
Last night’s film was moving along in a fairly direct manner when it sidetracked into a sub story that didn’t have any dramatic force. It was a fine scene, well cut, and visually appealing. However, it was a total dead end. It didn’t really play a role in the narrative of the story that had developed. It was interesting, but it was an unnecessary digression that hurt the forward force of the story. It was a tributary that the audience had to find it’s way back from once it was over. If the filmmaker gets rid of that and trims a few other minutes – he might just have a hit on his hands.
Now if I take my own advice we might just finish our own film.
About 10 years ago, after making several narrative feature films, we decided to give documentary filmmaking a try. Now we’re pretty sick of documentary filmmaking and want to jump back into narrative. Through the making of Donor 67 we met Alana Sveta. We are currently working with her on the script called “Adam and Eva”. In the meantime we are working to finish:
Battle of Brooklyn: We are in the final phases of editing this film about Daniel Goldstein’s fight to save his home, and his community, from being seized for a developer. after 6.5 years of shooting and over a year of solid editing the end is in sight. Daniel has been forced to move out of his home on May 7th.
Broken Angel Rising: We shot for two years as artist Arthur Wood fought to save his home from destruction by the NYC department of buildings. Due to all kinds of litigation Arthur no longer wanted us to film. We had begun the process of cutting but have put the film on hold until the situation is resolved. We have an incredible amount of respect for Arthur and hope that we can one day finish this film.
Donor 67: This film is as much a mediation on the nature of family, childhood, parenthood, as it is about donor issues. Three months before our second daughter was born my father was hit by a car and killed. I started to work on something about his passing to help me work through my feelings and then we had our second child. When she was a couple of months old a friend of mine suggested that I had to “go for a boy”. I was immediately reminded of the fact that as a former sperm donor, I might have dozens. I started to explore the realities of that world. In the last few years i have done a great deal of writing and a little bit of filming. I have also applied for countless grants. I’m considering a kickstarter campaign to raise a little money to get it going.
Dr. Sarno; Battling Pain:
For years I have struggled with intermittent sciatica pain. When my younger daughter was about 2 years old the pain got out of control. It was so severe that my nerve went dead and i lost the ability to use my calf muscle. I was on the path to surgery when I finally went to visit Dr. Sarno.
I knew about Dr. Sarno because my father had read his books in the 80’s and my brother had gone to see him in the 90’s. Both had been helped by him. According to Dr. Sarno the vast majority of back pain is based on psychological factors rather than structural issues. When he began practicing medicine in the 50’s there was no such thing as chronic back pain. Slowly he saw the rise of an epidemic and felt powerless when treating patients. The conventional methods didn’t work- but he found that talking to his patients did. He quickly found that in almost every case patients were struggling with a stressful situation- a young child, a divorce, terrible work situation, etc. He found that once the patient was able to make a connection between the pain and the situation they were able to overcome the pain. Over the years he’s developed a highly structured treatment program that relies on information and peer support.
When I visited Dr. Sarno with mri in hand he scoffed at the pictures and gave me the information I needed to overcome the pain. A few weeks later, while on my road to recovery I approached him about allowing us to shoot a documentary with him. After watching our film Horns and Halos, he agreed. I shot a little bit over the next several months but there several issues that have thrown up stumbling blocks.
Dr. Sarno is incredibly protective of his patients and wouldn’t allow us access to them. Due to my unyielding respect for him I found it hard to challenge him on this idea. We tried to scare up some other patients but it was difficult. In the meantime we applied for several grants without success. We are working on cutting a trailer with some of the footage that we have.
This is the one that just kills me that we can’t get done. I feel like this film could change the health care debate. I’ve been thinking about him a lot recently because for the first time in years my back is in good shape and I have finally gotten the strength back in my leg
Ann Lewison over at the New Haven Advocate recently acknowledged Horns and Halos:
Among the books Oliver Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser read when they were researchingW. was James Hatfield’s 1999 biography Fortunate Son, which earned notoriety for making unattributed allegations that Bush had been arrested for cocaine possession in 1972 and further notoriety when its publisher, St. Martin’s Press, recalled the book when it was revealed that Hatfield had done five years for attempted murder. The story of what happened next – far more dramatic than anything in W. – is told in Horns and Halos, Suki Hawley and Michael Galinsky’s documentary on the book’s republication by Soft Skull Press, then run out of the basement of a lower east side apartment building by its founder, Sander Hicks, who also worked as the building’s super.
While Bush and McCain battle it out for the Republican nomination, the young, politically committed publisher and the author, in his early forties and struggling to break out of a career on the midlist writing trivia books, “X-Files” tie-ins and unauthorized biographies of Patrick Stewart and Ewan McGregor, embark on a media tour that includes stops at “60 Minutes” and “Democracy Now.” For the second edition, Hatfield adds a forward explaining his criminal past, which leads to more problems. For the third edition he names his sources. Sort of.
The tale of quicky campaign biography that went astray with tragic results, Horns and Halosremains compelling even in the final months of the Bush Administration because it’s really about two little guys tilting at giant media windmills, a story that never gets old.
Horns and Halos is available from Netflix, at better video stores, and from the filmmakers themselves.
Its nice to know people pay attention. Wish more had seen the film 8 years ago.
