Observation.

"The Shakespeare Procedure" is a lot like Scorsese's "Shutter Island" except that "Shakespeare" is much funnier and only 12 minutes long.

A Link Of Interest and Thoughts

HOW CAN YOU GET LIFE INTO YOUR DRAWINGS?

The above link is from John K's blog (cartoonist and creator of Ren & Stimpy) about storytelling in comics and cartoons. I think this can be directly applied to creating characters and stories in live action films as well. All you have to do is replace a lot of phrases and jargon - like "on-model" into "formulaic script", or "poses" into "dialog and action".

The basic thing to take from this is to not to write stories simply from an abstract concept, setting, or style. If that's all you give yourself to work with, then that's all you have in your film. When you just focus on that the entire time, all you end up with is a neat chase sequence, or a film with a lot of guns firing in slow motion, or a great-looking 3D landscape, or what have you. Nobody will remember your film beyond that. Some kind of context is what makes an audience really connect to and remember a film. Characters are memorable because of their motivations - wants and needs - and not necessarily their appearances or quirks.

I honestly couldn't tell you what the hell this was about.

SHAKESPEARE PROCEDURE began as a concept film. "A film about brain transplants". Not much else It was like that through a lot of the pre-production. It was like that through production. Granted, there were vague ideas of what the characters wanted, but it wasn't really made clear, even in the editing. It wasn't apparent to me until I screened it with Mark and Ula.

A lot of the jokes fell flat in the screenings with the professors (I think the above blog link could apply to joke-telling as well) They were mostly trying to figure out why the characters were doing what they were doing. I forgot the cardinal rule of storytelling, is that your characters have to want and/or need something in order for an audience to know what the hell you're trying to show them. And on top of that, it needs to be CLEAR. Then, through their experience, you can understand what the filmmaker/storyteller is trying to say.

This guy has a distinct way of telling jokes through stories. He contextualizes them so we can connect and invest our emotions. And then we laugh. Hard.

I'm lucky to have a potential solution (voice-over narration) that may at least be a step in the right direction to make my characters' motivations much clearer, thus making them stand out and relatable. And perhaps it may even make the jokes just a teensy bit funnier.

We'll see at the rough cut screening tonight at Film Club!

So much for the twelve days of Shakespeare.

Yeah I've decided to abandon the Twelve Days of Christmas theme. Life has been kicking my butt too often lately to keep up with this thing.

Because of that, I've decided that Christmas should come early this year - here is the official teaser trailer for the film! Enjoy!

Teaser: The Shakespeare Procedure from Andrew on Vimeo.

More responses, and what the film is really about.

So I have more responses from people who read the script. Here are some of them, paraphrased:

"The film builds up to the montage scene, which if pulled off successfully, will be quite memorable."
"What? It was all a dream? I don't think I get it."
"I normally don't like the 'It was just a dream' ending, but I think it works pretty well in this story."

There are some minor things that I think I will change for the next draft. For example, the Junior character seems a bit out of place with a lot of his mannerisms and lines. But I think what raises a lot of people's eyebrows is the ending. This leads me to discuss what I believe this film is really about:

-brain transplants
-the mind, and the games it plays on us
-youth and fun

I don't intend to make a point or criticize anything. I just want to explore, and have fun along the way.

The ending reinforces that idea, forcing the audience to question what they saw, by having a cute girl say "it was just a dream" and wish the audience a good night. Though breaking the 4th wall raises another question: will this really work without pissing my audience off?

It's a fine line I'm walking here.

Next post will include character breakdowns.

Storytelling and Response.

I've been reading a lot of John Kricfalusi's blog (http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/) and he's been updating about the difficulty of pitching when his ideas of storytelling are different from the executives. Essentially how they use technical jargon and formulas to avoid genuinely good ideas.

In THE SHAKESPEARE PROCEDURE, the intention behind how it was written is to use cartoon structures in a live action short. I'm using the brain transplants as a vehicle for gags. Plain and simple. No complicated formulas, no real "arcs" just fun (or my definition of it).

So I've been shopping the script around, trying to get people behind the project. I really need a strong Producer to help organize things a bit, and get more people behind it. Someone who isn't going to flake on me. Someone who is going to really get behind the project as much as I am.

And I do feel really strongly about the project.

Some of the responses so far to those who have read the script, which have gotten me really optimistic:
"WHAT THE EFF?"
"I thought it was funny and cute. Should get some laughs"
"I get the comedy, but I think it also lends itself to creepy, eerie atmosphere."

I'm talking with someone about creating storyboards to use for pitching. Stay tuned.