Greg Mottola: My Inspiration

Originally, I had written my script as a One Act assignment for Ms. Lindsay. I then decided I'd turn this one act script into the screenplay for Ms. Jalilvand's class because I liked the script so much and had a fondness of it. I wanted the script in the beginning to be... Like serious, but comedic. Serious situations happening, but they're comedic in the aspect of laughing at other people's misfortune. I was going to reflect the style of Judd Apatow (known for directing Knocked Up and The 40 Year Old Virgin and acting as producer for Talladega Nights) at first but when I was writing the scene, I initially was reminded of Superbad. Probably one of the funniest movies I've ever seen. Because I really wanted my screenplay and short film to reflect the style of Director Greg Mottola, who did Superbad and is also known for Adventureland and Arrested Development, I decided to choose him as my inspiration instead. In actuality, my film is going to be inspired by the team of Judd Apatow and Greg Mottola. He was born in Dix Hills, New York. He received his BFA in art from Carnegie Mellon University and an MFA in film from Columbia University

Superbad Trailer: http://youtu.be/MNpoTxeydiY

Oscar Recap

This year's Oscars were notable. Spanning from the awards to the infamous slip ups different celebrities had. To some extent, I sympathize for John Travolta, haha, but he should have shown up to the Oscars rehearsals. Once again, Leo didn't win his well deserved Oscar. In my opinion, I think he should have won. Jared Leto was the thing that stood out to me the most. His speech was one of the only speeches that really stuck with me. Dedicating and sharing his Oscar with everyone who has ever battles with HIV or AIDS. But what I loved most was "anyone who has ever felt any kind of injustsice based on who they love." He seemed so humble, and just.... In touch with what his character meant and fought for in Dallas Buyers Club. I really look forward to anything else Jared Leto stars in. He really deserved that Oscar. 

The Life and Times Of Harvey Milk

The other day, everybody in the Booker T. production of Execution Of Justice had to sit down and watch a documentary by the name of The Life and Times Of Harvey Milk. I wanted to say that.... It really provided a lot insight to Harvey Milk and also Dan White's lives. It had a lot of information, provided background information not only pertaining to the trial, but also to the lives of the victims and perpetrators. I thought at first that maybe because it was an informational documentary that it would be boring and not very interesting. However, I was wrong. It was actually... Fun to watch. It was enjoyable and it managed to capture my attention throughout the course of the whole film.  My favorite thing about the documentary was probably how much old footage they compiled of Harvey Milk and Dan White together. It wasn't like a normal documentary when there's like... Just a bunch of footage spliced together and a narration over it, The Life and Times Of Harvey Milk all had footage to correspond with what was being talked about in the film. Harvey Milk's life shown step-by-step

Super 8 movie review (less than I thought it would be)

I had actually brought this up with Perry at some point in class when we were talking about documentaries to watch for the sake of reviewing and I remembered how I had heard great things about it a few years ago but never got around to watching it. After doing some searching online I found the full movie to watch. Let's just say that if I hadn't known it was produced by Steven Spielberg, I would have immediately guessed he was involved somehow. I liked the choices made by the team of Speilberg and Abrams. A LOT of the shots reminded me of his early films. The truck scene on the train tracks seemed like a modernized version of Close Encounters Of The Third Kind where Richard Dreyfuss sits in a very similar looking truck. A lot of the rest of the film seemed to be.... Like rehashed footage from E.T. But don't get me wrong, I LOVED the movie. Michael Bay did some nice explosions in there, although computers will never beat the old fashioned way, but I loved the kind of.... References and Easter eggs Speilberg put in the film to shout out his earlier work which I came to love in elementary school. It shows that he is still capable of doing some amazing movies. Highly reccomend Super 8. 

American Promise movie review

I had not seen this documentary before but I had heard... Just marvelous things about it. American Promise. The story of two African-Amercian boys within the top academic percentile of elementary level boys in the nation. This documentary is the story of Seun and Idris. The documentary focuses on how two boys adjust to life around a mainly... Caucasian population at The Dalton School. The Dalton School is the top elementary school in the nation and also functions as a high school. The students transfer from elementary school to high school, if their grades permit, and after they graduate they almost always feed into Ivy League colleges across the nation. The story was very clear and I really liked how much planing the docs took. The two boys started being filmed when they were both three and the film depicts their journey until their senior year of high school. I absolutely loved the ending, BUT I don't want to spoil it for anyone who happens across this blog. One of my favorite factors about this film is that it really had a great color pallet. Since we started learning about that in class, I wanted to pay attention to that factor while I was watching this. While part of me loved this documentary so much, another part of me didn't like it because I saw so much of myself in the little boy Idris. Stressing out about work and forgetting to do work and have materials. He was so scatterbrained and I loved it so much because it was relatable to me. I was lucky enough to DVR the first airing of it on KERA and hopefully it will be on netflix soon. I HIGHLY recommend this documentary to anyone interested in seeing it. It had a fascinating subject and shows that today there is still discrimination to some extent. The American Promise is an eye widening documentary and, like I said, is simply spectacular. 

Sasquatch Of The South documentary treatment

My documentary is something I've really been putting a lot of time and thought into. Ihave so many ideas and I keep changing things around because I want it to be perfect. One thing that has always remained true is the searching of Big Foot in rural Texas land. The thing I think I am most proud of was making the choice to film sections of my film using a crummy camcorder instead of my Nikon D-90. I did this so the audience would be able to differentiate between what parts are film by me, and what parts are filmed by the videographers and researchers trying to find the sasquatch. I have decided to entitle it Sasquatch of the South. I've been really experimental with filming in different types of weather. Especially since the weather has been different every day since I started filming. I incorporated this into my documentary saying that "Sasquatches are more prominent in only certain types of weather." My documentary is reflexive so a lot of my inspiration has come from This Is Spinal Tap. A little more of my inspiration has come from Snow On Tha Bluff. I felt my documentary was lacking the gritty, amateur feel I was striving for, so I incorporated elements from some documentaries to involve in my own short film.

Exit Through The Gift Shop review by Carter Brown

This documentary.. Was really, really intriguing to me. Street art has always been a fascinating subject and I'd heard before of Banksy and knew of the mystery surrounding him. Nobody knew who he was but his work was fascinating. Mr. Brainwash, as he's called now, was also a cool person we were introduced to. He always carried around a camera. Filmed everything he saw. I thought it was fairly relatable to how, at first, his first big project was a complete and total flop. The Television Life thing was a neat concept, but not for a short film or movie for something like that to be happening for more than 10 minutes. Constant flashings of normal things. People walking. A grocery store. An occasional street art piece in progress. THAT'S what I wanted to see and that's what we got more of. Banksy I feel got cheated. Banksy, I feel is the true artist here. Mr. Brainwash simply replicated everything Banksy taught him, did his homework on just marketing, and shot to the top. Yes, it was in tribute to Banksy but... Banksy did all of his art himself. Mr. Brainwash was doing it more at a pace of selling and manufacturing art, by hiring a whole team to work for him. I didn't think it was the true artists way. I think Mr. Brainwash should have stuck to documentaries and not have... Seemingly stolen an art form for the purpose of bragging rights from Banksy. The documentary... Was amazing. I was always interested. Always wondering if they'd get caught. Very fascinated by how these street artists work. I just can't help but wonder how many people were inspired to do the same thing based on this documentary? I'm REALLY glad I got to watch the whole documentary and learn to appreciate street art and the message it carries of individualism, art, passion, and rebellion.