Labor day was a few weeks ago, and I got to celebrate the federal holiday the best way I knew how. A cast and crew of my brother, his girlfriend and my dog Mishka boldly ventured to a liquor store sitting on a lot of barren wasteland and tumbleweeds at the intersections of Highways 33 and 152. A claustrophobic fly sauna- taco truck is in the way of the shot I want, but that’s ok, my enthusiasm say’s we can make it work. The family of four or so who own it sat in their small cab Chevy that was dressed in bible scripture bumper stickers and virgin Mary ornaments from rear view mirror watched as I decorated the wall in a bulletin board fashion, with missing dog flyers, a babysitter available ad featuring a picture of Casey Anthony, and some ads from the back of an old porno mag. We’re passed mid day and Sun’s scorching kiss is only a reminder, we are losing light. So we lay claim to a section of the stores wall, and stake our flag under the shaded structure that stands on the haunting desert- like lot to house my vintage Pacific Bell phone booth and shoot the big intro scene to my long anticipated project Killing Charlene.
This was only the 2nd time I’d set out with camera and crew to really take a shot at this, and day one now has concluded in more of a screen test, but we really dove in head first with the scene we shot. I, being the most influential decision maker on this project, really considered this a bold choice to shoot the big intro. It has special FX, props, and most importantly, it’s responsible for trying to keep the audience’s attention for longer than a thumb scrolls length of thought.
If you made it this far, thank you,
The rest of the days accolades included
being confronted by the store owner, who happily obliged us to finish our “Halloween video”, and befriending and inspiring a young man who was smoking blunts while working under a tent signing people up for the free “Obama phones”. He inquired if I would do a music video for a modest $100 which I said I would consider, only later to find out, he did not possess any music to make a video with. but since the encounter I saw he has now started a profile on Pornhub so our meeting may have sparked a new drive for cinematic aspirations for him
I really couldn’t be happier with the results. Of course through the course of the day I felt the stresses and self applied pressures contributed to late starts and the hardship of finding a bike that was needed to end the intros sequence. By the time the ball got rolling we made some amazing efforts and captured everything I essentially had visioned for the last couple years of planning this movie. I got to use the stunt double Mishka dogs that have been in my garage waiting to meet their demise and the special FX worked better than I thought. We really captured some glorious gore if I do say so myself. The day had left me exhausted by the time 5:30 had come around, and I was pretty much beat to the point where I wasn’t sure if my efforts had been as successful as I had always imagined but after editing I really had no reason to torture myself as I suppose one who wants the best for their projects would do