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Note- Forgive the stream of consciousness nature of this post as I wrote it over 2 days without doing any editing at all.

It’s a lazy saturday morning in SoCal and I’m nursing a massive hangover caused by getting shitfaced all over Venice Beach last night. My only caveat to Christian before indulging was that during the night not a drop of American beer would sully our lips and he wholeheartedly agreed. In alphabetical order we drank Bira Moretti, Newcastle Brown Ale, Red Stripe and finally Corona. I guess the pounding in my head proves that like spirits it’s not a good idea to mix beers. Oh well, que sera sera.

So as I lie in bed listening to some ethereal music by my newly discovered musical muse (Explosions in the Sky and El Ten Eleven) I ponder over the events of the past 2 weeks and the events that led to this moment.

Flashback

I had been looking forward to going to IFFLA for a while but fate it seems isn’t without it’s sense of irony. I’ve not been able to do much shooting since I got here coz of a myriad of reasons which basically sucks big time for me. I was gonna be working on a film starting exactly after IFFLA wrapped so I was looking fwd to that but lo and behold a friend of mine called me up and asked me to help on a film she was gonna DP. The catch was that it would conflict with IFFLA. What should I choose ? Watching films or making films ? My decision was made quicker than lightspeed.

Now one might say my action showed a certain lack of disloyalty to something I had pledged but the prospect of working on a HD feature being shot on a camera I was desperate to explore made it a no brainer. However if I be totally honest the blame can be laid sorely at the steps of Michael Mann.

Flashback within Flashback

1995. Delhi Public School Mathura Road. A couple of never do well tykes who share a fascination of Hollywood cinema watch the trailer of a film on Star Movies and are delirious with lust to watch it. These were the days when VHS libraries were in their death knell but hanging on by the skin of their teeth. So both of us got our paws on the film which incidentally was “Heat”. I swear to God that while shooting it the camera must have been loaded with testosterone instead of celluloid. It just oozes with machismo and pure drama. Ask a gathering of rough and tumble guys to name their fav films and chances are one out of five will name “Heat”. Girls generally don’t get it but that’s cool. I never got “Love Story” either.

So anyways needless to say the film totally rocked our worlds. I used to recite de Niro’s lines while my buddy would channel Pacino during class much to the amusement of everyone who could never understand the reference. One dialog in particular is burned into my soul. You think a film can’t change the world ? It certainly changed mine. Though I much prefer the version from the script rather than the improvised line from the film.

As point of trivia the other tyke grew up to work as an AD on RDB, Manorama, and Zinda amongst others. Hope he makes his directorial debut soon so that we can thumb our noses to all those teachers who threw us out of class. Revenge is a dish best served cold.

Cut to Present

Some urgent matters press my attention so I will finish this post some other time.

Dissolve

It’s a lazy Sunday morning now and once again I’m hungover. This time trying to finish off the bottle of slivowitz which looks at me mockingly every time I open the refrigerator and makes snide comments about my inability to kill it.  So I plonked down with the bottle at my side while watching “A Glass of Rage” and “Casshern”. Finished the first but dozed off 20 mins into the second.

Flashback

Film A was a NYFA thesis film to be shot on the lovely HPX-500. The resultant images with just a decent CAC zoom lens is superb with beautiful color rendition and bokeh. The DP rated the camera at 1000 ASA and I was like “Holy Shit” when she told me. The gear given to these guys by NYFA was pretty sweet with a Fisher 11,Porta-Jib, Kinos, HMI’s and the usual tungsten and grip gear. All in all I was very impressed as it was a def improvement over the gear we got but then this was the MFA program and mine was just the one year deal.

More interesting than the gear for you might be the film itself coz the director planned to shoot a feature within 10 shooting days. At an 80 page script that was 8 pages a day. 3 pages is standard, 4 is excellent and 5 is mindblowing for a feature but 8 ? I guess it would only be possible if one shot Dogma or just shot lengthy masters without any coverage. The fact that there was going to be extensive use of the dolly instead of handheld made it seem like a tough task indeed.

So once I again I found myself in the midst of my beloved G&E gear and people. Met the entire crew. Very cool dudes. The DP and I were the only Indians on the crew in case anyone is interested. What was really cool was that the director as well as the camera crew were female. I love working for female directors and by sheer fluke the last 4 projects I have worked on, 1 in Bombay and 3 in LA, have all had female directors. They make shooting stress free to a very large extent coz they are not prone to bouts to testosterone overdose and resort to yelling.

First day we shot in an art gallery in Hollywood and despite not having worked with anyone on the crew before we soon fell into a comfortable rhythm once the crew got the look and feel of the film which was high contrast with a lot of silhouettes and slow movements. That by the way is my default style of choice, as it is for the legions of acolytes of Vittorio Storaro.  He embodies the meaning of the word artist. I had the honor of meeting him when he gave a lecture at Columbia about Caravaggio and it was a life changing experience.

When I say life changing I don’t refer to my admiration of his genius which is given but rather the way he conducts himself. Here’s a man who is a 3 time Oscar winner , widely acknowledged as one of the greatest cinematographers of all time and yet he is humble and modest to a fault. No starry airs, no prima donna attitude and not a trace of megalomania. So now whenever I meet someone who has a too high opinion of himself as an filmmaker and tries to basically act like master and commander, I’m like “Dude go fuck yourself in the ear while stuffing a porcupine up your ass coz ur not Storaro and when he can act like a human being, you have no business playing the mercurial genius.” I want no part of such people anymore coz life is too short and there are too many things to do. Aah the advantages of a vagabond existence. Not possible in a desk bob innit ?

Subsequent days also went very well and I was having the time of my life coz of the great crew and also because the director was extremely visual and she had picked the most awesome locations to shoot in. Made lighting them such a pleasure. I think I forgot to mention that they also had a waveform monitor and this was the first time I had worked on a HD shoot which used one and it was an eye opener.

Basically while shooting HD you cannot light by eye or judge through the viewfinder. You have to light with a properly calibrated HD monitor equipped with a waveform and vectorscope. HD is also very grip intensive coz it has much less latitude compared to film that a huge amount of time is needed to flag off unwanted light especially when shooting day exteriors and Int/Ext scenes. The blown out over-exposed look might work in some cases but not in all.

The California sun is quite harsh and toppy and reminded me a lot of those endless Delhi summers where the tarmac used to melt underfoot. NY by comparison has a much softer and wrap around quality to the light. I’m guessing that’s why girls in NY look so much more beautiful than girls here. ;-)

Have to mention the craft service here. It was excellent. I cannot stress enough the importance of having good food and adequate supply of cold beverages especially on hot days where the risk of getting dehydrated is high. I still remember this one shoot where the director was a dick, production was non-existence, we ran out of water while miles from anywhere and we were fed hot dogs for lunch. My BP still gets high every time I think about it. If people are working for you for free then the least you owe them is good food and drink. You really don’t wanna get blacklisted by the crew or not have them on your side.

No such problems here and we were coasting along. I feel I must also mention the difference between shooting in LA and NY. It is pretty much impossible to shoot guerrilla in LA without a permit coz they cops will shut you down in an instance. A two man crew shooting B-roll might be ok or maybe out in the boondocks you might get away with it but no stealing shots the way we used to back in NY. We shot in the subway, in churches, near the WTC , on the Brooklyn Bridge etc etc all without permits but I don’t see that happening here. Spoke to a few ppl about it as well and they said it’s not worth to even try especially if actors are involved and I concur. In LA one has to do it via proper channels or suffer the consequences.

So anyways I couldn’t stay for the entire shoot coz I was double booked for the next job which I had committed to months in advance. One might say what’s the diff between one unpaid job and the next but I have a strict code of work related ethical behavior. One is only as good as their word when it comes to the movie business and you really don’t wanna get the reputation of being a flaker. Just a word of advice.

Present

So ends the story of Film A.

Adventures in Film B shall be posted soon.

Arrivederci !!!!