An excerpt from End of the Year Letter to Friends

So that's that.
But this doesn't mean I am giving up in what all those
before me, before us, those who were foolish like me
and some of you, of us, believed in and worked hard
to preserve in order that the City
wouldn't be destroyed by gods -- that is, as long
as there is at least one who believes in the not
believable, in short, in
Poetry.

-- Jan 3. 2003

Jonas Mekas

being wrong

I can be such a dick sometimes. I strive to be right, to know it all and to be smart as can be. But this TED talk really spoke to me:
Kathryn Schulz: On being wrong | Video on TED.com

Morning Glory and Mixed Messages

Dear Morning Glory,
I really enjoyed watching you. For a a few reasons that I'd like to take this time to share.
First of all, you were really pretty. Alwin Kuchler, nice work. Almost every scene had at least one beautiful shot in it. From the very get go, it was interesting to watch visually. The perspective of filming through the fence when Becky's leaving her station, to the scene of her tossing and turning in bed where it racks from the weird strands to her awake at 1:30 with nothing to do, to the argument with her and Mike shot from a second story window, to the perfectly framed reflections of Mike and Colleen in the coffee table- all very beautifully composed and really brings a fantastic polish to the film.
Second of all, your trailer did not give away most of your good parts. Yes, it sensationalized the movie and made me think it was going to take a very different direction BUT I'm so glad it didn't. Kudos on being enticingly and satisfyingly misleading.
Third of all, I'm a young single recent grad who just moved to New York to take a stab at her dream of producing television - probably very similar to your protagonist 7 years ago. Anyway, I loved that there was a character who was under thirty and not only producing television but getting job offers from NBC (aka network of my dreams). I love, too, that she didn't give up or shy away from the fact that her job was her life. Sure, a big emotional moment for her was realizing her boyfriend was important to her and she was stupid to have given him up. But she never apologized to anyone for doing what she loved. I hope I never have to either.
And if I ever get an interview with the big peacock, I, too, will wear bright pink heals for the occasion-just like Rachel McAdams. "More colorful", right?
-caro

Forget Forks, Who Kneeds Knives? Spoon is always the shit.

SPOON! New album streaming on NPR!
click here to make your life musically better

About half way through The Mystery Zone! It's a bit more mellow than their other albums so far.

GAGH! I lOVE SpOON.

fourninteyfive

A stale sadness accompanied me as I walked into my Senior Seminar in Film Producation: Narrative class. It was time to leave the refreshing and freeing world of experimental film and go back to the oh so structured world of narrative filmmaking. Don't get me wrong, I love love love love love narrative films, the pre-production and production process and I'm so pumped for this class. It's going to rock. But I thought to myself as we were going over the syllabus, "It's just not the same." Which just means I have to watch more Mekas on my own.
I'm so glad everyone is required to pitch a script. I'm going to finish writing my musical, The Singing Janitor, this weekend and submit it. I checked out a few old 40s musicals from the library to use as inspiration. Michael Curtiz directed Yankee Doodle Dandy! Love him. His use of shadow to fill the frame is beautiful! And his camerawork (and obvious addiction to the dolly) is fabulous! In Yankee Doodle there's so much of the performing onstage that a lot of the major scenes had the feel of early cinema. Like it was just the filming of a stage show, which makes me wonder if it was a choice to pay hommage to the protagonist's life in theater or a necessity to make time in production for all the song and dance numbers.
I was thinking about how to introduce the song sequences in my short and I think I want to do it visually. I want the "normal" world to be in muted colors, like you're looking at an old color photo from a newspaper in the 40s or 50s. And then the "musical" world to have lovely vibrant colors. The only thing is I can't quite use that to justify other characters singing.
Fuck.
And then there's the whole making music for a musical thing.
note to self: add jocelyn and figure out how to follow blogs.

what i learned: a sonnet.

in the course of taking a course
there are two ways to learn
the first is to memorize the source
and spit out answers when it's your turn.
the second way, and much preferred
is to welcome into your world, objectively,
the new views, new ideas you've seen and heard
in time adding new sights, new sounds, respectively
so that when arrives the moment to reflect
what a student has learned from a very special subject
it can be hard to capture, summarize and collect
all that's been changed, discovered and its affect.
But if i had to it'd be how to listen before sight,
see beyond hearing, and to create within light.

“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.” -Thomas Jefferson

I often have trouble finding a good place to start. The beginning of my involvement with Cucalorus can be traced back to my freshman year when I volunteered as a projectionist. Or maybe even further back to my old manager at the Galaxy Cinema-also an alumnus of UNCW’s film studies program-who said to look up Dan Brawley when I got to Wilmington. Or maybe even further back to my decision to work for less pay and fewer hours at the Galaxy Cinema instead of the local Carmike googleplex. Or maybe it can be traced back to fifteen years ago when a bunch of filmmakers showed their films in a bar one night. Or maybe, just like working on Cucalorus, there is no beginning and there is no end.
Working for Cucalorus is an amazing and transformative experience. You really have no idea what you’re doing for the festival if you’ve never attended before (and even if you have it’s a stretch at times). I could very easily fill this paper with all the tasks I’ve had to do at Cucalorus, all the new skills I’ve gathered and polished over the years, but it would only be a very small part of what I’ve learned from that bunion of a film festival. I could tell you all the stories I’ve grown and plucked over the years but that bouquet would be nothing compared to the friendship, inspiration, art and community that blooms at Cucalorus.
I’ve learned all those corny sayings the hard way—that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar; that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure; that a bird in the had is worth two in the bush; beer before liquor, never been sicker. But there are three things that stand out more than any saying, that are ingrained in my heart from working at the festival and that will stay with me far longer than the smell of a perpetually cold week in November.