Night of the Alien trailer - characters

character interlude

meet Lucky

Pickin’ up some inserts

Actual production over? Nope.

After this little cast and crew screening in the depths of the show cave, where members of the posse, who hadn’t seen the movie like a thousand times, finally got their little peek. Super human man of a thousand jobs Kelly Jones, pointed something out. We needed inserts of characters, who after appearing early in the film, come back much later. There’s dialog in the movie summoning said characters to their destinations, but with out a visual, said characters were getting lost in the audience’s mind.

Real Deal goes into producer mode and a time is set to shoot inserts of LUCKY and EDDIE.

The day starts at the Real Deal’s ‘secret’ hideout parking lot, where a little set of Lucky’s lair has been built with some flats. Kelly Jones, Raz, and the actors arrive, joining Lord and Lady Deal, ready to DO THIS.

RD begins dressing the set, Kelly starts lighting for the movie camera, Raz sets up the behind the scenes camera, the actors put on their make up, Lady Deal is helping all.

After a tweaking issue with the monitor, we begin shooting Lucky. Since no sound or coverage is needed, everything goes quick and smooth for a change. Main issue being making sure the action syncs with the dialog we’ll be L-cutting over, being at picture lock means messing with that now would cause all kinds of work flow issues later. 

As the set for Eddie is being set up we decide to take advantage of having an actor in character and having a set. So proceed with interviews of Lucky the character and Lucky the actor.

Next is Eddie’s insert. RD’s created a little intentionally low budget looking video shoot for Eddie to rock out to, we got this custom guitar from Hot Picks USA, Kelly is positioned way up high in his shooting perch. Away we go. Once again, no audio or coverage, so all goes well.

Kelly has recently become the kingpin of Wrightwood, so just having him around makes Raz suggest we interview him for the EPK. In typical KJ fashion, sound bite after sound bite flows out of his lips. The Deal does an interview as well and we wrap.

Easiest day ever.... MONTHS after we ‘thought’ shooting was wrapped.

PS.... these inserts have been dropped into the time line and work great.

Neil Lisk

Neil, an exceptional person. Truly. Kind, hard working, funny, dedicated, loving husband and father. A gentle soul. His talent as an artist, unparalleled. Rare it is to know someone who actually makes those around him better people. Not by any conscious effort, but by simply being humble, real, and true. One could not help but be the best they could in his presence. First to arrive, last to leave, no aspect of anything ever being ‘beneath’ him. He believed in others. A major facilitator in manifesting dreams. Light, angles, blocking, set ups, movement, depth effortlessly kept in his head. Multiple jobs unbelievably executed simultaneously. Never letting pettiness or ‘politics’ get in the way of larger goals. Kind and patient with anyone struggling, kept his opinions only for ears who needed to hear. Everything he worked on was better because of his monumental talent, everything. Thought the world of his wife and daughter. Genuinely cared about creating meaningful art. Always gave 100%, always. Intense and focused, yet finder of just the right moment to be light and joking. A true friend. He would never let you down. Fragile at times, with moments of frustration, worry, and doubt. Always believing one could do anything one set ones mind to. An influence and shining example in his craft, art, caring family life, and attitude toward life. Not a day will go by where someone does not think about Neil and smile, for every life he touched, for the rest of their life. 

I was fortunate and blessed to direct his first feature and his last. Neil Lisk, a wonderful presence to forever ponder upon, irreplaceable on every conceivable level of what it is to be human. I love you :)

character interlude

Ronald of Jarvis talks a bit about his life

story telling & editing

This ENTIRE movie was pretty much hella tweaked, rebuilt, and rewritten during the editing process. Some of the story concepts that seemed pretty cool on paper just didn’t end up translating all that well on screen... so measures had to be taken.

Scenes were shuffled, moved, and split LIKE CRAZY... since a good part of the story is told in non-linear flashbacks, there was a lot to play around with and no real ‘wrong’ way of presenting things. The real time part of the tale remained linear, but any part of the story that didn’t have to be exactly set in time became fair game for being shuffled around. The non-linear or FLASHBACK sequences we’re placed every which way possible until just the right combination was found to give the story proper flow, comprehension, and sense of magic. Yeah, the first half of the movie was pretty much Frankensteined, inclusive of actually pulling lines from one scene and sticking them into another.

The second half of the flick presented a whole nother slew of issues. The movie becomes linear at this point(though flash backs in the original script went well into the second half of the flick), many of the scenes ‘felt’ long, slowing the movie down big time. So lots ‘o lines got cut, and lots of scenes got cross cut with other scenes. Any dialog that didn’t serve the story got axed, yeah this included lots ‘o funniness, but if it didn’t have to be there... GONE. In order to make the story pop and flow scenes featuring different characters taking place at the same time in different locations were cross cut. Longer scenes became many shorter scenes intercut between each other. Once again lines were pulled from one part of a scene and moved into another.

The goal is ALWAYS to make the best, most entertaining movie possible. So going to what ever lengths, and taking what ever time necessary to get there was a given. Being independent and answering to like, NO ONE, means we have that time... and though it’s taken a lot of blood, sweat, and tears... ultimately FOUND A WAY of making this movie work in an entertaining, magical way.

CHARACTER INTERLUDE

Danny talks about his bike gang