editing Hatboxes

The Hatboxes shoot wrapped late the night of Wednesday, 26 June.  Our editor, Justine Gendron, submitted a rough assembly not quite two weeks later.  A rough assembly puts the best footage in the order the script dictates.  That version came in at a little over 21 minutes.  You could see everything, but it did drag.

Justine and I have met four times since, refining the film as we go.  As of today, Hatboxes is coming in at just over 17 minutes, right on target at about a minute per page of script. 

Editing detail, Hatboxes, scene 4.

This is no time to get sentimental about the words on the paper, or even some thrilling little fragment; if something doesn't serve the story, it has to go.  Whole scenes have made their way to the cutting room floor (now a dated metaphor, since this is all happening digitally...what used to be "slice" is now "click").  We don't want to rush the story, but we also don't want to drag it down or burden it because someone (usually me) can't let go of something.  An unnecessary turn of someone's head, a line that is, in the end, just "yadda-yadda," one blink too many:  gone.

What's astonishing is how much the actors brighten towards incandescence as we tighten the film.  Its emotional heft seems to be deepening, too.  Like everyone else, I'm anxious to see it when it's done.

Susana Darwin

after the Hatboxes shoot

Not surprisingly, there wasn't much time during the Hatboxes shoot to draft blog posts, but we did keep up with our Twitter feed (backwards chronologically):
https://twitter.com/#!/search/realtime/%23hatboxesthemovie



© 2012 Brave Lux. All rights reserved.



The shoot lasted for six days and went well.  We ran into some glitches beyond our control on the first day (the sun does move inexorably; so do the planes approaching O'Hare from the east and the Friday late-afternoon commuter trains), but beyond those, we kept to our schedule, ate very well, discovered that some cats are good at assisting with data wrangling, and came away with some very good footage.

Photos of the overnight shoot (Urban Orchard interior, day 3):
http://flickr.com/gp/esteban_monclova/4b1x5M/

Photos of the night shoot (exterior of the apartment building two doors from my house, day 5):
http://tinyurl.com/6salu8n

I learned more about HVAC controls in those six days than I had known living in 27 different places over my entire lifetime.  It's astonishing how noisy air conditioning can be.

I learned that while the shooting schedule may look modular on paper, when it comes to making scheduling changes, considerations beyond the cold linearity of time and geography require a filmmaker's attention.  It seemed to work out for the best that the two most intense scenes got shot on the last day, but that was a lucky break.  The cast and crew of Hatboxes were an exceptional group of professionals, and working with them was an honor.

I learned that hearing the ingredients in Cheetos read aloud at Hour 11 of Shoot Day Six is unaccountably funny.

We'll keep you posted on our progress.  We've already received a rough assembly of the film, and it looks quite promising.

Susana Darwin

2 Days before Day 1 of a 6-Day Shoot

The Hatboxes shoot is getting close.  This was part of the Hatboxes day today...

At 1:46 am, the first AD circulated an updated shooting schedule.

At 2 am, the director of photography circulated notes, which the producer responded to at 3:10.

At 3:35, I received a message asking what size Hatboxes T-shirt I want.

At 5:28, awakened by an 8-pound cat with 20-pound paws on a mission to snuggle, I replied that I'd like a large shirt, please.

At 6:15, I watered the garden.  Very relaxing; the time it takes is the time it takes.  Glad to see some tomato blossoms.  Contemplated despising something vital to the Hatboxes endeavor:  PayPal (user experience too often worse than voice-mail hell, if you know what I mean).

Handled a couple of pieces of Guild Literary Complex and West Andersonville Neighbors Together business.

Replied to a thread about the weirdos that come out of the woodwork when you put something out there...narcissism never dies.

Reviewed the 1:46 am shooting schedule and got dizzy considering how this whole thing went from "What if...?" almost two decades ago to "Day 1 Friday:  Shot 16 EXT. DALEY PLAZA – DAY Daley Plaza – 118 N Clark St:  6:30 am Setup..."  Quite the rainbow...

 8 am:  learned that we are now only $486 ($111 as of 7:30 pm) from our Indiegogo fundraising campaign goal! [21 June:  we cleared it, and then some!]

Gotta love the lighting equipment list:

(2) Juniors (2000 watt)

(6) Babies (1000 watt)

(6) Tweenies (750 watt)

(3) Betweenies (300 watt)

(3) Inbetweenies (150 watt)

(3) Inkies (100 watt)

(2) Mighties (2000 watt)

(2) Mickies (1000 watt)

(2) 4ft 4bank kinoflo

(2) 2ft 4bank kinoflo

(16) Baby stands

(6) Combo stands

(2) Mombo stands

Mailed a postcard to myself so we can maybe use its bar code sticker on a prop (It read, "CHANGE YOUR SOCKS!" if you must know).

Then I discovered that a pair of overlapping errors have created a scheduling conflict for one of our actors.  Circulated some options to the crew. [21 June:  1AD created a fine solution.]


Researched some last-minute wardrobe questions.

In the afternoon I picked up a couple of props...

(I'm a sucker for elegant design)
...and chatted with the folks at Farragut's about the wrap party.


Picked up enough bagels to feed all of Suriname for a day—thanks, Einstein Bros!

6 pm:  Rehearsals!  Great to have such smart, thoughtful people to work with.


At the end of the day, Etta Worthington, our intrepid producer, turned up with food and equipment and ideas and a to-do list that promises another busy day tomorrow.


Susana Darwin

The Producer

“What does a producer actually do,” someone asked me recently. I sighed.  This wasn’t going to be a quick and easy answer. A producer is . . .

Oh, yes, the person (people) who tromp up to the stage at Academy Award time and collect the Oscar for best picture, thanking everyone along the way.

Ah, but that doesn’t answer the question. People end up with producing credits for a variety of reason:

• they may have contributed or invested a significant amount of money

• they may have made some important connections to assure the film’s success—maybe have gotten a well-known actor or two to commit to the project, or some important investors, or a studio, or . . .

• they may  have helped develop or shape the idea with the writer and the director

• they may have been rewarded for something they contributed of significance along the life of the film

• they may have worked tirelessly to gather cast and crew, and other resources needed

• they may have organized the shoot, created the budget and schedule, and made sure those documents made sense and were adhered to

• they may have stood around during a shoot in the background, solving problems as they arose

Well, the list could definitely be added to.

The titles that come with producing could be executive producer, producer, associate producer, co-producer, line producer—each of those may or may not connect easily with one of the bullets above.

So, although I didn’t totally answer my friend’s recently asked question, I made a start.

For HATBOXES, perhaps I can tell you what I am doing.  I’m a project manager, essentially. I believe my job is to assure that the film is completed on time, on budget, and at a high level of quality. 

I’ve managed a lot of projects.  In fact, that’s how Susana Darwin and I first met.  I was a project director at an educational publishing company, managing a multi-million dollar textbook project. I hired Susana as a photo researcher—her first position in publishing.

Back to the film.  My job is to make sure that things happen and this baby gets made.  If it was a really big project, there’d be lots of people reporting to me, doing the legwork. But this is a small project, so a lot I’m doing myself.  This is shared as well. Susana is producing as well, but I see my role as making sure those parts of the project don’t overwhelm her, so she can focus on being the director.

Certainly, when we go into production, I  hope that she sheds her producer shawl completely so she can only think of her directing tasks.

So, what is a producer?  It’s somebody who makes things happen.

But I’m interested in finding out something: have you ever wondered what a producer does and if so, has this in any way answered the question?


by Etta Worthington

On Casting

I circle back to the film Antonia’s Line every couple of years not only for one of the best understatements by a lesbian in all of film (“Mooi motor” is Dutch for “Nice bike;” the look Els Dottermans gives that motorcycle is pure chrome lust), but because the film tells a compelling story and its actors are interesting to look at.  Few are classic beauties, but their faces and bodies are powerfully expressive, enlivening completely the characters they play.

I’ve tried not to fix particular faces in mind for the characters in Hatboxes as I’ve drafted the script and rendered the storyboards, though I did have to tell myself to quit staring in early April when a dead-ringer for “Miriam” turned up in line at the grocery store check-out two carts behind me.  Energy, presence, depth of attention, flexibility are among the qualities I’ll be watching for when we hold our casting calls.

Chemistry is the element that stirs the most anxiety when considering casting.  An individual actor’s charisma is one thing; what happens when two actors play together, with and against and off each other, is part of film’s magic.  The conundrum of chemistry is that acting at one level is fake.  

However, chemistry is something that can’t be faked, and its faking has been the downfall of too many lesbian films.  Maybe it’s one or both actors ducking out mentally at the moment when authenticity matters most; maybe it’s the director failing to clear obstacles to authenticity.  Maybe it’s rushing and losing focus and not capturing the best take, not having the courage or discipline to wait to be moved and insisting on that.

Susana Darwin

April 2012

Hatboxes script...storyboards...overheads...shot sheet

First came the script:  the idea of chemistry developing between a secular lesbian and a recently separated Orthodox woman arrived a long time ago, but telling a compelling story in an independent short was there from the beginning.  After many years, various titles, and numerous shifts in focus, the script made huge gains with the attention from my writing group, 41N 87W.  "Your story starts at page 15," they told me in 2009, and they were right.  In early 2011, I said to myself—probably aloud—"All you've ever wanted to do is make a movie, so go make a movie!"  A Chicago Filmmakers screenwriting class in got the screenplay within striking distance of creation.  Producer Etta Worthington applied her expertise late in the year, and now, Hatboxes is locked down and ready to shoot.


Which means that whatever is on the page today may need to change once we get on set in June.  Whatever's best for the story.

Next came the storyboards, which for Hatboxes look like a graphic novel by someone who is competent with a pencil, but who hasn't dedicated a lot of time to drawing.  Round 1 was good for the trees (six images to the page), but if you don't have a single image per page, it's hard to move them around.  Hard?  Impossible.  Plus, the scale of the boxes I was drawing in was too small for my skills—I needed more room (I felt like a kindergartner with a fat pencil).  And then there was the fact that pencil didn't scan well at all...so round 2.5 featured me and a Sharpie getting reacquainted with each drawing.

There are 123 of them.  That may be overkill.
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After the storyboards came the overheads.  Imagine those schematic drawings of office cube farms showing the chairs, the desks, the filing cabinets, and maybe circles within flattened ovals representing a human figure from above.  Overheads are great for discovering logic bombs in the storyboards:  in shot 15, character X is on the left, but in 16, she's on the right.  Was her move intended?  Why did she move?  It has to be better to work out these kinks on paper [sic] than on set.  Planning is a gift to your future self.


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And then came the shot sheet, a list of all the shots that squares with the script and storyboards.
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I can't wait to review these with our director of photography.

Stay tuned...

Susana Darwin

April 2012