Firmly Upon the Upward Path

Here we are, the penultimate weekend.  As of last night I had only ten thousand words remaining in my edit of Her Demonic Majesty, and given that I have a whole lot of nothing ahead of me today, that means that by the time I return her tomorrow, I’ll have but one chapter remaining, or I’ll awaken feeling bright and shiny, and there will be nothing left but to compile the story into a Word document and created the Table of Contents.

Either way, I finish the edit and format within the next thirty-six hours.

That means next week is filled with fun and frivolity.  I know I’m going to be interviewed, but it’s going to be an interview the likes of which many of you have never seen.  I’m thinking up a book giveaway, But I want it to be something different–which means I’m not sure how I’ll do it, but I’m investigating means.  I had considered asking people to guess what color I look best wearing, but one person would walk away with everything then . . .

The interesting thing I find is that I’m overly excited.  Worried, yeah; I’m always worried that something will show up wrong in the story, that it’s not going to sell, that it’ll be rejected after all my hard work.  But that happens, you know.  My friend Jo Custer said yesterday that she was told that the movie she’s trying to Kickstart into existence is “filthy”.  Many jokes were made of this comment, not the least was that someone should tell Lars Von Trier there’s a new bitch in town.  Though if you want to get into Lars Von Trier territory, you need a leading lady to come up and spit on you every morning and tell you what a horrible person you are, because she knows she’ll be spending the afternoon her standing naked in a mountain stream masturbating while being yelled at to “Look natural!”

We creative times, we do our own thing.  We love praise, but be usually get criticized to hell and gone.  As I’ve said many times, the non-creative out there don’t get us.  Yes, they want to be entertained by us, but they don’t get what we do, and why.  If you’re like some of the people I know, their notion usually boils down to, “You wanna make money.”  Well, yes, dude:  I would like to make money.  I’d like to make enough money to do this full time.  There isn’t a one of us who wouldn’t love to spend their days crafting stories or making movies or producing pretty pictures.  And I’m not talking talking making mad J. K. Rollinbucks cash here, either.  If I was making fifty thousand a year writing, I’d be home all the time writing.

Why do we suffer the pangs of criticism,  though?  I think part of it comes from the un-creative being unable to build their own works, but damned if they don’t know what a good work should look like.  There are things out there that are broken, that is true, and creative works that are totally Teh Suk.  But the hate does seem to come at everyone and everything, and it’s almost impossible to avoid.

The trick comes from deciding if the criticism is of the good kind . . . and if you can learn from it.

As for the other kind . . .

Write your own stories, then get back to me.

The Kindred Dreamers

If you know movies, you know Roger Corman.  You can’t help but know it, because in many circles of fandom Roger is known as the King of Crap, a guy who has produced or directed at least four hundred movies that can be described in two word:  ”Low Budget”.  These days Roger’s work usually ends up on the Syfy Channel (or as I like to say it, “Siffy”), as the Saturday Night Monster Movie, where we have been entertained with the likes of Piranhaconda, Dinocroc vs. Supergator, and that most marvelous of wonders, Sharktopus.

Corman makes movies.  Good or bad, you can argue that all you like.  He has said that he’s never lost money on a film, because he goes cheap and fast.  It is said that he completed filming of Little Shop of Horrors in two days.  A running joke was that he could negotiate a movie over a pay phone, then shoot the movie in the phone booth with the money found in the change slot.

There’s something else he’d done:  he’s pretty much made modern cinema.

No way, you’re saying.  Way, I tell you.  This guy may be a schlock merchant, and he’s done a lot of things on the cheap; yep, no argument there.  He’s also discovered, or gave early roles to, Jack Nicholson, Charles Bronson, Robert De Niro, Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire, Diana Ladd, and Sandra Bullock.  He worked early on with screen writer Robert Towne.  And he’s mentored and/or given starts to a few directors you may know:  Jonathan Demme, Francis Ford Coppola, Ron Howard, John Sayles, James Cameron, Joe Dante, and Martin Scorsese.

Roger has always been ready to help people get started, to show them what they need to know to keep making moving and being creative. We have ways of doing that today, though most do not involve making miniature flying piranhas.

I have more than a few friends who are in the creativity business.  The majority of them are writers, like me, but I know a few poets, a couple of artists who love to draw, and one film maker.  I’m all over the place, I am, being plugged into this network of magic makers who, for the most part, struggle to get their creations made so that others may enjoy.

My filmmaker friend is Jo Custer.  Her bill paying job involves driving a cab done New Orleans way, and she’s written about the experience a few times.  She made one short film, Hotcakes, and she’s in the pre-production phase of her second film, Sonuvabitch.  There’s a nice website up for the film, to give you all the information you may need, but there’s something else as well–  See, Jo wants to do things a bit different this time around.  She wants to shoot on locations; she wants better equipment, and she needs more actors, because she has one scene that involves about twenty people in frame.

Jo has put up a Kickstarter to help her meet her budget, because she isn’t exactly getting funding from Universal.  I get involved in Kickstarts now and then, only because I’ll see something come along that gets me interested, and I slide a few bucks their way.  I don’t do it very often, but when I can help out the creative community, I do what I can.

I know what you’re saying:  ”Cassie, are you hyping this woman’s project?”  Yeah, I am.  I usually don’t do things like this–hell, I hardly promote my two stories–but I like Jo.  She has something I didn’t have at her age, and that’s tenacity.  She puts in a lot of long hours in an attempt to reach her dreams, and if I had been more tenacious with my creativity when I was her age, I might be sippin’ on cognac right now, thinking about what i’m going to write next–though if I’m sippin’ on cognac at nine AM, I’m probably working on getting drunk by ten.

We should help the dreamers however we can.  I gave money to a young girl who had been accepted into Space Camp, but who didn’t have the finances to travel there, nor to cover her expenses while there.  I gave her money because when I was a kid I dreamed of going into space, and if I could go to Space Camp today, I’d leave in a second.  If there is one thing I could do before I shuck this mortal coil, it would be to go into space.

I know about dreams:  I have them all the time.  Some of them I’m starting to turn into life, and one day, maybe, they will be my life.

Jo’s got a dream.  If you can, help her out.  If nothing else, pass the info along to some friends who might be interested in playing Roger Corman in their own way, ’cause when you make a dream come true, it not only brings you good karma, but it makes the world a better place.

That said, I need to start working on a story treatment I have for a film called Acrocalypse–

I heard Roger might need something for Siffy, and I believe I got a winner here.

Princess in the Glen

Today is going to be another one of those really busy Saturdays.  How busy?  Here it is, 5:45 AM, and I’ve just finished up editing an article I was asked to write for a new online magazine that’s starting up in the UK, and I had to cut out 500 words because I’m, well, wordy.  So five minutes ago I finished my edit, cut it down to 996 words, and shipped it off to the editor who’s submitting it for me.

Did I mention I wrote the article while my eyes were closing on me last night, and didn’t finished up until about 11 PM?  Damn, this is all crazy stuff, let me tell you.

The main reason it’s going to be so busy is that we are off to the movies once more.  Later in the morning, after my daughter has kicked butt at her martial arts class, we are going to see Brave, the new Pixar film.  My daughter, just turned thirteen, has been talking about it for weeks now, and I’ve been following the movie since the first teaser art came out a year ago.  After the movie is over, I’m seriously considering kidding her about the fact that she, Miss Anime, Miss Anti-Disney, has been bugging me to go see a movie about a . . . Disney Princess.  Which the character what Merida, the main character in the movie, is.

I’ve written about Merida before–sort of.  She reminds me of Cassidy, who is, pretty much, my alter ego.  One of the, but she’s sort of the main one.  She’s been quiet of late, the little red haired lass who was bothering me in my dreams back in April, bugging me about getting my butt in gear when it came to writing.  Which I’ve been doing–

I mean, finished up a couple, three novels; sent two out for consideration, of which one is, I think, going to be bought, I just haven’t heard anything; working on another story; getting my idea for my NaNo Novel . . . Oi.  It’s all there.  Busy, busy, busy.

You happy now, Cassidy?

Actually, she probably isn’t.

Just like Merida, she’s a pushy little girl.  She keeps telling me, “It’s not enough, you know.  You gotta keep working.  You gotta get your name out there, honey.  You gotta make people see you–”

See what I mean?  Pain in the butt, she is.

It’s one of the reasons I wrote this article.  The last week I’ve felt like I’m going to fall asleep at any moment.  Not much sleep at night, and getting up early every day, is starting to drive me a little batty.  This morning, here I am, up at 5:10 AM.  What do I do once the computer is up?

You’re reading it.

I started wondering yesterday if I’m loosing my enthusiasm for writing, because the last few nights, when I started in on my current story, I didn’t feel all that much like doing anything.  Last night I didn’t write, because I was, to be honest, exhausted.

But I’m not loosing enthusiasm; I’m just tired.  If I had started writing last night, I’d have written crap.  When I get to the Y for my daughter’s class in about 45 minutes, I’m going to work on the story.  I’m going to go for a thousand words.  And I’ll get it, ’cause that’s how I roll.

Pipe down, Cassidy.  I know what I’m doing.

Just enjoy the ride, will ya?

Storytellers Assemble!

Today is going to be a very busy day.  Right now I’m blogging–really, if you’re reading this, then it happened, no?  Then, I’m heading out with family for a very early, 10 AM showing, of The Avengers in 3D.  I will be the first to admit, I’ve never seen a movie in this newfangled 3D the kids are all talking about, but I’ve had recommendations from other folks who, like me, aren’t that inclined to shell out big bucks just to have crap jump out at them, and they’ve told me, “Spend the money, Ray.  You’ll like it.”  So, early show, Tony snarking, Hulk smashing, Black Widow kicking butt.  Yeah, it’s a morning.

Then it’s back to the house, and cooking.  I’ll be on the grill today, first with hamburgers for lunch, then slow-cooking a couple of slabs of ribs for dinner.  Ummmm, meat . . . I’m sure, about 7 PM tonight, when I’m bloated and feeling like something huge is lodged in my lower intestine, the cows that gave their lives will be watching me from somewhere, going, “Yeah, got your ass, didn’t we?”

Oh, did I mention it’ll be 95 F, 35 C, about one o’clock this afternoon?  It always seems like when I want to cook out, it’s hotter than hell.  So it’s good that I’m at least doing the ribs for dinner, because I only have to venture outside once every hour or so.  Otherwise, screw it:  like I need to be standing over a hot grill.  I know:  ”But it’s a dry heat!”  Yeah, so’s a blowtorch.

This brings up the question:  when will I have time to write?

I hear people say all the time, “I’d love to write, but real life gets in the way.”  Yes, it really does.  Unless it’s what you do for a living, you have to find a way to fit your five hundred to a thousand words a day into some kind of Chronic Hysteratic Loop that’s going to let you write quite a lot, while still finding time for everything else.

Then I started thinking:  what does Stephen King do on the weekends?  I mean, really:  I know he writes for a living, but think about it.  I’m sure there’s shopping, and, in the past, he probably got out and did a little cooking on the porch now and then, probably with a beverage nearby, and then watched a little TV . . . I mean, I’m guessing during the weekend, Stephen, and William Gibson, and a whole lot of other writer types did much the same thing I’m going to do today.

So, while I have ribs on the grill, I’ll have Scrivener open, and I’ll start a new story:  Diners at the Memory’s End.  Yes, I’m not finished with the final edit on Her Demonic Majesty, but I’ve only six chapters left to edit, and I’ve been itching to get into this new story for a week.  I can write some new copy for a while, then jump into editing a little later, yes?  I mean, isn’t that was real writers do?  Sometimes work on a couple of things at the same time?

As writers, we make our own rules.  We spend all our time building new universes, so why not set the rules about how we want to write?  I put in a lot of long days in order to write.  I’m up early to blog, then I either work, or do other things during the day, then it’s home to eat, a little chat with friends, and then, back to the stories.  I have done more than a few twenty hour days fitting in everything I want to do, because there are things I want to do.  I even remember someone online yelling at me to get to bed, because I’d remarked I was putting the final touching on an edit, but I was getting close to having been awake for twenty two hours, and man, was I sleepy . . .

Even if we were working for a living as writers, real life is still going to get in the way.  Your eight hours a day you’d spend storytelling is probably going to be interrupted by phone calls, and kids wanting something, and IMs from friends (and perhaps a few fans), maybe a discussion with an editor . . . I imagine you never have the full peace of being able to sit and just write with the door locked and the ideas flowing.  There’s always going to be one thing or another going on, and we’ll need to deal with the situation when it arises.

Like it or not, sometimes you gotta become your own superhero just to get through your day of storytelling–

‘Cause if you don’t save your own imaginary world, who will?

I’m Ready For Your Closeup

As this is Speak Out With Your Geek Out! Week, I’m going to spend part of the week blogging about things that gets my geek up, that brings out the geeky part of my personality, that has people turn in my direction, point at me and say, “Geek!”

And I wear this title proudly.

So what’s on tap today?  Movies.

As a kid I grew up in a time where TV was the “vast wasteland”, where there was 5 channels and nothing on, and I do mean that: you had the Big Three networks and WGN on VHF, and WDLD, Channel 32, on UFH.  That was it.  And if you think TV bites it these days, hey, man, I was made to watch My Mother the Car, which is about as close to existential horror as once can get when you are 8.

But there was one good thing about growing up then: there were a lot of movies.  ABC showed literally every monster and sci fi flick from 3:30 to 5:00 PM every weekday, and WGN ran old movies from 10:30 PM on.  Since I was home from school by 3:15 PM–and I was the sort of kid who didn’t do homework because, well, it bored me–I sat down and watched things that you almost never see these days: The Monolith Monsters, Teenagers From Outer Space, The Giant Gila Monster, The Mole Men (which really scared me for some reason–it’s the eyes, you know).  But I also caught Them! and Kronos (the giant energy stealing robot) and It Came From Outer Space and Invaders from Mars (another flick that scared me a lot).

At the other end of the spectrum I had a huge amount of exposure to all things classic: the Jimmy Cagney catalog, Humphrey Bogart and George Raft goodness, the Thin Man series . . . it was all there for the taking, and it was free.  Just con your parents (in this case my mom, who owed me big for the mental torture of having to watch her stuff) into letting you stay up late and promise to get up for school the next day (which I could, since I could get by on 4 hours of sleep without a problem), and you were In Like Flint (which I also saw).

It was by using this scam that I was able to stay up until 11:00 PM one night and, with no one else awake, watch Forbidden Planet for the first time.  That was really a bit of magic that, these days, you’d be hard pressed to match that.

But late night TV wasn’t the only place to find this magic.  To me, the 1960′s and 1970′s were a time of major insanity for film, as it seemed like just about everything and anything was up for grabs.  Sure, I didn’t see Midnight Cowboy as a kid (no getting into X-Rated movies then, you know?), but I remember getting hauled off to a drive-in to watch a double bill of Patton and MASH, and how you can get a greater dichotomy on that subject, I don’t know–triple bill it 10 years later with Apocalypse Now, I suppose.  (And my slice of morning trivia: MASH was the first major Hollywood release to drop the f-bomb, done so in an ad-lib by actor John Schuck.  So I was there at the beginning, so to speak.)

I saw The Godfather; I saw The Exorcist two weeks after it premiered in a theater that was nearly empty; I saw Jaws; I saw Silent Running and The Black Hole . . . I conned some friends into going off to see the original Rollerball and wondered when we could see guys on roller skates beating the hell out of each other.  I hauled at least a half-dozen friends off to see Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on 5 different occasions . . . let put it this way: if the movie is listed in Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, I saw it in the theaters (and if you haven’t read this book, you should).

And as the ’80′s and ’90′s came around, there was the discovery of movies from Europe, of movies from Hong Kong–and if you’ve never seen the pre-Hollywood catalog of John Woo, you should do this while reading Sex and Zen and a Bullet in the Head, ’cause it doesn’t get any crazier.

Sadly, these days I’m not as much a film geek as I once was.  Maybe it’s the feeling that everything these days is little more than an effort to put butts in the seat while convincing movie goers that a billion dollars spent on the production of 3 movies detailing the exploits of a line of 1980′s toys is really a good thing leaves me wanting.  Maybe it’s the feeling that the visual is all and story is something that gets in the way of putting pretty CGI on the screen that bothers me.  Maybe it’s the notion that Touch of Evil and Sunset Boulevard are really a quantum leap ahead in everything when compared to just about anything made today, save that done by Christopher Nolan.

Still, movies have soothed my jones for decades.  They affect each of us differently, and while what you like isn’t likely going to be what I like, never the mind: it’s the magic within that counts.

And this is the glue that real binds all us film geeks together.

Puttin’ the Money on the Screen

First, if it seems like it’s been forever since I last wrote–well, not exactly, but it’s been a few weeks.  Reason being . . . it just has.  Like having a shy character who is shy because they are shy, I haven’t done anything of late because I haven’t.

That said, roll on.

I don’t know why this is pissing me off today.  Maybe because the political season has begun and Teh Crazy has begun full-blown.  Maybe because I’d love to whack me some Conservatives who think playing whore to their moneyed pimps is a great way to live.  Maybe it’s because I’ve finally become completely, utterly, and totally sick and tired of hearing about how “Liberal Hollywood” is corrupting “family values” and the end result of this is that Little Timmy is gonna fall in love with Little Johnny’s butthole and Pretty Penny is gonna have 20 abortions by 19 men and a transsexual when they all grow up if they keep watching TV or going to the movies.

Lets back up on that last shit for a moment.  Liberal Hollywood?  Why is that?  Is it because some actors go out and protest the construction of nuclear plants, or spend a few hours picking lettuce with migrant workers, or get behind their favorite social program for the poor?  Or, worst of all, they are . . . wait, here it comes . . . gay?  Is that really what “Liberal Hollywood” is about?

Let me burst your bubble here: Liberal Hollywood is about a liberal as Barry Goldwater–though I think I hear a Teabagger out there yelling, “He was!”.  Liberal Hollywood has two faces: the actors who are in the public eye and whom need something to get behind (not all, mind you, but more than a few), and the producers and a very few marque directors who are really running the whole damn thing behind the scenes.  And it’s this last group of people who are only concerned with one thing: making money by putting your ass in a seat.

And if it means spending a bazillion dollars on a movie, consider it done.  For example–

You may be unaware of this, but there’s a Transformers movie about to take over theaters for the 4^th of July weekend.  Now, I understand there are a huge number of people out there who love these flicks despite them consisting of bad or non-existent acting, racist caricatures that almost make Jar Jar Binks look noble (almost, I said), more shit blown up than you could ever hope to see in one lifetime, and Megan Fox’s ass (said ass now replaced by a that of a lingerie model ’cause–why not?), but who am I to say they can’t blow their $10+ (based on what they charge where I live) on mindless bullshit?

I mean, I like shit explodin’ as much as the next person, though I don’t enjoy it as much these days mostly because the mindless crap between the ‘plody shit drives me crazy.  But there is one thing that really drives me nuts about the Transformer movies, and that’s the one thing that most people never think about:

The budget.

Making movies are a very expensive endeavor these days.  Dropping $150 million isn’t out of the question, and if a studio spends “only” $60-$70 million on a production, they’re in danger of having said flick labeled an “independent production”.  Most of that money goes into “production values”, also known as Special Effects, also sometimes known as the shit blowing up on the screen, and for the most part you do see the money.

So how much did Liberal Hollywood spend so Transformers fans could get their kicks?  Well, that’s pretty easy to figure out, because in the days of the Internets you can look this up.

The first movie had a budget of $150 million, which again seems about average for a SFX-heavy movie these days.  The second movie had a budget of $300 million, which is now moving into rarefied air, because only a few movies have approached Titanic-level spending.  But seeing how much money the second movie rolled up, it was justified–at least by the studios.

And the budget for the third movie?  Well, now, you may as well ask, “What’s the operating budget for Area 51?” cause the answer is very elusive indeed.  There is no “official” listing for the budget just yet, and the best I could find was an unconfirmed report that the budget hit $400 million and was “still going north”, meaning the final tally is probably very close to the magical $500 million mark.

Liberal Hollywood–which, remember, is all about making sure our kids turn into gay atheists who love Muslims–likely spent a half a billion dollars on a movie about toys made in the 1980′s beating the shit out of each other.  Oh, and destroying Chicago, but, hey: it’s either toy robots or giant grasshoppers, take your pick.

And when you add in to this mix the first two movies, you realize that these crazy liberals have spent a billion dollars on three movies.  Think about that: a billion dollars.  Your school system can’t get $150,000 for new computer labs, but banks lined up to fork over cash so robot trucks can be kickin’ ass while low-ballin’.

Hollywood is about as liberal as Wall Street.  It’s all about domestic and international gross.  It’s all about how to go about maximizing products and spinin’ the toys–I’m sorry, the “collectibles market”.

In the end, it’s all about the green.

I can think of a lot of ways to spend a billion dollars, an none of them involve CGIing a couple of robotic Stepin’ Fetchits.  But then, I understood Inception ($160 million to make) and had no problem following it, so what do I know?