“…some you win, and Dim Sum you lose.”
September 24, 2004
I won’t lie to you kids - some nights you win, and some nights you lose. That’s what makes for poker games. And while we came out of our latest marathon Thursday night session with an excellent new episode everyone left DED HQ feeling like they had had their asses kicked by fate, so if you’ll excuse me I’m just going to upload and call it a night.
Talk to you soon!
This technology is revolting!
September 18, 2004
Man when it rains, it pours. Not only did Ash, our beloved server choose last night to decide to be surly and ill-tempered, but the original files for Episode 41 distributed Friday have an error in the sound which causes it to go out of synch in parts and look like some kind of bad foreign dub work. Have no fear though, we’re once again friends with technology and, as such, have repaired versions now available!
Sorry about that.
Run for the cure
September 17, 2004
Apologies for the slight delay in the new episode, a 4am audio glitch required a few hours sleep to resolve. Hopefully you’ll enjoy the episode that much more now that it has been remastered with 100% more sound goodness.
One of the things I’ve been proudest about Dead End Days, is the relative lack of hucksterisim on the site. We don’t bombard you with pop-up advertising or spam, we don’t ask for donations, I’ve never asked you to beat up on a helpless simian and although we occasionally shill t-shirts and stickers they are great quality products at excellent prices - a fair trade if ever there was one.
I know that you likely, as I do with similar sites, appreciate the fact that we’re not constantly asking you for things, other than 5-10 minutes of your attention every week… which is the donation that (frankly) means the most to me at the end of the day.
That being said - I’m going to dust off my soapbox here and break from tradition for one post only, and I’d greatly appreciate it if you could take the time to see it through:
Breast cancer will affect 1 in 9 women over the course of their lifetime (over 21,000 new cases will be diagnosed in the upcoming year in Canada alone). I do not know anyone who has not been personally touched by this disease either directly, or through friends or family. In the “Days” community alone there are multiple instances of cast and crew who have lost loved ones to breast cancer - and unfortunately I’m sure the same goes for all of you out there as well.
Rob and I have been very strong supporters of the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation for several years now and have adopted the 5k CIBC Run for the Cure on the first weekend of October each year as our annual fundraising event.
The CBCF is an excellent charitable organization with over .90 from each tax-deductible donated dollar going directly to cancer support services and leading edge research. Having been to their offices on a few occasions they are excellent people who make a huge difference in the lives of those they selflessly serve.
While I know everyone’s budgets are increasingly tight, if you even have a couple of bucks to spare and would like to somehow thank us for the work we have done over the past year to (hopefully) bring some entertainment to your Fridays it would mean the world to me if you could find a donation for the CBCF or other breast cancer organization this year. Any amount, no matter how small, will make a world of difference to someone - and hopefully help contribute to the day a cure can be found, so I can rant about Robots for a full 52 weeks out of the year.
Thanks folks.
To sponsor Rob in the CBCF/CIBC Run for the Cure click here
To Sponsor Brad in the CBCF/CIBC Run for the Cure click here
How to make a film
September 10, 2004
And thus concludes day three, all wrapped up like Ken Jenning’s winning streak.
I had an interesting discussion last week with the usual gang of idiots about why Q&A sessions at film events are usually so painful to sit through. With the Toronto International Film Festival in full swing it’s prime screening, interview, and question panel time around these parts so you might be surprised that, ever-loving film geek that I am, I usually head for the exits as soon as the microphones come out and the audience is canvassed for any interesting queries. It’s not that I don’t have any interest in the people behind the films, their craft, or what they have to say about it, nothing could be farther from the truth, however, I no longer can listen to the litany of “what advice do you have” questions that are inevitably exclusively asked at these types of conventions without wanting to scream.
I don’t mean for this to seem mean spirited, or like some kind of pronouncement from above - but the problem with the generic “What advice do you have for someone who wants to make a film” question is primarily that it presupposes that there is a “magic bullet” that is being denied the questioner. It makes the question about the audience member not the cast. I don’t want to know how the smelly guy sitting next to me wants to make a movie, I want to know how the people on stage made their movie, or approach making movies, or would change the way they make movies given the chance. There’s valuable interesting information there waiting to be mined lying fallow.
Through the auspices of my day-job I work with a lot of people who work full time in the film business. Writers, directors, actors, editors, makeup artists, accountants - pick the category and I probably am on a passing acquaintance with a few folks off the top of my head. The one constant between them all is the absolute lack of unity in how any of them arrived at the positions they are in, even ones working in the same areas. I know the way *I* ended up working for a film company is unlikely to be duplicated by anyone else, just as I don’t think it’s likely that meticulously re-creating Norman Jewison’s early days driving a cab or working on television would make me an exceptional director. There is no “magic bullet” solution to working in film. When dealing with making movies, it’s even worse. No two movies have ever been made in exactly the same way, with the same funding, for the same reason. Without an in-depth understanding of what you want to do / be, what resources are at your disposal, and how hard you want to work at it - no one can answer that question except for vague platitudes of “keep at it”.
The cold reality is that there is little advice that can be gleaned from a simple question and answer session about an undertaking as mammoth as making a film. All you can do is do it, which is frustrating to people who know they have a great story or script, a firery passion for the medium, and know that they have innate talent - they just can’t get anyone to give them millions of dollars and a support structure to actually make it.
So in the interest of saving Q&A moderators at film festivals and conventions around the world allow me to give out the big secret once and for all and answer this question so we can move on to more productive matters, like talking about how I desperately need a Robosapien:
Q: What advice can you give to someone wanting to make a first feature film?
A: Get a camera. Any camera, hi-8, mini-dv, webcam… doesn’t matter. Point it at something. Record for 80-120 minutes. Splice on some titles and credits if you are so inclined. Congratulations you’ve just made your first feature film. Now go make a better sophomore effort.
Production, Production, Production Journal - HO!
September 7, 2004
There’s some level of controversy surrounding the relevancy of the front page rants. A little over a month ago, Shane ‘Pipes’ Arbuthnott (so nicknamed because of his impressive upper-body muscle-mass, which he recently confided in me is due entirely to a diet punctuated by Sunday morning McGriddles) sparked the aforementioned quasi-heated debate upon his return from Canada’s sexually innuenduous Regina. Some friend made some offhand remark about the production journals seeming redundant – having relatively nothing to do with Dead End Days episodes and having entirely to do with Brad’s technophilia and Matt’s belligerent bad-movie pimping – and I won’t deny that the connections are often tenuous. Or nonexistent. And this seems as good a time as any to mention that ‘innuenduous’ is not a real word. I completely made it up.
But every so often, it seems, a Production Journal comes along and strikes a resonant chord in the hearts and minds of our audience, sparks a frenzy of discussion and debate; tears us apart, brings us together, reminds us what is really, truly important about life. Such was the case last week, when I wrote a brief but glowing ode to my brand new Thundercats tee-shirt (purchased for a mere twenty-eight dollars from a vendor at the Sci-Fi/Anime/Comic Book/Horror geekathon Brad forced us to flyer because he’s the Producer and we’re his bitches). The Thundercats tee-shirt soon became the proverbial eye of a proverbial storm.
So deep and resonant a chord was struck, so potent were the flood of Thundercats-related childhood memories, that many a forum poster broke down in tears, lapsed into incomprehensible rambling (though that usually happens anyway), and, in one case, started a poll. A poll to gauge how hot I look wearing my Thundercats tee-shirt. Now, at long last, photographic evidence of how my hotness combined with the tee-shirt’s ass-kicking coolness reaches previously unheard of levels of super-freakin-awsomeosity we humans have not dared to dream existed. Go on, take a look. Try and tear your eyes away, and then vote with your heart.
Now I need remind no one that Thundercats is a thrilling adventure epic chronicling the heroic antics of a league of feline humanoids who flee their doomed homeland of Thundera (vaporized by the solar-system’s dying sun – a prescient foreshadowing of Earth’s ultimate fate?) for the calm botanical hinterland of Third Earth. At least it would be calm if it weren’t for the connivances of one Mumm-Ra, and his motley mutated ne’er-do-wells, Slythe (big frog), and Jackalman (big Jackal).
Lion-O, the reluctant leader of the Thundercats (see, Thundercats are a naturally collaborative catpeople, so establishing hierarchical roles such as ‘leader’ runs contrary to the spirit of their race) is the guardian of the Sword of Omens, entrusted to him by their erstwhile mentor Jagga. Jagga, due to the space-vessel predating the invention of autopilot, and an unfortunate shortage of suspended animation chambers, dies steering the ship and its precious cargo to Third Earth…and freedom! (Luckily Jagga lives on metaphysically, Obi-Wan Kenobi-like, to dispense handy nuggets of sage advice/information/philosophizing when such nuggets are most needed.) One would assume that upon arrival, the older (male) Thundercats – Lion-O, Pantera, and sprightly Tigra – would immediately set about re-swelling the ranks of their nearly deceased species by endeavouring upon a frenzied mating bonanza with the svelte, athletic Cheetara (think Madonna (circa 1985) meets Mary Stuart Masterson…but with spots) in much the same way one would imagine the Smurf’s maintain such a robust population with but one Smurfette amongst them. Alas, the adolescent fantasies of an entire generation were lost to the chaste perimeters of animated children television programming, and the characters remained – ostensibly – abstinent.
This industrious intergalactic Swiss Family Robinson – including Kit, Kat, and Snarf – settled in and set up shop, trying to make the best of their new home. When trouble arose – as it is wont to do when you’re sharing a planet with an insane Egyptian iconoclast and his subservient mutants – Lion-O could galvanize the team, no matter where they were, no matter what they were doing, by chanting a robust, reverbial “Thunder- Thunder- Thundercats! HO!” and thrusting about the mystical Sword of Omens. As the ever-erecting sword achieved its maximum girth, so too were all the Thundercats endowed with preternatural superpowers. And superweapons. A big staff, for example.
This was nothing short of landmark children’s entertainment. And though it has not inspired the fanatical devotion of today’s Pok
Days: 1 / Computers: 0
September 3, 2004
Our usually faithful sound-editing software crashed pretty good tonight, rendering two hours of work naught well past the hour when sane individuals go to bed. But since we’re a dedicated bunch (and the local 7-11 stocks Bawls) we soldiered on undaunted! Way to many hours later - Voila, a new episode
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Due to the delay however, I’m completely bushed and going to bed now!
