Category: Geeks on Movies

[Pardon the poor quality of the image above … its several generations old.]

Hello. My name is Travis, and IÂ  am a wanna-be animator. It was my senior year in high school and my best buds and I had the worst case of senior-itis. We decided we were all going to take the Film-making Class together, which was actually an English elective offered only to seniors. We thought it would be a lot of fun and an easy way to get credits and goof off our last semester. In reality, it ended up being one of the coolest classes any of us had taken. We had a few different projects, most of which we don’t openly talk about with others outside our group. However, there is one project, the big one, which we are all still terribly proud of making.

ENOUGH! was our group’s animation project.  It was a three-minute stop-motion animation shot on Super-8 film. The story goes something like this … It is the distant future and a battle royale of all the galaxy’s fiercest warriors breaks out on a Mad Max type apocalyptic planet. The battle boils down to the final two warriors and the film ends with the victor defeating his enemy.

The Making of ENOUGH! … When we were given this project, the class was split into groups determined mostly by the students themselves. We had a dream team super group of six, all of us friends and all of us geeks. We quickly joined forces and came up with the concept for our epic masterpiece. One of the gang had hordes of action figures stored away in his dad’s basement that he had kept from his childhood. This, together with whatever the rest of us had, we muddled through the casting process. We had one helluva megastar ensemble, including G.I. Joe, He-Man, Spawn, The Thing, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Battle Beasts, Muscle Men, Earthworm Jim, Splinter and many more. We chose to build our sets from a mix of constructs and strategically placed space toys, including a partially beaten Millennium Falcon. We quickly learned the importance of having a place of our own, undisturbed, to shoot our film. It was apparent that we would not be completing this in one night. In fact, it took us  nearly a month to complete the shooting phase, making quarter-inch movements at a time, taking two single shots of each movement. We had to be sure that everything was perfect, as we could not go back and redo any shots. Eventually, it was finished.

At this point, we technically could have said “we’re done … let’s slack off until the end of the semester.” Oh no, not us … we were geeks thoroughly obsessed with our new found form of creativity. Instead of calling it finished, we set out to further perfect our project as other groups still toiled with what to to with their poorly sketched cartoons and clunky Lego blocks. A couple of guys in our group were also in Television Production classes, so they hooked us up with time on the Toaster. For those of you too young, or who weren’t involved with television classes in school, the Toaster was a computer-aided VHS FX editor used to add nifty wipes and dissolves, etc. The professional version of this technology was used in the early years making the Tim Allen sitcom Home Improvement. In addition, we used the studio equipment to lay down a soundtrack for our film. We chose to transfer the footage from Super-8 to Super VHS [via local photo/video finishing shop] and then edit the footage to the song “Enough” by the band Gravity Kills, who at the time was one of our favorite local Saint Louis bands, second only to The Urge.

Why am I talking about this? Well, I ran out of other ideas … no, actually I was thinking about this little film we made, and how a few of us sometimes talk about doing another one, just for fun. I was thinking about this and realized that this is how many film-makers get started, even the big ones. Steven Speilberg and M. Night Shyamalan both got the film-making passion from making silly little movies like these with their Super-8 cameras in their adolescent years. What I’m saying is, if you’ve thought about doing things like this, go for it … you never know where it might take you. Besides, many of these that I’ve seen from other people are actually fun to watch.

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus has just resumed production in London, which was placed on hiatus after Heath Ledger’s death on January 22, 2008. With the film’s future unknown, three great actors stepped up to the plate; Johnny Depp (no stranger to working with Gilliam), Jude Law and Colin Farrell. This revelation was the first sign that Gilliam’s luck was changing, allowing him to continue work on this fascinating new addition to one of my favorite film-maker’s resume. In an interview with Variety, Terry Gilliam had the following to say about the late Heath Ledger’s work on the film: “I am grateful to Johnny, Colin and Jude for coming on board, and to everyone else who has made it possible for us to finish the film. I am delighted that Heath’s brilliant performance can be shared with the world. We are looking forward to finishing the movie and, through the film, with a modicum of humility, being able to touch people’s hearts and souls as Heath was able to do.” Also during this interview with Variety, the producers commented on how this shift of actors  is possible: “Since the format of the story allows for the preservation of his entire performance, at no point will Heath’s work be modified or altered through the use of digital technology. Each of the parts played by Johnny, Colin and Jude is representative of the many aspects of the character that Heath was playing.”

For those who aren’t familiar, The Curse does not refer to some secret horror film project being undertaken, but refers to Terry Gilliam’s turbulent and often disastrous encounters with Murphy’s Law. During the production of Brazil (1985), production issues as well as fights with the studio made for such a problematic experience that it spawned a book, The Battle of Brazil and  the Criterion DVD release had an entire DVD full of features highlighting the struggle. Later on, Gilliam undertook making a movie called The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, in which production problems eventually got so bad the entire film was shut down. A feature-length documentary called Lost in La Mancha (2002) was made, chronicling the epic struggle.

Asia Argento is the daughter of Italian horror director Dario Argento (Suspiria) and Italian actress Daria Nicolodi. She comes from a family of artists and entertainers, perhaps destined to follow. While Asia’s career hasn’t included what most would call any great accomplishments, I would say she’s not the typical b-movie icon as we’ve spoken of before. Instead, she’s an artist of a different sort, growing into here talent within a rather tight body of genre work. Generally best known for her roles in Italian horror films, Asia has also branched out into independent action and drama films. Asia first appeared in Lamberto Bava’s Demons 2 (1986), also written by her father. The story follows a group of people trapped within a ten-story apartment building that is crawling with demons, hunting and feeding on the humans. Asia returned to Demons 3 (1989), directed by Michele Soavi (Cemetery Man).

It wasn’t until her father cast her as Aura in his horror film Trauma (1993) that Asia would attract the eyes and interest of American audiences. Trauma stars Brad Dourif (Dune, Blue Velvet) as Dr. Lloyd in a story of a young woman, played by Asia Argento, who escapes from a hospital. Her parents are violently murdered by a wandering serial killer and Aura sets out to uncover the mystery behind their killer. Asia would return again to work with her father in Dario Argento’s Stendhal Syndrome (1996), playing a young detective who slowly loses her mind as she tracks down a serial killer through Italy.

	Asia would next land a role on Abel Ferrara’s New Rose Hotel (1998), starring along side Chistopher Walken, Willem Dafoe and Annabella Sciorra. The story takes place in the future when two major corporations are feuding over the greatest minds in the world. Asia plays Sandii, an Italian girl that X, played by Dafoe, hopes to train as a double agent to win over the heart of Hiroshi, considered the greatest mind. Hiroshi is the target of both corporations, but the mystery behind what is and is not really taking place only begins here.
	With her growing success, Asia would play Beatrice in B. Monkey (1998). Alan Furnace is a typical London schoolteacher, but he longs for excitement in his life. He finds it in Beatrice, a beautiful and wildly reckless jewel thief, whom takes him full throttle into the underbelly of London. However, when the two of them become more serious and Beatrice gets a glimpse of a quiet life as a schoolteacher’s wife, she must decide if she can remain true to that path, or will she be drawn back into the excitement of the criminal life.
	Asia would enter into her most visible Hollywood roles as Yelena in Rob Cohen’s xXx (2002), starring along side Vin Diesel. In a complete 180 degree shift, Asia would write, direct and star in The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things (2004). The story follows Sarah, played by Argento, who is a young mother who steals her seven-year-old natural son Jeremiah away from his legally placed foster family and runs away with him. Over the years, Jeremiah is subjected to his mother’s low-life, led to alcohol and drugs and is abused by his mother, her lovers and her psychotic family. Jeremiah discovers the way of the world, first-hand, at an early age.

Asia would follow this with an appearance in Gus Van Sant’s Last Days (2005) and in the role of Slack in George Romero’s Land of the Dead (2005). Slightly out of her normal character, Asia played Madame du Barry in Sofia Coppola’s modernized retelling of Maria Antoinette (2006). She would also star as Zingarina in the drama Transylvania (2006) before starring in the thriller Boarding Gate (2007) and Abel Ferrara’s comedy Go Go Girls (2007). Having gradually developed an independent career out of her father’s support, Asia Argento is just beginning to bloom. She is currently working on three more films in 2008.