Keaton

As the official "That guy who was here for a while that one time" member of the Turning Point crew, I felt it would not be out of place for me to offer a few insights from my point of view on watching this production unfold. My part has been atypical of how I initially envisioned my involvement in the film's manifestation simply because of how ultimately detached I was from it for the greater part of pre-production and shooting. However, I felt it was an even greater adventure for me once I finally arrived.

It may have been as far back as 2006 when I first heard about Turning Point. In fact, it may have been the first conversation I had with Ryan that was more than five words long. Ryan and I worked together at the oldest, most historically-burned-down-by-drunken-cowboys saloon in Arizona (a.k.a. The Palace). It was there that I first seriously began my involvement in film-making by talking with and getting to know Ryan. The first things he told me about himself was a mish-mash of different pieces of his personal history. I gathered that he had spent time in Hawaii, that he had done practically nothing but write a screenplay while he was there, that he was saving up money to go to Thailand, and that nothing is worse than being "donked by a mother-fucking donkey" in poker, whatever that meant.

Time passed. Ryan left The Palace and went to Thailand, but I heard from him shortly after he returned. At this point I had enrolled in film school along with another partner-in-crime, Mr. Winniford, and within 8 months time found myself a stones-throw away from a gen-u-ine Zeedonk, playing croquet at midnight on a tiki-torch lit lawn and learning more about the screenplay Ryan had written during his time in Hawaii.

It was carried out into the living room in a shoebox. The title page was so covered in blue ink notes and hand-drawn charts displaying the rise of tension by page-count that finding the actual title of the script was like searching for Waldo. Alright. Turn that page and here we are; page one.

You know how archaeologists digging for dinosaur bones examine the age of the fossil depending on what layer of earth they're buried in? That was how it was like looking at my first draft of Turning Point. Layers of blue, black and red ink. Then pencil. Then the actual word printed on the page, if it hadn't been crossed out and illegible, could be read. Alternate dialogue was written in a box off to the side, words and phrases were taken away and replaced with a better word.

If Ryan had continued to keep that first draft up-to-date with all the revisions I would read after that night, the pages be as brittle and yellowed as papyrus toilet paper by now. It seemed to me that most of the work had already been done, from the written word's perspective. But it didn't take long. Not five minutes after that shoebox was opened and the first pages were turned, the questions began.

"What would be a better way to say this?"

"Does this make sense?"

"Is it funny?"

"Is it good?"

I hadn't written a thing at that point. Arguably, I still haven't. However tattered and scribbled those pages were, there was something invaluably encouraging about the process of reviewing Ryan's work as a writer. It demonstrated to me that, until the words are actually filmed, the words could always be rewritten, which meant that it could always always always improve.

Fast forward three years.

Ryan lives in L.A. Finally the film is starting to come together. He's shown me audition tapes, sent me draft after draft of rewrites, test footage has been shot, locations being secured, and most important, plans to get the movie shot are being made. The transition from the page to the screen is being made. It's exciting, it's fun, it's scary. Ryan has made many films at this point, but never one on a feature-length scale.

As my luck would have it, it seems that it would be helpful to have me come to L.A. and lend a hand.

I'm not sure if this was more a favor for me or a necessity that I be there for the first week of shooting in San Diego, but it was one of the best times I had ever had doing anything. I'm not going to lie, airplane rides are still as fun as they were when I was a little kid, going someplace new is always great, and seeing old friends after a long absence even more so. The break from work doesn't hurt either. But the best part of it, by far, was doing something I love doing, and the validity of contributing to a project that I had watched grow bigger than the shoebox it was in when I first saw it.

I met a lot of new people, cast and crew, during my involvement on the set for Turning Point. I watched actors taking the words I had originally read three or four years prior and say them out loud, figuring them out and making discoveries with them that I hadn't realized. There were a lot of laughs, and a fair share of 3:00 AM shot 27 misery (as I knew first hand, as I tried in vain to keep up writing the shot number on the Sean-Marin-style slate-board). Although I blame Mr. Winniford for a lot of over-worked, under-slept laughing fits, my intention was to be present and participate as much as possible that week. Firstly because after I was done and got to go home, everyone else had to stick around for another indeterminate amount of weeks to keep shooting. But also, because these opportunities come so seldom after all, and you never know when it's going to come again.

By the time I was finished on-set, it was only an hour or two away from dawn, every single piece of equipment still needing to be wrangled, packed up and loaded, every inch of Mr. Bailey's parents house cleaned, and Mr. Winniford kept awake at the wheel for the 73 hour drive home. Everyone else still had a months worth of production left to weather, and I was too bombed out and depleted to savor the moment. I slept-walked through the cleanup and eventually we were on the road, driving back to L.A., watching the sunrise on the road.

I stayed awake as long as I could, and just before my eyes were literally shutting themselves,

Chase, "Hey are you awake back there?!"

"Yeah."

"Well, say somethin."

Forty minutes later we were a car stuffed full of deliriously high giggling baboons.

And then there was a record breaking heat wave to sleep through that day in Los Angeles.

And then I woke up to Spanish girls laughing at me on webcam.

And then there was egg rolls in China town.

And then there was a few hours sleep.

And then there was a car ride to the airport.

And then a fat, bearded lady had me take off my belt and my shoes and felt me up.

And then I was walking myself two miles home from the shuttle drop off at Super 8 in Sedona, Arizona.

And that was it.

It wasn't long before Ryan was sending me further updates on rewritten scenes that hadn't been shot yet. Head shots of actors auditioning for older versions of the principles followed. I got a few peeks at some of the new footage being shot at waterfalls and swing sets. I was allowed to take a look at a rough cut over Skype. It was great being kept in the loop, but not without a sense of melancholy that I wasn't there to see the rest of it happen.

Until finally I get an e-mail from Ryan about the Turning Point blog. Things are starting to wrap up. Loose ends are being tied, final touches are being made, the final day of shooting is fast approaching. Turning Point is now slowly going (nearly) full-circle from a pipe dream, to a project, to a happening, to a reality, to a memory. Amazing, really. Once the film is finished, it will officially be something that "happened", no longer something that will one day happen, or something that is in the process of happening. Past-tense. The film's own turning point. The turning point for the people who helped make it happen.

It's been a pleasure to be a part of it. More. I had always hoped that the film would get made, one way or another, but I never remember daring to hope that the film would ever be finished. It always felt like there were too many other things that needed to happen first. I didn't have my hand in the pie nearly as much as anyone else who took part. A lot of sleep has been lost, a lot of hours volunteered, a lot of frustration and exhaustion. I know this has been a journey for everyone in many different ways, but knowing something about the length of time Ryan has spent with these characters, with the drafts, with each word of the script, it's good to know that the whole Turning Point adventure was an eventuality from the beginning.

-K.S.Z.

Nostalgia

Feeling a sense of nostalgia due to me looking back towards the beginning of this production. There's a strange feeling that it was a life time ago when we were actually filming this project.

For anybody that knows little to nothing about the process of filmmaking here is the basic premise of how it works. It's a bit like a sandwich.

PRE-PRODUCTION
Production
POST-PRODUCTION

Why are pre and post capitalized? Because those are the two most time consuming aspects. But they also make up the bread of our sandwich. You can't have a high quality sandwich or hamburger without excellent bread or buns. I can prove this to you by having you purchase dirt cheap hot dogs but buying excellent buns. It's a great hot dog. Flip that procedure around, cheap buns and expensive sausage. Not so great.

This is my formula for my film.

Pre-Production:
-5 years until final draft of screenplay (this was not full-time work but probably over 1000 hours of accumulated work)
-5 months of prep time for film production including casting.

Production:
-Over the course of 3 days 1/3 of the film was shot. Almost all San Diego scenes were completed.
-2 days of shooting desert locations.
-2 days for San Francisco road trip.
-3 nights of filming night car driving (including reshoot)
-Other than this odd and end scenes were shot. Beach location was shot on 3 separate days due to scheduling and weather conflicts. A night parking lot scene was shot in this fashion in a single night.

Post-Production:
-Countless hours.
-Editing was taking place in between shooting. Documented in this blog are 15 hour editing days. There were plenty of them.
-Jason Rudd has been working ruthlessly on sound for over a month and a half now.
-Jason Downer was becoming soul crushed due to music burnout.
-Color timing took well over 200 hours of work including the render out.

So I guess the train of thought in this whole post was filmmaking is brutal. But if you want a great sandwich you need great bread and a delicious middle. It's just strange that the meat takes so little time compared to making the bread.

So many hours of my life have been slaved into this project. Sad to know that some people for one reason or another will simply not like the film. But hey, you can't please everyone. And on a side note, anybody that would make such a simple statement as "that movie sucked" has never made, and will more likely than not ever make, a feature length film in their entire lives. So they're opinions are almost obsolete.

I also wanted to note in this entry that it has been a wild, wild, wild ride making this. I'm coming towards the final line of completion and in a strange way I'm a bit sad of this fact. Even more bizarrely, I'm even a little scared. It's strange to have something with you for so long and to finally just say "Yep. All done." Seems surreal to me.

I want to welcome my new actors to this project but I'm going to keep them secret and not reveal their identities until I finish shooting the opening and closing scene of my film. We're scheduled to shoot the brief but critical scene on March 6th. Still waiting to see about weather and other logistical concerns.

Filmmaking's a drug. Through all the ups and downs (thrilled/joyous/suicidal/homicidal) I can honestly say that I have the desire and the burn to make another film. During the stress of the production I was certain I was going to call it quits, (almost always feel that way during any production I've done) but as the film begins to take its true form and make it's own little world the joy of playing God is overwhelming.

I hope each and everyone of you reading this enjoy the world I created with this film.

Much love,

-Ryan.

8 Months of Blog Action

8 Months of Blog Action
1.5 Years since Casting Began
3 Months since Principle Photography was Finished
5.5 Years since Rough Draft of Screenplay was Completed
3 Weeks until Opening and Closing Scene will be Shot
Final Color Time Finished Today for Main Portion of the Film
Sound Design Begins

Closing in on completion. Lots more dates to be listed but it's time for bed at 6:23AM on Friday February, 18th. Hopefully I'll be a smart brother and call my sister to wish her a Happy Birthday. If I happen to wake up absent minded at least it's been documented that I do remember when her birthday is.

-Ryan.

Sound and Color

Things are slowly but surely coming along. Jason Rudd is working magic and making the project sound like a "movie". So happy to hear such rich and clean dialogue tracks.

I recently got back from my month long trip to Mexico and I've begun continuing color work. I'm really pumped because it's looking gorgeous.

Other than that my diary has kind of died. I feel like I'm talking to myself on here since nobody reads it and I haven't had much energy to entertain myself.

I've begun writing with my friend Keaton S. Ziem so that's a good thing. We have 99 pages of scenes. Is there a real story in it yet? Nope. But it's great! We've been sending scenes back and forth with the plan of getting as much good material possible and sculpting a screenplay from that. Writing is usually a lonesome journey so this has been quite fun. It's also been quite liberating not constricting our creativity to a plot or any other structure details at this point.

So all in all it's a great start to the New Year.

-Ryan.

Criticism

I figured I should put this out there to the world (1 or 2 readers of this blog and anybody that may read it in the future).

This is a quote I'm stealing from my favorite author Chuck Palahniuk. He's been very influential in my perspective of the world and I wore a necklace he personally made for me during my entire shoot. For those of you who don't know who he is, he is the author of my favorite book which would later move on to become my favorite film "Fight Club".

Anyways, this is a quote in regards to the hopes of my film ever being seen and the inevitable trolls that will come forth.

"Until you can create something that captivates people, I'd invite you to just shut up. It's easy to attack and destroy an act of creation. It's a lot more difficult to perform one."

-Ryan.

I Color...

It's what I like to do.

I'd rather sit here and listen to music and play with colors than socialize and interact with human beings.

Some call it pathetic. I call it bliss.

-Ryan.

Alive

So the project is still continuing and I am still alive. I decided to go for the homeless look so I stopped shaving and I never combed my hair to begin with so hooray for that!

I've been busy casting actors for my final scenes that I need to film. I have also completed locked picture for many of the scenes in the film. So I'm happy to say that the fun times of sound editing have begun! I'm really happy my good friend Jason Rudd is in charge of that department. I've heard some of the work he's done already and it is sounding amazing.

Once I finish the rest of my small scenes I get to send off the almost completed film to my other buddy Jason Downer who will get to put in beautiful music and make the film sound lovely. Can't wait to hear what he comes up with.

I've also finally learned the ins and outs of a software program so I can begin color timing the project soon. Multiple actors that I've met mention how beautiful the cinematography looks from my little temp trailers and teasers. I can't wait to hear what people think when the footage has actually been treated. Hooray and good luck for Matt Bailey getting future jobs! He's going to have a nice stable career as a cinematographer while I'm scrounging through garbage looking for something to eat. Please still be my friend Matthew Raymond Bailey.

Well at least I can say I wrote, directed and produced a feature film. Not many can say that. Good game.

-Ryan.