I've gone through the scratchy throat and runny nose phases.  I fear the hacking cough comes next.  This afternoon I forced myself onto the bike trail.  I managed ten miles, and that was plenty.

Earlier I talked with Alan Govenar.  He and his wife Kaleta Doolin run a non-profit arts center in Dallas out of an old firehouse on Columbia Avenue.  Documentary Arts publishes books, produces films, archives photographs of historical importance, puts on arts events, and even is currently involved in an international touring musical on the life of blues legend Blind Lemon Jefferson.  I was pleased that he remembered who I was.  He seemed enthusiastic about screening his La Junta doc, “The Devil's Swing,” in San Antonio.  But on the date I'd hope to schedule the event, he'll be in Europe.  Ah, those damn scheduling conflicts.  My choices are to, a.) show it without Alan (but with Enrique, who was heavily involved in the production phase of the film), b.) try for another date, or c.) look for another film.  The final choice is best to be avoided.  After re-watching the VHS screener that Paula had given me a couple of years back, I realized it would be a perfect piece to show for an event cosponsored by NALIP and AIT.

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Later, as I was hauling out my recycling, I stopped to chat with my neighbor, Cara.  She lives on the south apartment in my three-plex.  She's the neighbor who works as a river boat captain on the tourist boats that cruise up and down the River Walk area of the San Antonio River.  Cara hadn't known that Matt had moved out.   It seems that Cara is also moving out.  End of the month.  And I'm currently looking for a cheaper place.  It might be getting pretty lonely on this side of the block this spring.

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I have two new links for my loyal fan-base.

The Nations Entertainment Group website has me on their front page in the Crew Spotlight section.  These are the folks producing the feature film “Leftovers,” that I'm helping out on.  Kevin Nations sent me some questions the other week, and I answered them, trying not to sound overly pompous or gassy.  The previous crew member to be spot-lit was Ezme Arana, the brilliant woman who's been providing make-up for the actors, and subtle therapy sessions for the production folks (thanks Ezme, for keeping us all from killing one another!).  I took Ezme's responses to her series of questions as my guide.

Also, I've posted a new video blog.  When I was on the phone the other day with Enrique, he reminded me of my last visit.  We were looking at some bluebonnets behind Rosendo's general store.  Enrique commented that they were the tallest he'd ever seen.  I should point out that the bluebonnets most people see are of the Texas Hill Country variety.  These are the ones that are seeded along the highways of Texas as part of Ladybird Johnson's legacy:  the Highway Beautification Act.  But the feral bluebonnets of Trans-Pecos Texas are a tough, rugged subspecies.  The blossoms are not such a deep blue.  Some are even pinkish, or almost white.  They don't clump together quite so much.  And they are significantly taller.  In fact, as the bluebonnet is the state flower, there had been questions in the Texas legislation if these mavericks should even be given that exalted designation of State Flower.  But the wise bureaucrats, who hunker down beneath the pink dome of Austin, made sure in 1971 that all of the bluebonnet variants be included.  Anyway, the bluebonnets behind the Redford general store came up as high as my sternum.  I'm about 6'1″, so that's a tall flower.  But I shook my head when Enrique praised the height the the blossoms.  I told him that I had been riding my mountain bike on the unpaved ranch roads back towards the Bofecillos Mountains.  I discovered a taller flower.  Ruby gave a shrug and a bit of a laugh.  She's not into any sort of competitiveness.  But Enrique was intrigued.  He raised an eyebrow.  “How tall?”  I shrugged, and put my hand to my adam's apple.  “Think you can find it again?”  I told him I knew exactly where it was.  We went back to his place to pick up my video camera.  As we were loading up the truck for a flower safari, a man who was in town visiting his girlfriend who worked with the local Outward Bound field school asked us what was up.  We explained our quest.  He enthusiastically begged to come along.  He asked the girlfriend.  She rolled her eyes, assuming us all mad, and apparently found something better to do.  But we found that flower.  And I have the video evidence.  I'm thinking five foot one inch probably isn't the tallest bluebonnet, but it was a fun day.

I awoke feeling muddled.  It took me almost twenty minutes just to load up the espresso machine. I kept getting side-tracked answering email, reading people's blogs, and playing with an inflamed and swollen fingertip (some sort of in-growing fingernail that hurts like hell — but it looks so pleasingly hideous that I can't leave it alone).  And by the time I'm hearing the steam hissing and the coffee gurgling, I realize I'm having this oh too familiar tickle and soreness in my throat.  Damn, I'm coming down with a cold.

Jorge had sent me an email a day or two previous asking if we could meet today for lunch.  I finally got around to answering him in the affirmative.  Not much of a lead time, but I'll blame the swarm of rhinoviruses storm-trooping across my every corpuscle.

I switched on my DVD player and watched two projects of which Jorge wants feedback.  One was a music video for his nephew's band, Frequencia.  This isn't the video he played the other week at the NALIP video slam.  This is for another song.  He's using footage from my short, “Awakened by an R,” interspersed with shots of the band playing live.  The other project is a narrative he's doing in collaboration with Roland Jasso (no relation to Matthew Jasso).  The latter was freezing up.  This is why I hate home-burned DVDs.  Someone please tell me how it's supposed to be done.  Is there some failure-free authoring software?

Next I watched Alan Governor's excellent documentary on La Junta de los Rios, entitled “The Devil's Swing.”  It was done seven or eight years back.  I hadn't seen it in a while, but, as I want to bring it to San Antonio for a screening, I needed to see it afresh.

La Junta de los Rios is that region where the flood-plains of the Rio Grande and the Rio Conchos join at the US/Mexican towns of Presidio and Ojinaga.  It's a region rich in history, culture, and beauty.  I suppose it's my favorite place on earth.  And not a day goes by when I wonder why I'm here, and not there.

After the credits rolled, it hit me how long it's been since I was last in La Junta.  A year and a half?  Too long.

I called up Enrique.  He lives down there, and is not only one of the on-camera subjects of the film, but the translator and location scout.  I want him to come to town to present the film.

The phone rang twice, and Ruby answered. And it was like that year and a half and those four hundred and fifty miles just melted away.  Both Enrique and Ruby are friends of mine who I consider family.  If we're lucky, we have people like this in our lives.  And I'm blessed with a good number of these friends who I love deeply, and who I believe feel the same way about me.  But, at times, a dreadful chill passes over me, and I wonder if I've taken this person or that person for granted.  But, no chills today.  Ruby brought me up to speed on life in the tiny hamlet of Redford, Texas (AKA El Polvo).  The Outward Bound field school came very close to shutting down their Big Bend location.  This would have devastated Enrique and Ruby.  They rent out three or four apartments to the instructors, and thus the school provides almost all of their income (southern Presidio County is one of the most impoverished regions in the country).    But there was a huge letter writing campaign of previous instructors and students, and the corporate office decided to keep a presence in Redford.  Ruby said that Enrique had finished a new book.  It's a translation of three different Spanish expeditions that came into the Big Bend region in the eighteenth century.  It will be a lavish coffee table book with maps, photographs of the region, the translations, and scholarly notes.  It's slated for a fall 2007 release, published by the Center for Big Bend Studies at Sul Ross University.

Ruby talked some about the work she's been doing.  Odd jobs, mostly.  The Redford school, where she once taught the elementary students, has closed down.

“Enrique's working at the post office right now,” she said.  “And we're probably going into town this afternoon.  You can call us back tonight.”

I hung up and was eyeballing my espresso machine with thoughts of a second cup of coffee when I heard footfalls on my porch.  It was Jorge.

He let me choose the restaurant.  There was only one choice.  Pepe's daily special for Monday is a chili relleno, and it's sublime in it's tasty simplicity.  I usually wait until after two to hit Pepe's.  I don't like crowds, and for some reason I prefer to have lunch around three or four, no matter how early I might have eaten breakfast.  But today I was looking forward to lunch, because I'd never got around to breakfast.  The waiter, Carlos, brought me a cup of coffee without being asked.  He knew I took iced tea when it was sunny, and coffee when cloudy.  The place was packed and the poor guy was working his ass off.  Just him and a waitress in training.

Jorge and I hung out talking for quite awhile.  It eventually calmed down, and we were one of the few tables occupied.

Back at my place we watched the narrative film Jorge had done with Roland. He had another DVD.  It played without troubles.  I gave some generic feedback.  And then I played it again, pausing here and there to make a point.  I hope I didn't overwhelm him with critical observations.  I only wish Roland had been there.  He had been making some classic mistakes.  I wanted a chance to tell him that there's absolutely nothing wrong with making mistakes early on in any creative endeavor.  But here they were, mistakes.  You might fix them this way, or you might fix them that way.  They're there to learn from.  Do another film and try it a different way.  Keep tinkering.  Keep learning.

It was nice to see two actors who I like.  Kareem.  He's always so appealing.  And Amanda.  She's beautiful, charismatic, never stumbles over a line, and the camera just can't get enough of her.

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I drove over to the offices of the American Indians in Texas to drop off a video tape of “The Devil's Swing.”  A young man walked up when I entered.

“Um, is John here?” I asked.

He looked puzzled.

“Juan, Juan Vasquez,” I said.

His smiled became a bit more indulgent and confused.

“I mean, Ramon,” I said.  The young man brightened.  “Sorry,” I mumbled.  “I use the name his father calls him.”

“No, he's gone for the day.”

“Well, if you could put this on his desk.”  I handed him the video, gave my name and departed.

I drove home, and with my cold coming on full-bore, I crawled into bed and clocked out for an hour.

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This evening I phoned up Enrique.  He seemed okay with the idea of coming to San Antonio to present a film.  But, because he's so god damn humble, he kept mentioning other films.

Her mentioned “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.”  “It's a bit moralistic,” he added.  “But it captures the anglo ranchers in this area.  Your film group would like it.  I have the phone number for Tommy Lee Jones' production company around here somewhere.”  I said that was bigger in scale than I had planned.  I knew that Enrique had been hired on by that particular production when they were shooting in southern Presidio County, but I wanted to show a film more personal, and directed by an individual more accessible.

He mentioned a documentary on Esequiel Hernandez, the teenage boy from Redford who, while out herding his family's goats,  was shot to death by a covert team of US Marines stationed on the border ostensibly to curtail drug trafficking: our country's insane drug interdiction policy, coupled with the dangers inherent in militarizing the border, resulted in the slaughter of one of the most indisputably innocent individuals on the planet.  I knew there was a production company working on Esequiel's story, but I had not known they had it in the festival circuit.  I need to track down more information.

I explained that his ideas were sound, but I wanted to stick with the Devil's Swing.

We talked about Richard Dawkins' new book on atheism, alien species thriving in La Junta (Russian Boar and Aoudad Sheep), where to find good tamales in San Antonio, Daniel Dennett's theory on the consciousness of — “Oh, um, Ruby's giving me a look.”

“I know that look.”

“Dinner's about ready.  You're invited.”

“Sure, you're just down the road.”

“There's a flight from San Antonio to Lajitas.  Once a week, I think.”

“It's tempting, but ….  I'll talk to you soon,” I said.  We made our goodbyes and I hung up.

Tonight I feel like I'm a long way from home.  

Sunday I headed downtown to crew on a friend's film project.  It was pretty last-minute because a couple of crew members weren't available.  Seeing as it was Easter Sunday, I wasn't too surprised.  We were shooting at a tourist bar on the riverwalk.  Even though we had two hours on premises before they opened for business, the place was a lively echo chamber of raw noise.  Coolers, compressors, ice machines, the screech of stacked metal chairs being dragged across the cement floor, and employees double-checking with one another the daily specials from opposite side of the place.  Blacken tilapia.  But the manager, Mimi, was very accommodating.  We had the upper bar all to ourselves until three, and she kept the music off for us.  There were two shop lights on a single stand.  I bounced them off the ceiling, and then checked it out in my camera's monitor.  There was some pleasing shadows.  But later, I noticed that the other camera had not only not been white balanced, but was cranked opened so the light was flat and unvariegated.  In the interest of civility, I kept my mouth shut.  And in the interest of delivering a better chance of matching these two cameras (of different manufactures), I shifted my settings a bit brighter.

I've mixed feelings about running a two camera shoot.  I've only done it twice.  The first time I was producing and directing a recruitment film for a university's graduate department.  I kept my GL2 on a tripod for all the interviews, and another camera operator used a PD150, keeping it handheld and constantly in motion.  The idea was to be able to generate perfected synched jump cuts.  We fed the audio into the stationary camera.  I did an intriguing and dynamic edit where I desaturated the footage from the moving camera and bled out the edges with a Gaussian blur.  It was funky, but the client chose the more sedate edit which only used the interview footage from the stationary footage.

The second time I used a second camera was in the restaurant scene in my short, “I Do Adore Cream Corn.”  Alston had recently bought a GL2, so I knew the footage would match.  And I plugged both cameras into my field monitor, which takes two feeds.  I could toggled back and forth between cameras A and B, and make sure we were getting visual parity.  I decided on a second camera because I only had the location for two hours, and I needed to shoot about three pages.  The two hours were for set-up, tear-down, and the orchestrating of about a dozen extras and five featured performers.  I planned it out in advance.  Light for wide shots.  Decide which couplets of set-ups would best facilitate in the editing process.  It's a technique that provides certain solutions, while at the same time introducing new problems.  But we moved through without any significant snags.  And, man, we got that stuff done fast, with time to spare.

So, my advice on multiple camera work is to either do it all the time so that you become adept at it, or plan it out damn tight in advance.  Half-assing with two cameras in a run-and-gun approach is guaranteed to bite you when you get around to editing.  Mismatched cameras, different shooters with different aesthetics, compromised lighting, and the occasional redundant angle (“I told you to go wide!” “oh no, you told me to go tight!”).

After the shoot, I headed to Pete and Lisa's for Easter dinner.  When I rang the bell, Cooper flung open the door.  “Uncle Erik, Uncle Erik,” he shouted, as Ripley and Hazel barked and snapped and danced across the foyer. “Uncle Erik, I'm five years old and I've lost two teeth.”  Clearly he knew that I was well aware how old he was.  Pete cleared it up later.  “He's the only one in his class who's lost two teeth.”  So that was it.  He meant he was only five, yet had ALREADY lost two teeth.  Clearly well ahead of the tyke pack.

Earlier, Jean had called.  I told her I'd call her back.  When I got home I climbed under the covers — because it was still freezing — and had a nice long chat about what we've both been up to and what I'm missing out on in Dallas.

Not a bad Easter.  I succeeding in avoiding almost any exposure to Jesus or bunnies.  

It's a miserable cold, sloppy day.  It's 10 at night, 35 degrees.  I don't think it ever got over 45 today.  Those days early in the week that got up to 85 spoiled me.  It's freezing in this place.  I got home from Robin's shoot about an hour ago.  And with the heat up all the way in this drafty place, I'm hunched up at the keyboard, periodically warming my hands with my breath.  It's well into April, this sort of weather is supposed to be little more than a vague, unpleasant memory.

I was far from thrilled getting up this morning at 5:30 to make the 7am call-time in Seguin, but I knew it'd be warmer there then it'd be at my house.  I was correct, and no matter how much our cast and crew carped about the location house being cold, I was happy.  At least I wasn't able to see my breath.

We had five scenes to shoot.  Really, four.  One was broken up by an insert scene.  But we had to drop three scenes (that broken-up one as well as the insert).  It was, as I've more than amply made clear, cold and raining.  So, we didn't bother shooting the bit where DB and the boys are fishing at the river.  And as the scene connected to this exterior bit was where one of the boys brings a wriggling fish into the kitchen — a fish he had just caught from the river —  we found ourselves without the live prop fish.  Someone from Robin or Kevin's family was apparently in the neighborhood dangling a baited hook into the Guadalupe River.  Kevin received the occasional fishing up-date.  It just wasn't happening.  The fish were torpid and huddled down in the mud, probably a good sight more miserable than myself.  So, we concentrated on the two other scenes, and brought in a third, alternate scene.

We began the morning with a night scene in the master bedroom.  We blacked out the windows and threw in some blue-gelled lights to give the impression of moonlight.  We added a practical reading light to warm things up, and let some light spill in from the bathroom.  The information conveyed in this scene is that David and Carol have taken in three young boys until their irresponsible mother can be found.  As David and Carol are starting to get PG frisky, the youngest two boys rush the room and tumble into bed with them, wanting to play and share knock-knock jokes.  As they're led back to their room, the high-strung of the two gets over-excited and vomits.  David escorts the two boys into the bathroom, and the third boy comes in to apologize for his brothers.  And then, David and Carol's granddaughter comes in to see what all the hubbub is about.  When she see the mess on the carpet, she gets grossed out, and also vomits.

It's maybe two and a half pages.  Three at the tops.  Yes, there was a fair amount of blocking.  Six actors, four of them children.  But, damn!, it sure as hell shouldn't have taken us six hours.  I don't know what happened.  (Well, the problem all along has been that we lack a whip-cracking AD.)  We should have knocked that whole scene out in three hours.  It was involved.  But not to that degree.

Here's one thing that worked against us.  We realized that we had significantly fewer pages to shoot because of the weather.  So instead of getting out of there a few hours earlier then our 12 hour maximum day of shooting, we found ourselves in this weird scenario where we kept to that 12 hour schedule and just shot much … much … much … more… slowly.  In fact, we put in a 13 hour day.

We didn't even have a kid vomit on camera.  Not that I thought that we should.  But it would have helped justify that endless scene.  I should point out that we (production/crew) were the problem.  The cast gave us whatever we asked, and never disappointed.  Somehow we just got caught in a funk.

The next scene was more straight-forward.  Less lighting needs.  More simple blocking.  Less dialog.  It still dragged a bit.

Our final scene was the only one I was really satisfied with.  We shot in this incredible bathroom that's bigger then my whole apartment.  It was a short, basic throw-away scene.  It's the other side of a phone conversation which we'd already shot.  The fact is, we could have shot Carol's side of the phone call almost anywhere, but because Robin (wisely) decided to use that amazing bathroom, me and Russ put some significant work into lighting and deciding camera set-ups.  Hell, we already knew we weren't getting out early.  Besides, we were working with Sherri (who plays Carol), and she's getting ready for a bath when the phone rings.  Sherri is a very beautiful woman.  And that's all that is needed to make me and Russ slow down and begin to tinker with lighting and camera set-ups to make the whole scene with the pretty girl as aesthetically pleasing as possible.  I recall that Robin had initially praised the bathroom because it was so large, clean, and white.  But by the time the camera rolled for the first take of the first set-up, we had that bathroom lit warm and intimate.  I mean we had candles around the edge of the tub.  The robe Sherri first had on wasn't working.  Soon we had her wrapped in a towel, and nothing else (well, I suspect Sherri had something on under that towel (we'll analyze the footage later)).  It looked great.  The lighting.  The candles. And, especially, Sherri.  That was the fun scene to shoot.  Cozy, warm, intimate.  And Carol receives a panicky phone call from her daughter.

Things are moving along well.  We only have a handful of shooting days left.  When you run the sorts of feature film productions where the crew are working for free, points, or a pittance, it's often the case that by the halfway mark, the crew is lean, stream-lined … because some people have dropped away.  Often it's understandable.  Things come up in peoples' lives.  Such as, well, paying gigs.  And sometimes you have to be understanding and let these people go do their thing somewhere else.  So, we've become a bit smaller of a production.  Mark is still working on a paid gig.  That's a shame.  I don't know what his specific designation was on Leftovers, but he did a bit of everything.  Perfectly.  Mark is one of those folks who knows all aspects of production.  You need him to do that, he'll do that.  Perfectly.  Mark is worth five standard crew people.  And I'm sure the production he's currently working on has also learned this fact.

Since Mark has been on hiatus, Erin continues to be the most valuable crew member.  Yeah, sure, she's our art department, but she's there when you need her to do everything else.  Said it before, I'll say it again.  Before you have to ask for something, Erin's there with it.  When we were in the cold bedroom (we had to turn off the heater while shooting for audio reasons), poor Sherri was in a skimpy nightgown.  After a take, it became clear we needed to adjust the lighting scheme.  Russ was just about to ask someone to get a blanket for Sherri, and there was Erin, as if by magic, draping a blanket over Sherri's shoulders.  Also, Erin's kid sister Karli is still coming to help us.  She's there with the slate, our little clapper girl:  “Scene 53-G, take 7!”  SNAP!

Man, it's late.  I'm still cold.  Even with my oven broiling with the door open and two burners on high on the range-top.

It's pushing midnight.  And for some reason, I said yes when Matthew Jasso called up yesterday, asking if I could help him shoot a scene for one of his films Sunday morning. That's tomorrow.  Easter Sunday.  8am call time.  My life of pro-bonery never ends.  It'll be beastly cold.  And we'll be shooting in some River Walk bar — it calls itself an Authentic British Pub.  Sounds ghastly.  Don't people realize that the only authentic British pubs are to be found in that island nation, thousands of miles away?  Fuck.  I need to make a stand.  You know, where I refuse to shoot video or film in a location where I'd not otherwise go.  That would rule out all of Bexar County north of highway 410; homes in gated communities; apartment complexes; fast food restaurants; shopping malls; house built after 1940; and god damn quote unquote Authentic British Pubs.

Oh, man.  My bed's going to be so warm and cozy tomorrow morning.

What have I done by saying yes?

Just a quick blog up-date.  It's pushing midnight, and I have to be Seguin in the morning for a seven o'clock call time.

Today was a series of meetings, and many of the people turned out to be related to one another.

I joined Deborah and Ramon for breakfast.  Ramon's usual taqueria was closed for Good Friday.  So we went down the road to another little place on Hilderbrand.  I always enjoy spending time with the two of them.  We discussed letting the San Antonio Museum of Art screen our Dia de los Locos documentary for one of the museum's Family Day programs later this month.  It sounds like a nice idea.

Then I had to head over to Guadalupe street to meet Ramon's son, Juan.  He runs the American Indian's in Texas non-profit.  We discussed a joint program between NALIP and AIT.  I mentioned a documentary filmmaker I was keen to bring in to town.  And, in keeping with NALIP's Meet the Maker film series, we would need a filmmaker with San Antonio connections.  Juan said he'd track down a few leads.  I'll meet with him again Monday to give him a screener copy of the film I'd like at have shown.

And at some point, while driving around, I got a call from Ramon's ex-wife, Gloria.  She's retiring from the IRS (she refers to it as “The Service”) and wants me to put together a photo show of her family's history she can screen at the going-away party.  She dropped off a CD of the images around five and we chatted.  “It's been twenty years,” she told me, referring to her stint with The Service.  I feel like a prisoner finally getting released.”  She paused.  “The only difference is, I get a pension.”

Also, Pete comes by to borrow some wireless mikes from me.  But he phoned later, having some problems with them.  I hope he worked that out.

I met up with Dar, for our weekly hike.  We made the circuit along the River Walk.  She brought me up to speed with her new film festival, SAL (San Antonio Local).  And she mentioned that Dago and Andy have one more day of shooting for their short horror film.

A fairly well-rounded day that a traditional job would have mangled.  Most of these meetings are about small, but still paying jobs.

But now I have to catch some sleep for the larger, non-paying job.  Crack of dawn on the banks of the Guadalupe River. 

Thursday night was the final shooting for Heartcore, the Short Ends Project short film I've been working on.  We had five short scenes to do, and one quick insert for another scene we had already shot).  George and Catherine at Urban-15 were gracious enough to let us shoot at their space.

The first scene was in the basement space.  We needed Adrian, Roze, and Laura walking upstairs with their instruments to play an important gig.  Roze had brought along his fog machine, and we had it cranked up, with a light shining from behind.  It was a very striking shot, the band silhouetted as they vanish into a cloud of smoke.  They pass Carlos (as his menacing character El Picante), who is sitting in the doorway reading a book.  I'd set up a quickie bit of high, raking light onto him.  But before I could get around to fine-tuning it, Russ commented favorably on it.  I walked over and looked at the monitor.  Perfection!  It had this harsh Edward Hopped look.  The lamp painted a perfect, sharp right triangle on the wall behind him.  All very nice.

Next we set up a couple of lights outside the side entrance.  It would serve as our back entrance of a club.  Herman Lira (who's been doing shit-loads of animation work on George Cisneros' current Somos Project) was just clocking out for the night.  We conscripted him to play our door man.  He's a filmmaker himself, so he quickly understood what we wanted from him.  Also, I make a little cameo as the club owner, but because of my poor acting skilled I have yet had the stomach to look at the footage.

And finally, we did a couple of scenes in the parking-lot with Thorne playing a sketchy character who steals equipment out of the band's van.  He'd previously been studying this real person we all had seen at one of our locations from the other week.  And when I told him he could get in costume, I wasn't quite prepared for the transformation.  Pretty damn impressive.  He really got the essence of the guy, with his own particular spin added to it.  I really wish we'd thought to get a photo.

The night went a little long, and we kept some people there longer than I had planned (thanks for hanging in there with us, Laura), but we got some good shots out of it.

But the time I got home, I realized I'd been running all day with no lunch or dinner.  I scarfed down a banana and hit the sack.

Back to Leftovers.  I had Saturday off.  And I had a leisurely day of video editing, bike riding, and film viewing in the evening at the Blue Star Brewery.

But this morning I was up at 5:30, to give myself time to conjure up a mammoth cup of espresso, shower, load up a few pieces of film equipment, full up at the gas station, and head out on that drive to Seguin.

It was a light day.  I'd checked the script against the daily schedule posted on the Nation's Entertainment Group web-page.  It looked to me like a scant 1 2/8 pages.  I was pretty close.  We also picked up a couple of shots we missed in previous days.

The low page count, I assumed, was because of cast conflicts.

We started out with a tiny scene which serves as a morning establishing shot.  Tasha comes out to pick up the newspaper.  Simple enough, one would think.  But as I'm unloading equipment from various cars, I notice that the big crane on loan from NewTek is being assembled by Kevin and Russ.  We had it set up on a smooth paved driveway.  Russ wanted to pan, rise, and roll.  Well, the crane was indeed mounted on a wheeled tripod.  It seemed theoretically doable.  I was the one pushing the tripod in a slow, gentle arc.  Slow and gentle, I'm not so sure.  I hope it didn't shake the camera too much.  We did about seven takes.  Erin's sister Carly came to help out (she's been on set before, and her willingness to return may well mean that a second member of the Gray family has been pulled into the dark arts of movie making).  Carly took over with the slate.  It seems we've lost Mark — one of our most dependable stalwarts.  He was offered a paying gig, so I can hardly blame him.

The next scene was about a page.  Tasha, DB, and Ayla.  Ayla's fishing a bit away from Tasha and DB who are having an exchange of dialog.  Me and Russ set the crane on a wooden deck out over the river, maybe six feet above the water.  There are two smaller piers down at about water lever on each side of the deck.  Robin wanted Ayla to be fishing on a lower pier, while the adults are up on the deck.  I didn't like the lighting situation.  The pier was in full daylight.  The deck had a nice dappling of shade from a big pecan tree.  The initial plan was to use the crane as a jib, following DB from Ayla (he had just finished helping her stab a worm on her hook) as he then walked up to the deck to talk to Tasha about her trepidation concerning her enrollment in medical school.  But the camera was following DB from full-bore sunlight, to shade.  It wasn't looking good.  I mentioned that if we waited long enough, we'd have shade on the deck and both piers.  But Russ wasn't listening to me.  No one was.  There were these horrendous shouts from next door, as a couple of kids were screaming like they had decided to rub jalapeno juice in one another's eyes.  Russ trotted over to the fence line to appeal to their … well, they're kids — maybe he was just going to threaten them or ask if their parents were around.  I don't know what the parley was all about, but the hysterics pretty much subsided.  While this was going on, I wandered over to the other pier, to see how it might look as a crane placement.  It gave a beautiful view of the sun reflecting off the rippling water and onto the underside of the deck.  I was thinking of having Ayla do her fishing over on this other pier.  I waved Russ over.

He saw something I hadn't.  He say Ayla.  She was sitting over on her pier, waiting on us.  She was wonderfully framed by the deck.  We dragged the crane over to the far pier.  I hooked up my field monitor, and Russ showed me what he was thinking of.  He dropped the crane so that the camera was inches above the water.  And, from that warm, rustic shot of Ayla with her fishing-pole, Russ barked at DB to get onto Ayla's pier.  He did so.

“Let's see this,” Russ said, more to himself than to me.  He was lost in the possibility of the shot.  “DB,” he shouted, “Walk up and around to the deck, and go stand beside Tasha.”  DB got it.  He tousled Ayla's hair, keeping in character, and as he walked off the pier and up the small hill to the deck, Russ simply raised the crane.  The camera passed close to the edge of the deck, and suddenly we were looking at Tasha's feet, and following up her body as DB came into frame, laying his hand on her shoulder.  It was a beautiful, intimate establishing shot.  We did several takes, and then we moved off the crane, for more traditional camera placements to shoot Tasha and DB's conversation.

There was a moment where we were waiting on something.  Makeup?  Equipment to be moved?  Something.  Ayla was poking into the Styrofoam cup of dirt that held our prop worms.  I guess Robin had bought them from some fishing shop.  Ayla had one dangling up close to her face, sizing it up.  She mentioned that she'd acted in the movie How to Eat Fried Worms.  (Clint Howard keeps popping up in this blog, and I can't seen to stop it.)  She mentioned some other kid actor in the film who ate a worm.  I guess it was part of the script, rather than behind-the-scenes high-jinks, but I was only half listening.

“I'll lick this worm for a dollar,” she suddenly said.

That got my attention.  Ayla's, um, I guess about 12?  And like a lot of child actors, she can slip into a comfortable rapport with adults.  Don't get me wrong, she's as professional as they come, but she knew we are waiting on something that kept us from shooting.  Often these sorts of lulls are those wonderful moments on set where an actor shows a talent unknown to the production.  Singing, juggling, what have you.  And Ayla was willing to lick a live worm for a dollar.

Now, for a bit of disclosure.  I know that Ayla's mother subscribes to my blog.    And she's clearly aware of her daughter's quirky sense of humor and her general playfulness.  But I wonder, has Ayla told her folks the story?  I'm thinking yes, in graphic detail.

“A dollar?” Russ mused.  “I know Erik would do it for five dollars, or a plate of cheese enchiladas at Tito's Tacos ….  But one dollar?”  He fished in his pockets.  “I happen to have a one dollar bill.”

Ayla nodded.  The girl is fearless.

Russ started his camera rolling.  Ayla held up the worm for the camera.  It was all glistening and wriggling.  She slowly ran that worm along her tongue with a big defiant smile.  She dropped the worm back into the styrofoam cup of dirt, and, in one smooth motion, she allowed her hand to cross the camera and pull the dollar bill from Russ' hand, displaying it close beside her face.

“It's money in the bank,” she said with a grin.  She gave that dollar a couple of snaps — the sort of behavior of one who is absolutely in control of the situation.

Whatever was holding us up was at the moment being resolved.  Ayla announced that she had no pockets.  Who would be so kind as to hold her winnings?  Robin stepped forward and put the dollar bill in her pocket.

Ayla dropped back into her position on the pier and was back into character before we the rest of us were ready.

The remainder of the scene went great.

At the end of the day, I was packing the light kits.  Robin wandered by, and suddenly I heard her mutter to herself, “Oh, no.”

I looked up.

She slowly pulled a hand from her pocket.  When I saw that dollar bill, I just started laughing.

That poor girl was long gone.

I told Robin she should keep that ill-gained dollar.  Frame it.  When the IRS comes by to scrutinize her book-keeping (god forbid), she can point out that dollar on the wall to the auditor.

“You think you can just waltz in here with your pen-protector and hundred dollar calculator and I'll start to tremble and scribble you out a fucking check?  Look at that dollar bill.  It was my second feature film.  And I got a 12 year-old actress to lick a worm for that dollar.  She did.  Yeah, little Ayla Judson.  That's right, THE Ayla Judson.  And who has that dollar now?  I'll tell you who has that dollar now!  I do!”

Saturday night was another great video slam.  NALIP does these things quarterly, and they never disappoint.  This was one of the best yet, and I've been going to them for at least three years.  I learned early on that is was a good venue to get a guaranteed second local screening of the short films I've done for the Short Ends Projects group.

I'd like to thank Lee, in his blog, for already writing about the event.  Not only did he have a few warm words concerning the short documentary I screened (thank you so much, Lee), but he also seems to have been taking notes (or in possession of a great memory), thus saving me tortuous minutes trying to recall what was shown.

The evening started out with my friend Jorge Lopez, screening a music video of the band Frequencia.  I had seen some of an early edit, and he's really tightened it up.  Good work, Jorge!

Then my piece screened.  And all my fears of my home-burned DVD freezing up, turned out to be nothing more than my own empty paranoia.

Bryan Ortiz showed Goodbye Digital.  A clever, simple piece, perfect to be shown on Valentines Day … or Halloween.  It's pretty much a tightly edited monologue of a harmless geek tossing his bait of love into the incognizant waters of internet dating services.  Bryan is the only actor in screen.  His comedic timing is impeccable.  The filmmaker / producer team of Bryan Ortiz and Michael Druck is poised to knock this town on its ass.

Next was PrimaDonna Production's poetry video (a music video, but with a poem being delivered by founder of the local Sun Poet's Society, Rod C. Stryker), Rio Grande Odyssey.  Chadd Green directed this one, and it's slick and polished.  I remember Nikki and Chadd asking if I could help them shoot it.  I was otherwise employed or swamped.  And so they got AJ Garces to shoot and edit the piece.  Good call.  I wouldn't have done such a stellar job.

Nunca Sabes, by Bryan Ramirez of Irez Productions, also screened.  This was the third time I've seen this one.  The first time I was a judge for the Cine FEstival at the Guadalupe.  We judges unanimously said yes.  And I saw it later when it screened at the festival.  And it held up quite well on a third viewing.  This time around I took the time to concentrate on the excellent acting, especially of the brutal security guard.

Some guy by the name of Jon Simpkins (again, Lee, thanks for all your attention to detail — I wanted to remember this guy's name), did a hilarious short narrative comedy called 2 x 4s and Time Machines.  It was a perfect example of the strength of a good story, even if you don't have a budget or scads of cutting-edge equipment.  A guy builds a time machine in his garage with planks, duct tape, and a double A battery.  Very wry, goofy, deadpan humor.

Then there was a meditation of the history and cultural significance of Chihuahuas by a woman whose name eludes me.  I first met her at the Adelante Film Forum.  Anyway, it was a very warm, engaging documentary / essay piece, superbly edited and structured.  TJ Gonzales (our Master of Ceremonies), pointed out to the audience after the credits rolled, that this was her first film.  Very impressive.

And there was another piece by a filmmaker whose name I didn't catch.  He edited comedy routines by Bill Hicks and Denis Leary, showing how shamelessly Leary stole Hick's material.  It was too long, and hardly the sort of thing you could try and sell (a nightmare with regards to clearing copyrights) — but the truth is, if all the films screened Saturday had been posted on YouTube, this is the one that would get more hits than all the others together … by a factor of a hundred.

Vincent Moreno was a new artist to me.  He showed us a work in-progress titled Mankind's Odyssey.  He introduced it by saying that he only recently got around to watching Kubrick's 2001.  He did his own take on that film's trippy visual journey beyond the physical universe.  There was a series of kaleidoscopic images set to a piece of music by Ligeti.  It was that sort of over-blown pretentious stuff I love, and so rarely see these days among filmmakers.  The swirling colorful abstract images eventually gave way to coastal shots of Mexico, distressed with color-shifting, negative images, solarization, et al.  I loved every second of it.  And the applause that followed encouraged me that there was still an audience for smart, aesthetically rich experimental video work.  Moreno answered a few technical questions by some of his envious fellow filmmakers.  Swirling galactic clouds?  Easy.  Video tape soy milk slowly poured into a glass tank of water.

The evening closed with The Second Coming by Ya'Ke.  I missed the opportunity to see Hope's War last year, which received nothing but high praise.  This film was a student piece he did at UT.  It's a powerful, spare piece.  A simple direct story perfectly executed.  It has a violent scene that isn't bogged down with that sort of shit seen in so many other films by young, beginning filmmakers; it's honest, integral to the plot, with no kung fu or zombies.

Bryan Ortiz and Michael Druck won the best of the night.  TJ presented them with some sort of big chocolate easter thing, wrapped in pastel cellophane.

A very inspiring night of films and videos.

A very unproductive day.  I'm waiting on pieces of info for two paid projects I'm currently working on.  So mainly I did laundry and transfered a couple of video projects to DVD (the San Miguel de Allende documentary as well as the short experimental piece I did with some of the stray just-for-fun footage I shot in San Miguel — I need to send copies down to some of the film folks in San Miguel to set up a screening).  But these are basically things one does that involve simply pushing buttons (making DVDs and doing laundry) … and waiting.  So I read a few short stories from R.B. Cunninghame Graham's collection, “Progress.”  He's one of those great authors that no one reads anymore.

It's been raining steadily these last two days.  I've barely felt like venturing out.  But as 6pm neared, I headed over to the Esperanza Center for day 5 of Cine Mujer.  I'm constantly amazed how rarely I see local filmmakers at any of the film festivals and film events in this town.  I mean, there must be two dozen organizations that put on film events in this city.  (That came out sounding a bit of hyperbole — but I just now took pen to 3×5 card and, in two minutes, scribbled down 12 established annual film festivals in this city, and three new ones I know of that will premier this year; add to that SEP, IFMASA, the NALIP events, film programs at the Mexican Cultural Institute, monthly screenings on “the Slab,” and the miscellany at the dozen colleges and universities in Bexar County.)  Those people who bemoan the paucity of art events in this city are clearly living in some fanciful damp place teeming with grubs and earwigs, awaiting that wondrous day when that large stone overhead is lifted up and away.

Tonight I finally saw some familiar faces from the local film scene at the Esperanza.  Dora and Manuel Pena made it around eight o'clock.

For those San Antonians who don't venture far from the comfort of the grubs and earwigs, you might not be aware that Dora Pena promises to become one of the more important local filmmakers.  Her short film “Crazy Life” is impressive stuff.  She's currently working on a feature, and I predict it will easily kick all our asses.  So, damn, people, get out their and don't miss out on all this stuff.

But I digress.

Cine Mujer.

The evening opened with “100% Woman.”  This is an hour-long documentary about Michelle Dumaresq, a Canadian professional downhill cyclist who was born Michael Dumaresq.  It's more than just an “over-coming adversity” story.  Sure, there's that, but we also are pulled along on a series of races where we see her trying to deal with a more prosaic adversity — she's trying to win.  There's a fine-line this film walks between Dumaresq being a trailblazing transgender professional athlete, and the constant animosity many female racers — who are clearly feminists — have towards her.  Like all great biographic documentaries, I left it with a sense that I had spend some quality time with an extraordinary individual.

“In the Tall Grass” is an hour-long documentary about reconciliation courts in Rwanda — one of the tools with which the country hopes to begin the process of recovering from the genocide of the mid-90s.  This film concentrates on one case in a rural village where one woman confronts the man, a neighbor, she claims murdered her husband and children.  It's powerful stuff.

We then moved to the third film of the night.  If the genocide of Rwanda didn't get you pulling your hair, you were hit again with “Rosita.”  This is another hour-long documentary.  Rosita is a Nicaraguan girl who, when she was nine years old, traveled to Costa Rica with her parents who went to work on the coffee plantations. Rosita was raped and became pregnant.  It's not so dreary a film as it sounds.  The story is really about how the impoverished parents fought to get their daughter — a second-grader — an abortion, whilst the governments of two nations and the Catholic Church fought them every step of the way.  The film somehow manages to remain upbeat throughout.

There followed two shorts.  “Andaluz” is a 6 minute animated piece of colorful changing images and shapes.  Very pretty.  It was followed by “The Dangers of Smoking,” which was a student project which had a good idea (a humorous surreal interlude where a little girl falls into a creek while her mother has turned away to block the wind as she lights a cigarette).  But the piece suffers flat lighting and poor photography.

The last film of the evening was a feature, “Cave of the Yellow Dog.”  It's directed by Byambasuren Davaa, a Mongolian woman, who after working in her country's television industry, moved to Germany to study film.  The credits of this movie give the impression of a Mongolian / German collaboration.  The story is about a nomadic Mongolian family.  Their oldest daughter, who can't be more than seven, finds an abandoned dog on the desolate and beautiful steppes while she's out gathering sheep dung for fuel.  Her father wants her to get rid of the dog.  It's a simple conflict.  And that's all you need.  It is one of the most beautiful movies I've seen in years.  The countryside is breath-taking.  As are the people, and their exquisitely-designed possessions.  The mother, father, two daughters, and baby son, are, I believe, all truly related.  And I'm wondering if they might actually be a nomadic, herding family.  One of the things that makes this movie so wonderful, is the extraordinary performances by these children who are so young.  It's currently my favorite G-rated film.  If it's available for rental, check it out.

While “Cave of the Yellow Dog” was playing, I heard this fainting thrumming.  “Wow,” I thought, “that's some killer foley work.  It sounds like those rain drops are hitting the ground fat and heavy.”  It was a scene of the husband preparing to head to the nearest town to sell some sheep skins.  The camera  switched to a close-up of the wife.  But their clothes weren't wet and it wasn't raining.  You see, it was raining in San Antonio.  I was listening to a fresh thunderstorm hammering on the roof of the Esperanza.  And then I realized why this sound was actually familiar.  I used to live in a space with the same sort of roof.  An 1920s era industrial warehouse with a wood beam and slat ceiling, with a roof of sheet tin covered with tar and gravel.  It's actually a very peaceful, comforting sound.  The rain drops fall with a muffled “puff” “puff”.  There was a time in the film where it really did begin to rain.  And when the movie rain finally ended, one of the characters said, “the rain has stopped.”  At the moment the rain also stopped in San Antonio.  Wonderful and freaky.

After the film, me and Alston stood up and walked toward the stairs.  One of the Esperanza people picked up a microphone and alerted us to the fact that the building was built on a dip in San Pedro Street, and there was some flooding.  She said that the Esperanza Center would be more than happy to drive us, a few at a time, to the flooded parking lot.

Me and Alston rolled our eyes.  It's just water.

But when we stepped outside and looked toward San Pedro, we saw the flood waters.  We had both parked on the other side of the building.  Neither of us wanted to splash through two feet of water to get to our cars.  The rain was just a mist.  We decided to walk around the block.  Graciela Sanchez, the director of Esperanza, asked the two of us if we wanted to cadge a ride to the parking-lot.  We were feeling adventurous, so we smiled and said we'd walk.

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A bit last minute, I know, but to those readers who are local, I'll be screening my “Dia de los Locos” documentary tomorrow night –that's Saturday night, March 31st — at the Blue Star Brewing Company, which is in the Blue Star Arts Complex on S. Alamo.  Head to the back room.  This is part of the NALIP spring video slam.  It's free this time around.  NALIP members get screened first.  But please come on down and bring a DVD if you have one.  We are all hoping to see something new, fresh, exciting.

Hope to see some of you there.  Unless, you know, you're really happy hanging out with the grubs and the earwigs.

Another night at the Esperanza for Cine Mujer.

The evening's fare opened with a hour long documentary called “Mom's Apple Pie,” which chronicled the Lesbian Mothers National Defense Fund (LMNDF).  As   the history of a grassroots activist organization, it was very well done.  But I agreed with Alston when she wished they'd done more interviews with the children stuck in the middle of the custody cases which the LMNDF did it's best to advocate for the lesbian mother.

“Pura Lengua” was a slick narrative short  (11 minutes).  The story involves a woman being rejected by her girlfriend — and anger, mixed with one beer too many, sets into action further degradation.  The framing device of the whole piece is when the lead character walks into a coffee shop to give a poetry reading, and when she turns around, the crowd sees her bruised and cut face.  We jump into flashbacks  The camera work and editing really impressed me.  It's nice to see that the writer was also the cinematographer.  Writer/cinematographer, that's a double-barrel vocation I would certainly want to aspire to — particularly, if the end result of my work resembled the professionalism of “Pura Lengua.”

Following “Pura Lengua,” we had a reading of a work in progress by Adelina Anthony.  It's a theater piece called “Bruising for Besos.”  I'd never heard of her before, but she hails from San Antonio's southside, and currently calls Los Angeles home.  She had done some sort of comedy act earlier this week at UTSA — I guess this was “Master Sex and Tortillas” I'd seen mentioned somewhere.  She's a hell of a performer; and as a writer, she possesses a perfect sense of rhythm.  She knows how to pull her punches — hold back so that the understatement carries the emotion and the humor.  Maybe 20 percent was in Spanish, and I could follow some of that — but the juicier stuff (doubtless idiomatic phrases) were lost one me, but certainly not the majority of the audience who were laughing in wild-eyed gleefulness: “Did she just say THAT??”  Her depictions of love and lust, and the more mundane, non-romantic experiences of a gay Chicana, were wryly and cleverly conveyed to the audience.  As Alston whispered to me, “Why are all the good local artists living in LA?”  Yeah.  I can understand the impetus for the exodus (a great name for a Klezmer band), but it still sucks.

“I Wonder What You Will Remember of September” brought us back into films.  It's a sloppy 27 minute experimental documentary which attempts to thematically link the USA trauma of September 11, 2001, with Chile's black day of September 11, 1973, when Pinochet pushed through his coup.  It's a good concept.  But this film has no focus.  The filmmaker has some interviews of her parents who lived through the coup.  Her dad came close to becoming one of the disappeared.  That should have been the story.  Something personal.  A family event.  Authentic and powerful.

“House of Sand.”  This feature-length narrative closed the night.  It's a Brazilian film directed by Andrucha Waddington that lasts 103 minutes, that feels like 203 minutes.  I'm not opposed to long, slow films.  This one is beautifully photographed.  The first 45 minutes is brilliant.  Set in the first decade of the 20th century, an older man drags his young pregnant wife and her mother into an inhospitable stretch of sand dunes to homestead.  He dies and they find themselves trapped.  It has certain properties of “The Piano,” as well as some Latin American magical realism novels.  The camera work is flawless.  And the protagonist and her mother give solid performances.  I just looked them up.  They are famous Brazilian actresses, and are actually mother and daughter in real life.  Both myself and Alston were somewhat disappointed with the film, but as I only talked with Alston as I walked her to her car, we didn't get to hash it out too much.  It might have some flaws, but I think it's a great film, if only for it's breathtaking aesthetic elements.

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Since this afternoon, I've been getting text messages from Carlos.  I don't know how to respond to a text message, nor do I want to know how.  Why should I learn how to type with my thumb, when I can just call you and use my voice?

Anyway, he's in Austin, attending the gala opening of “Grindhouse,” the double feature production directed, one by Tarantino, the other by Rodriguez.  Carlos was in whichever has zombies.

The first text was something about how he was drinking in a bar in Austin.  Then I got some joke about “okay, a hippy walks into a bar.” And then, an hour later, I get something that may have been the punch line.  But I didn't quite get the humor.  Or maybe a hippy really did walk into the bar.  It's Austin, right?  An Austin bar where a hippy wouldn't walk into, would have to be located in some parallel universe.

But I hope Carlos has fun.  And I hope he gets drunk and makes a scene.  Because, hell, Tarantino and Rodriguez clearly don't need more people kissing their asses.