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.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

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.

@@@@@@@@@

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.

This week the Esperanza Center is running its annual Cine Mujer film festival.  I'd missed it the last two years.  It's a week of films by and about women, with an emphasis on the global peace and justice movements.  And it's free.  Monday, March 26th through Sunday, April 1st.  Over thirty films: shorts, features, documentaries, narrative films, and experimental work.  I missed yesterday's opening night, but I made it to tonight's screening with my friend Alston.

I like the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center because they are always pissing people off.  Maybe, on occasion, they alienate those kindred individuals and organizations who are philosophically in agreement with them … but, the problem is, I still haven't lived in this town long enough to work out all the history and back stories of how San Antonio cultural non-profits interact.  You know, all the bad blood and the petty bullshit.  But, damn, Esperanza runs some great art events, especially films with a radical of progressive edge.

Tonight the program opened with a grouping of three shorts.  “Bingo Nation” took a lighthearted look at a bingo parlor and the women who obsessively show up to win.  This ain't no quilting bee.  One of Alston's friends — a woman named Frieda, who is, I'm guessing, 70ish — came and sat with us.  As the end credits rolled on the bingo film, I heard her whisper to Alston:  “Oh, my.  I hope I don't become like that.”

“Light As A Feather / Heavy As Lead” was a video montage of a performance piece where a woman in a Puritan dress is submerged in a giant fish-tank as a poem was read about testing for witches (you know, float or sink) … as well as other metaphors.  Visually, it has a wonderful element of ritual.  The glass tank, the black dress, the audience sitting on the floor in the background … and the tank was just large enough so that the woman in the dress could maneuver in a gentle choreography, with the dress billowing around her like a jellyfish.

“Clean” is a work in progress from a local artist who I've not heard of.  Julia Barbosa Landois.  I'm curious as to why an unfinished 6 minute piece was submitted, unless the artist is a friend of the Esperanza Center.  It's a poem about the eradication of that which is unwanted.  And that which society wants cleansed isn't always what the individual herself wants cleansed.  The cleansing metaphor is the egg ritual used by curanderas.  We watch as a woman (the artist?) rubs herself with an egg.  It's a visually stunning piece.  The poem works fine.  But I don't need to see a six minute work in progress.  Go ahead and finish it before showing it to an audience.

“Black and White.”  A 17 minute piece about the relationship between photographer and model.  The two subjects of this piece are from New Zealand.  The model is Mani Bruce Mitchell, who is designated as “intersex,” what some might call an hermaphrodite.  The photographer is Rebecca Swan.  Mani appeared in one of Rebecca's books, and filmmaker Kirsty MacDonald showed up as they were working on a second book.  It's a wry and moving little film that probably would have lost focus or turned mawkish were it longer.

“Look Us In the Eye: The Old Women's Project.”  About thirty minutes of old women talking about their political activism.  They're funny, mildly crass, and have been working in the trenches of political activism even before they turned old.  The core group is just three.  And often they organize events with hundreds showing up.  There was a little clip of a young woman who, and here I paraphrase, praised the three leaders of the Old Women's Project as: “They're hilarious — they bring this wonderful combination of levity and gravitas.”  There's the quote for the DVD box.

“Transitional Tradeswomen.”  This is a feature-length documentary on female construction workers in Asia.  The piece was directed by an American construction worker and trade union activist.  It was okay, but could easily have been twenty minutes shorter.  There were some technical problems that were very intrusive. Someone needs to give Vivian Price a grant to re-edit this piece.  The information is great, but the final product is a mess.

“Border Cafe.”  This was the only narrative of the night.  It's an Iranian feature film about a recently widowed woman trying to run a restaurant which serves tourists and truck drivers on the north-western frontier of Iran.  It's a wonderful little film.  And I think it's crucial for American audiences to see films like this which have been produced in those countries which we deem our enemies.  What “Border Cafe” shows us is an Iran which is willing to admit that it has problems with gender equality, the inflexibility of Koranic law, and occasional repressive behavior with movement through its borders.  International films are a great panacea for the obscene Yankee propaganda that makes us think that the devil resides in occupied Palestine, Cuba, Iran, Venezuela, and whatever current region of this planet onto which our country's executive office has turned a suspicious eye.

I'm going to Cine Mujer tomorrow night.  Be there or be square.  I did say it was free, right?  No excuses, mofos.  

I started riding mountain bikes about ten years ago when a touring cycle I had back then was ripped off from a garage apartment I called home during my Fort Worth years.  I decided to make the move to the studier frame and the fatter tires so I wasn't constantly judging whether the pothole or sewer grating coming up on me and fast was to be feared or sneered at.  One Peugeot trail bike later, I sneered at all obstacles and I never looked back.  Often people give me hints as to challenging trails they think I'd love to explore, zooming along loose and bumpy terrain. That's not my bag.  Unpaved fire roads in state parks are fine, but I'm not in it for the adrenaline rush.  The bottom line is I'm too fat and clumsy to venture on the rougher trails — except very slowly.  And today, while on an unpaved path atop the levy of the San Antonio River just behind Mission San Juan, I decided to take the incline down to the grassy floodplain.  It was hardly what you'd call steep, and the gravel surface seemed innocuous enough.  But halfway down I realized the recent rains had loosened the larger rocks.  Also, heavy dredging machinery had used this road, tearing it up even more.  I kept my focus on that area just around the front wheel.  A bad call.  You really need to take stock of the next ten or twenty feet.  I saw a chunk of limestone a smidge bigger than a softball.  I swerved and rolled over a section of wood the size of a tallboy.  The gravel was too loose to brake hard.  And then I saw that I was heading for a section where the “gravel” was nothing but those softball-sized chunks of limestone.  I tried to push on through, but by them I was bouncing too much.

On those rare occasions when I lose control of a bicycle, it's always a smooth separation; like the lower stages of a Saturn V, the bike just falls away from me as I somehow manage to launch myself into unencumbered freefall.

I love those magical moments.  I was laughing as I sent a lone expletive toward the sky.  I'm not sure how fast adrenaline hits the bloodstream, but the rush hit me then, truer than were it delivered by a hypo.  I reached out with my left hand to brace for impact onto the rocks — and there was a smooth interval of time where I turned to smile at the bicycle rotating above me, heading toward the grass, and then I looked back down and watched a rock-strewn puddle rush up at me.  I skidded first on my left palm (padded by my glove), and them I took most of the impact on my shoulder, splashing down into the muddy water.

And then time was back to normal as I found myself back up on my feet, grinning like an idiot.  I picked up the bike and continued along the path, walking it beside me.

My iPod continued playing Christine by the band Deckard, but it wasn't meshing with my mood, so I switched it off.

This is exactly why people ride bikes down mountains … on purpose.  A spill isn't really a bad thing.  The biggest problem with a surge of adrenaline after you crash, is waiting to see what the real damage is.  This whole hormonal component of the fight or flight reflex keeps one in the dark — the pain comes later.  Sometimes not for hours.  But that all was seven hours ago, and it looks like I lucked out.  Just a stiff thumb.

And Drew, if you're reading this, the bike I'm borrowing from you, came through it all unscathed.  Kudos to the lowly Schwinn.

@@@@@@@@@@@@

I was able to enjoy a Saturday on the bike trail because the shooting for Leftovers took a weekend off.  When Robin called me the other day, I was a bit baffled.  No movie?  What was I to do?  My weekends had been filled with production for — well, it seemed like a very long time.  Besides, I'm not a fan of weekends.  When given the choice, I prefer working on weekends and taking off a couple of weekdays.  Weekends are crammed with a bunch of assholes running around getting in my way.  But what am I griping about?  My current status of self-employment allows me to enjoy my weekdays to the full.  So, really, today was just another day.  I worked on the Josiah Festival.  And I laid out a course for the up-coming NALIP Meet-the-Maker film series I'm curating.  It's too early to starting talking much about my plans until I speak Monday or Tuesday with our nonprofit co-sponser.  And I still need to contact the filmmaker I want to bring to town.

I've been lucky enough to have friends who have provided financial assistance to get me through this rough patch.  But I'm currently working on three different film events — all with budgets!  The payment might come slowly on two of them, but I've got some breathing room.

Now what am I doing tomorrow?  I know I'm not making a movie ….  Oh, actually, this will be the first time in over a month I'll be able to go to Pepe's Cafe for their Sunday lunch special of Enchiladas Verde.  And that, my friend, is the cornerstone of any successful Sunday.  That is, for us unbelievers — hellbound, perhaps, but definitely well-fed.

I've come to the realization that I do indeed have a problem.  That's the first step, or so I've heard.  Last night I found myself without my computer, and thus, internet access. All it took was several ounces of hibiscus tea, sticky with a super-saturation of sugar, spilled across my keyboard.  I sponged, rinsed, and dried the board with a box fan set on a gentle breeze.  But nothing could bring it back.  These are the times one realizes the depths of ones internet dependency.

It was like some life-affirming PSA.  While the fan was doing its work, I sat down on my porch to enjoy a perfect night.  I watched as a curious skunk waddled across Jerry's yard and between the fence slates to nose around in Hope's rose garden.  A frisky rat scampered along the telephone line above my driveway, and leapt into Marlyss' palm tree.  Matt came out to put his trash on the curb, and we chatted.  He said he's leaving at the end of the month to move into a small house over near Brakenridge Park.  Phil stopped for a moment while out walking his dog. He give us an update on his inept contractors who have pulled up his kitchen floor yet seem not to know how to put in a new one.  Phil and Cutesy padded off down the street and Matt told me that the firm he works for, Lake Flato (one of the more reputable architectural firms in the country), was currently involved in only one local project.  It's that cool four story building off the river walk where the Circus Museum used to be.  And years earlier, it was the downtown branch of the public library.  He suggested that I give him a call next week, and he could tour me around inside.  I sure as hell will.  It's done in a style I have a weakness for.  What I refer to as Nuremberg Gothic.  That depression era style with clean lines and just a hint of deco.  It's Empire Period placed in the hands of the WPA.  At that moment five cyclists with halogen lamps strapped to their heads glided past, their skinny tires make no more noise than a dog passing gas.  Wow.  There's just all this stuff going on around me that isn't associated with a www.  How quaint. How empowering.

The next morning I gulped down my espresso and choked down a couple of oat cakes while I sat at my desk where — any other morning — I'd be reading foreign papers online, or listening to recent archived shows from Pacifica Radio.  When I'd finished my breakfast I drove out to Office Depot.  They had a few relatively cheap keyboards with USP connections which professed to be Mac compatible.  They had the aesthetic appeal of a parsnip.  But it was the best I could do.  I sure as hell wasn't driving to the Apple Store.  The pretentious hellhole was way up in La Cantera shopping center — a place which has the same effect on me as when vampires inadvertently stumble onto consecrated ground.

Well, my new keyboard (branded with the word “Microsoft” in 72 point type) worked straight out of the box.  But my old beautiful Mac keyboard had come with additional USB ports on the upper rail. Two of them.  One I used for my mouse.  The other for my jump drive.  But now, I have to plug my mouse into the second USP port on my CPU, just below my keyboard feed.  And that's all I have.  Two.  Until I figure this out, I'm SOL when is comes to my printer and my jump drive.

Apple, Microsoft … why can't you boys just learn to play together?

At least I have a keyboard.  My shakes were beginning to level off when Pete stopped by.  He was working a bartender gig at some sports event at the Alamo Dome.  He, understandably, cringed at the thought of 10 dollar parking.  So I drove him to the entrance, and said I'd await his call to pick him up.  Maybe not until midnight.  That sounded like one damn long day.  I hoped he'd get a mountain of tips.

Back home I waited on news from one of my actors to see if things were go for tonight's final shoot for my Short Ends short film.  When I found out it was a no-go, I started making the calls to cast and crew.  With those fires out, I headed over to Urban-15 to see how things were coming with this film festival I'm coordinating for them.  George was over at the Smithsonian (the San Antonio annex) working on his installation piece.  So, Catherine helped me get access to their website's mail server so I can begin adding contact emails to the address book in anticipation of the first wave of calls for entry.  She explained that their web-master would be by around 6.  I told her I'd try and make it back then, but I had a few things to do.

Things like stock up on coffee.  That internet withdrawal had been harrowing enough, but I sure as hell wasn't going to wake up Friday with nothing but herbal tea.

After my shopping trip, Russ dropped by.  He'd spent a long day teaching at Harlendale.  I told him we'd not be shooting, so we might as well grab a late lunch at Tito's Tacos.

At Tito's, Russ entered ahead of me.  He chose a booth and took a seat, forcing me to take the opposite side, in line of sight of the TV.  I want an absolute moratorium on TVs in restaurants.  When did this happen?  And why?  Anyway, it was the news.  Some crap about Anna Nicole Smith's mom.  Won't these people ever go away?  I kept trying to look away — but, like most Americans, I was practically raised by the TV.  And then I saw Tim Gerber.  He was standing in front of the Alamo Dome, cautioning commuters to take an alternate route, because this big sports event was causing a major cluster fuck (though I believe he used a different phrase).  It's always a treat to see someone you know on television (unless, you know, they kill someone or embezzle from an orphanage).  Tim's the hubby of actress Anne Gerber, and he always appears so relaxed, doing his schtick effortlessly.  How refreshing.  Most news folks come across as smarmy jackasses.  You just wanna smack them.  Not Tim.  Yeah, he can put that on his CV.  “I do not want to smack Tim Gerber,” –Erik Bosse.

After the overload of cheese enchiladas at Tito's, I waved goodbye to Russ and checked my email.  It was pushing eight.  I felt over-fed and bloated, but decided to head on over to Casa Chiapas (which was pretty much across the street from Tito's — but hell, they are both in my neighborhood).  NALIP was having a member meeting.  It started at 6:30. But when I got there, things were still in progress.  Seven people sat around the table in the back room.  I wasn't surprised by the low turnout.  I got the email yesterday.  It was Roger Castillo, Lisa Cortez-Walden, TJ Gonzalez, Robb Garcia, Dora and Manuel Pena, and some guy whose name escapes me.  They were in mid-meeting, so I took a seat a bit back, and tried to get up to speed.  They were mostly talking about the recent national conference many of them had attended in California.  When Lisa mentioned something about one of the upcoming film series that needed attention, I piped in that if they needed help, I could organize it.  I was already gearing into event manager mode with the Josiah Festival and the 48 Hour Film Project.  She shrugged.  Prez Roger said, sure.  Then I learned it was a paid curator position.  Not a lot of money, but something.  I guess it was a good thing I showed up.

I headed home and lounged around until midnight when Pete called.  I drove to the Alamo Dome, half fearing a crush of fans trying to drive home.  But, no.  It was just Pete, standing forlorn at the entrance to parking lot A.

Seems it was not the gold mine of high rolling tippers he'd been led to believe.  The final analysis, he was wise to avoid paying ten dollars on parking.  What we do for money … shit.

Anyway, this is a rambling post that might bore most people (except perhaps Anne's mom who gets to read a snippet about the son-in-law), but I'm offering it as a typical day in my life.  I do lots of things, most which don't amount to much.  I'm usually immersed in several projects — some that pay, most that don't — and they all are subject to the uncertainty that comes with collaborative work.  You have to be flexible, and you have to learn to get over those things that piss you off — the quicker the better, because you need to figure out a new course of action.

Last week when we were shooting the Short Ends film, Thorne made a comment.  We were packing up the equipment after a fairly short and successful night of shooting.  “I want Erik's life,” he said, while collapsing a Lowell light stand.  I made some quip about how I've heard people say that before, and that “everyone wants my life, but me.”  And Thorne quickly returned with:  “Well, I want certain parts of Erik's life.”

Fair enough.  We had just finished a wonderful rock-out scene where Roze, Adrian, and Laura were pantomiming playing their instruments (actually, Roze was really playing his drum kit).  And I was running around spritzing down the trio with a spray bottle of water.  So I think I know what he meant.  I can't complain when I find myself in a situation where I'm spraying fake sweat on a heart-achingly beautiful girl playing a Fender bass.  At the point, yes, indeed, life is good.  I hear you Thorne.  But otherwise, it's buying coffee or trying to be in the right place at the right time when you can score a job as a curator or event organizer … or get paid to go to Mexico to make a film.  Sometimes it's not bad being Erik.  Even without the spray bottle.

I spent the day waiting on an email or a phone call that might allow me to move a particular project forward. Futile, as it turned out. If nothing else, it gave me a chance to catch up on some of the blogs I subscribe to. (I highly recommend an RSS “reader” or “aggregator” to alert you when a blog you read has been updated — there are loads of free programs and services out there).

@@@@@@@@@@

My sister, who works for a large chain book store in Dallas, writes that next week Lauren Bacall will be at her store signing books. As she's already scheduled to be in town for the AFI film fest, it makes sense that she makes the rounds. Paula ponders: “I wonder if Miss Bacall would be offended if I showed up with a can of Fancy Feast for her to sign?” Hell, give it a try. Make a few test runs with a Sharpie on the upside of a cat food can to see if the signature won't rub off. And don't forget to video tape the whole request and signing, so that you have a better shot selling on eBay. I had forgotten those Fancy Feasts commercials. YouTube brought it all back. I had remembered that the pampered cat was served from crystal stemware, but I hadn't noticed before that the opening shot is a famous stock photo of a romantic medieval village on a Greek island. I know for a fact that THAT cat wouldn't stand for Purina products introduced into her Aegean villa. And then there's the matter of Ms. Bacall. How did the world's most beautiful woman make it from Key Largo and Dark Passage to hawking pet products? Maybe she should have never done those Rockford File episodes. The slippery slope must have began somewhere.

@@@@@@@@@@@

On Pamela Ribons' blog, she's imagining a conversation between her and her girlfriends as they consider the possibility of a version of Wuthering Heights starring Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie.

KATEY: That's…
PAMIE: I know. I know!
KATEY: Oh. Oh, my God.
LIZ: I just… God, I want to fuck that movie so hard.
PAMIE: I know! I want that movie inside of me.
KATEY: I so need that movie in me.
PAMIE: Right now. In me. Right here. I want that movie on my face. I want that movie screaming my name.
LIZ: Oh, my God. That is a seriously hot movie.
PAMIE: Even if it sucks, it's going to be SO AWESOME.
LIZ: I want to bend that movie over and just… oh, man!
KATEY: Why isn't everybody talking about this all the time?

I love these riffs Pamela does. I've never watched the Mind of Mencia, but I can only assume that her talents are wasted writing for that show.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

And Thorne, in a recent blog, writes about building a character he's going to play in my Short Ends film by analyzing the behavior of someone he observed while we shot last week. I was there watching him watch this guy. A double whammy of voyeurism. He likens this guy's bird-like movements to an Emu. He's right. I really enjoy watching people go through this sort of process to create a character. When I write, I do this sort of thing all the time. But because I'm tinkering with characters, revising while I write, the process isn't so apparent. Not even to me while I'm doing it. But for performers it's all about building up that character so that when the curtain rises or the camera starts to roll, it is all realized and ready to unfold.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

It was a grey lifeless day, with low banks of clouds occasionally dripping down with just a breath of rain. My weekly hike with Dar was re-scheduled for today. I decided to try Eisenhower Park, up near Camp Bullis. I had been there only two or three times before, with Pete and Cooper. On those occasions we had kept to the paved paths. Today me and Dar just meandered. We found some very nice rough and rocky trails.

She brought me up to speed on her film festival, SAL (San Antonio Local). This will be the first year for SAL, as well as the two film events I'm hired to promote (Josiah and the 48 Hour Film Project). We are already exchanging information and contacts, but it occurred to me that we probably need to sit down with a couple of people who've experience running these sorts of things for some years already. People like Adam Rocha and Denise Crettenden.

What a lot of work. I'm exhausted just thinking about it. Truly, life would be so much easier were I living in a villa on Corfu with an aging Hollywood starlet serving me dinner out of a can … and placed into crystal stemware. No cares, no woes.

My auto insurance company called last week telling me that my drivers license was expired. Now if only the state of Texas could mange to be so efficient. I could hardly blame them, as I failed to notify them I had moved from Fort Worth. However, as I tried to find out what sort of information I needed to get the thing renewed, the failings of the Texas Department of Transportation became glaringly apparent. They are obviously understaffed. I tried the phone numbers of all six San Antonio substations. One was no longer in service. All the others were constantly busy as I tried for about thirty minutes, moving from one number to another. Even the customer service office in Austin was busy. And it wasn't those sadistic automated voices that keep you hanging on the line listening to bilingual PSAs or light jazz. All I got was a “because of the high telephone traffic, we are presently unable to assist you — hang up and try later.”

So I just drove down to the offices on the southside. It was just coming up on noon, and I knew that was a mistake. Yep. The parking lot was choked. I walked up to the door, and before my hand even made contact with the metal handle, I saw the sign: “payment in cash and check only,” and I spun around and headed back to my truck, and drove home to get my checkbook. I had seen on the website that they accepted credit cards, but I guess that was just if you were going to pay online. I decided to stop for lunch at a little taqueria on S. Presa. So when I went back, the noon rush at the DOT had subsided a bit. Just a bit. I had to stand in line to get a number to stand in line.

I sat and filled out paperwork in a plastic chair. The woman behind me started a conversation with a man next to her. It seemed they had mutual friends at the sports bars they tended to hang out in. “You know Manny?” “The guy with the tattoos right here?” “Naw. But I know him too.” “Oh, I know who you're talking about. He works the back bar on weeknights.” The woman was afraid that when she got to the counter and gave the clerk her paperwork that some message would surface from the computer concerning her three outstanding warrants. “Speeding tickets,” she said. “Mostly.” And then a woman behind her chimed in about how they most likely would arrest her on the spot. “My cousin had like a million tickets and warrants, but the computer didn't say shit. He got in and got out. He was lucky. They have a sheriff in the back room. I was here three years ago, and my name came up. I didn't have a thousand dollars for the fine, so I had to go to lockup. They have awful sandwiches. And the cookies … those weren't what I'd call cookies. All they served was this nasty orange drink.”

A couple more voices entered, and I wish they were in front of me, so I could watch as well as listen. Mostly they were talking about their personal experience in jail. The sort of stuff this woman could expect. When the woman's number came up she got phone numbers of her new friends. “If my name doesn't come up on their computers, you're all invited to party with me tonight.”

Later, as I was standing in line, the woman emerged from the final room beaming. She rushed over to the rows where her seat-mates still sat, waiting.

“Party tonight!” she said quite loudly, and I watched her give a little jig. I only wish she had emerged from that final room with a cheerleader victory dance and had shouted to us all: “Damn, I beat the system! Tonight I'm gonna get tanked and drive like a maniac!”

The sad thing is she was about my age. This is what you encounter in these bureaucratic offices. The poor and the fuckups. I guess I fit into both categories. Our social betters do this stuff online, through the mail, or over the phone. Oh, wait, there is another group. The old codgers. They haven't embraced technology. They vote, pay bills, renew drivers licenses, and all that, in person. They've done it that way for over half a century, and the only way it's going to change is when they climb down into the ground. You can spot them easily. They are the ones not wearing flip flops, and their hats are not on crookedly. They have trousers with pressed seams, their nails are clean and trimmed, and they often clutch accordion folders with a solid decade's worth of pertinent documents. And they haven't a clue as to what sort of sandwiches are served in the Bexar County lockup.

I finally made it to the front of the line. After an eye-check, a electronic signature, and biometric scans of both thumbs, I wrote out a check for 24 bucks, posed for a photo in front of the classic blue backdrop, and got the hell out of there. (The one thing that surprised me was that they had me remove my glasses “because of the glare.” I remember one time maybe two decades ago when, in a moment of vanity, I removed my glasses just before the drivers license photo was to be taken, and the clerk chastised me. “We want you to look the way you usually look.”)

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

After I got that out of the way, I stopped by Urban 15. George is deep into work on his video art project for San Antonio's Smithsonian Museum. He and Herman were running a mockup of the hardware in the basement space. The current scheme is to run three HD projectors, each connected to a committed PC. The video piece is using a specific program that allows one massive, and horizontally long, QuickTime file to be spread across these multiple projectors so that there is no seam from one projected quadrant to another. The video images themselves are presented in collage form, in constant motion.

I spent a bit of time with George talking about the upcoming Josiah Youth Media Festival I'm helping them run. We're still waiting on putting out the call for entries until their web-master creates the festival's website.

Last week I finally got around to seeing some of the works of Josiah Neundorf. He was a former high-school student of George Ozuna. He then went off to study film in Boston. But shortly before his 21st birthday, he passed way because of a rare form of bone cancer. Much of his work is animation. Stop-motion, with clay as well as real objects (in the manner of Jan Svankmajer), and also drawn images. He did one piece with found, archival footage which reminded me of a very early experimental piece by Peter Greenaway. And there is an excellent live action narrative about a man inadvertently making a deal with the devil. It's a strong piece, well shot with smart set ups. Good actors. And all in Spanish — with English subtitles.

The kid was an artist. As young as he was, he had a definite and an emerging style. To attached his name to a film festival — a youth film festival — makes perfect sense. Josiah was walking down his own path in life, and making work that any of us would be proud of.