My Filmmaker

J.R. Hudson

J.R. Hudson

Spirit Animal
My 7 year old son and I were watching CHRISTINE; John Carpenter's most technically savvy film IMO

There is a scene at the drive-in when Arnie and homegirl are chillin (The one where she chokes on the brownie) ... during the sequence, Carpenter repeatedly sets up the shot with showing a white car parked next to them (This is the man who gives home girl the Heimlick and saves her from choking) sp ?

Anyways

The first shot is a hand off

The camera pans with homegirl getting out of the car only to come to rest on this white car as she exits the frame; Carpenter does it again as she returns to the car

My son ask's

Why do they keep showing the white car ?

I said, I don't know. It seems a little contrived to show us there is a car next to them AT THE DRIVE-IN

He says

I know, it doesn't make since, it is a waste time

THIS IS VERBATIM

He was telling me that storywise, it was uncessary to show us this vehicle as we already know there are cars next to them !

He is 7 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Awesome

My little filmmaker junkie

I'll be working lame jobs all my life and he'll win the Oscar.
 
reminds me of the time i was watching Carlito's Way with my little brother, who was 10 at the time. There was a scene where Al Pacino and John Leguizamo are talking -- in it, Leguizamo is bathed completely in red light, while Pacino was half red, half white. Our conversation went as follows:

little bro: " ahhh, i see what they're doing."

me: "huh? what are you talking about?"

little: "the red light. that guy's (pacino) starting to be like that guy (leguizamo)."

me: "what the @#Z!&@%#$@!!! You're ten!!!"


i couldn't believe it. for a time, i thought i had a filmmaking child prodigy on my hands. he has since taken this sensitivity for the arts into the graphic arts.
 
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Here's a story that's quite the opposite.

I watched Memento with a friend of mine. I told him beforehand that it went in reverse chronological order and that he should remember this.

The movie ends:

Me: did you understand it?

friend: I think so...

me: Well you know how Leonard...

friend: what were you saying before about backwards?

me: it went backwards in time

friend: OOOH that's why it didn't make sense.



edit -- My dad told me I should be a filmmaker when I was 8 or 9 because I was getting mad when my parents bought full-screen versions of movies and I watched the special features more intently than the film itself. I laughed at him because at the time I only wanted to be a "film historian."
 
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this reminds me of the time i was watching "a clockwork orange" with my 5 year old son and he asked why they were making that man watch that movie with his eyes open.
 
Hudson;
People make films? There are "actors"?

You son totally "Get's it" :grin: that's awsome


- Mikko ... heard of someone who honestly didn't want to "spoil" Titanic, but felt like they had to let on that the boat sinks to a friend.
 
That's fantastic.

My kids aren't old enough for that yet, and somehow discussing the camera angles and color timing of Dora the Explorer just isn't the same.

This is the playful fight between my wife and me. Are the kids going to grow up wanting to watch movies all the time like Dad, or grow up wanting to go on hikes like Mom. Keep your fingers crossed for me, guys. :)
 
There is a story Keven Smith tells, about sitting down with his little girl to watch Dora, and she's explaining Swiper to him.
 
ugafan said:
this reminds me of the time i was watching "a clockwork orange" with my 5 year old son and he asked why they were making that man watch that movie with his eyes open.
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That reminds me of all the times I tried to keep my eyes open during a Kubrick movie... I haven't been successful yet.:evil:
 
Tlalconetl said:
Holy sh*t--you let your kid watch movies like that?! Pretty hardcore. Don't let social services find out.
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I censor him at scenes but you'd be surprised what I've let him watch. I'm not saying it is right. I saw TEXAS CHAINSAW, CARRIE, DAWN of the DEAD and HALLOWEEN as a wee 7 / 8 year old.

I will not let him watch those.

Christine has one scene I have censored him on and it's when homegirl grabs Arnie's 'Floogle Horn'. The rest is fairly harmless faire.


mikkowilson said:
Hudson;
People make films? There are "actors"?

You son totally "Get's it" :grin: that's awsome


- Mikko ... heard of someone who honestly didn't want to "spoil" Titanic, but felt like they had to let on that the boat sinks to a friend.
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Heh heh ! If I only had a dad that recognized my love of film as wee grasshopper. Jared was booming some BTS for me last month; pretty funny.
 
I was the first person in Bensonhusrt that had a DVD player for sometime.... I was alos the only person that has rented the "calibration" DVD from the first blockbuster in the neighborhood, when i was 8, so i could make sure my TV was showing an accurate image. I also prefered Widescreen ina time when that was shunned for "making the picture too small".......

Look what became of me.... Nothign has really changed....
 
I remember as a kid I asked my dad if it was possible to make a copy of a rented VHS movie, beacause we had 2 VCRs. I asked if it could maybe somehow be possible to connect them.


It was many years before I got involved in Theater, let alone video.


Man, if only I'd have known back then...

- Mikko
 
John,

You're obviously a proud dad! And sharing moments with your son early.

I started making movies when I was sixteen. Super 8. Editing 50 foot reels. Cut and splice with tape. That was 30 years ago. My 20 year old son is now making films with me (he was emmy nominated for his first student film). I couldn't be more proud of him.

Look what you have to look forward to. Enjoy the moments!

Regards,

RobertE
 
Totally off-topic story, but since we're swapping:

When my girlfriend and I first started dating we went to a relatively mainstream film (can't recall what it was). Normally not something that I would have seen, but we had just recently met and she wanted to see it, she was not a film person.

Well I think she could tell that I wasn't digging it and she asked "What's wrong?" and I whispered "It's just so damn predictable, I mean I've seen this same movie 20 times." She responded with "What do you mean?"

I looked at my watch and said "Within the next 5 minutes *this* is going to happen to make *this* happen to the character"- which it did. Then I just started glancing at my watch every once in a while and thought about where they were in they're painfully slavish 3 act structure and told her what would be coming up.

Well, after she realized that I was not actually magic and that there was a whole secret world behind films she became intrigued. Long story short, she just graduated with a BA in Film Theory.
 
Nicely played TC!
The real magic there is that you managed to pull it off without getting an ear full of "SHHHh!!" and "Shut up!" every time you commented. :grin:


- Mikko ... speaking from experience.
 
That reminds me of when I first watched Jaws with my older daughter when she was 10. At the end when the shark has the tube in its mouth she says, why don't they just shoot the tube, they said it was highly explosive earlier in the movie.
 
mikkowilson said:
I remember as a kid I asked my dad if it was possible to make a copy of a rented VHS movie, beacause we had 2 VCRs. I asked if it could maybe somehow be possible to connect them.


- Mikko
Click to expand...
My mom did the same thing in the early-eighties...we had (no ****) a room full of shelves containing recorded VHS movie (usually 2...tho sometimes 3...films to a tape.)
...and you'll never guess whose job it was to catorigize them.:Drogar-Mad(DBG):
 
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