Brian P. McQuilkin
Active member
A Little Blood in Athens
Reserved for poster, etc.
First Fest entry!
Reserved for poster, etc.
First Fest entry!
Last edited:
A Little Blood in Athens
- Thread starter Brian P. McQuilkin
- Start date
Brian P. McQuilkin
Active member
Production Blog
8/6
So I decided that I would enter the next fest, and when it was finally announced my brain shut down and I couldn’t think of a story idea. I wound up keeping a log (manly way to say a diary) of ideas and random thoughts on the entire process. It read like something Lawrie Brewster would write after being bitten by Woody Allen (that is by means a slight against Mr. Brewster – his production logs and commentaries are always an interesting and enjoyable read – mine were more on the neurotic side) . Instead of boring you with the details of that diatribe, I’ll summarize the process.
The problem wasn’t that there were no ideas, but that there were too many ideas. Most were more comedic than anything. For the past few years I’ve been working on a script called ‘Steve the Zombie’, which is a very deep and thoughtful look at a zombie trying to get laid. At first I thought that MonsterFest was the perfect opportunity to finally make this story come to life – just boil it down to 6 minutes and go for it. But to execute it the way I want to, well, I simply don’t have the funds.
There were some other ideas, including using Chuck Norris an the monster. Imagine a bunch of teenagers together one night, and one of them is dared to say “Chuck Norris” into a mirror 3 times…and then they are picked off one by one by disembodied roundhouse kicks to the head…until there is only one left, who finally meets his doom when strangled by a red beard.
A while back a friend of mine asked me to rewrite a feature length vampire movie based on a rough first draft he had written. I wrote a treatment for a new story – revamped the characters and created a more structured plot while trying to maintain the overall feel that my friend wanted. While writing the treatment I developed a scene that was fast paced, tense, and funny. Like any good scene, it had its own beginning, middle, and end. As I wracked my brain trying to decide on a movie, I remembered this scene, wrote a quick draft, and now I have my entry.
Whether I can pull off a fast paced, tense, and funny movie…well, probably not. But it will be fun trying. Spent the last several days just trying to come up with a title. Some prospects were ‘Bram Stoker’s Twilight’, ‘No Country for Sparkly Vampires’ (another Twilight jab…my wife loves the books and movie…egad), ‘Three Men and a Vampire’, and so on. Since the movie is not meant as an overt comedy, I shied away from those and went with something tied to the location, Athens GA.
And now on to the fun parts…re-writing and re-writing, location scouting, putting together a semi-competent crew, casting, test shots, figuring out effects, rehearsals, and maybe if there’s time, shooting the damn thing and editing it.
Oh yeah, it’s a vampire flick.
Poster and other stuff soon to come…pretty damn excited to have moved from lurking to actually participating. There are some damn good filmmakers around here…
8/10 – Put up a casting notice on a couple of the local boards and have had a few responses. Everyone wants to be the vampire. Literally. Have had no one send in anything or meet the description of the 3 main characters (which the only real description is that they have to look young enough to pass for 18-19 years old). Those who have responded for the vampire role all have very impressive resumes and most look like they can bring a unique visual to the character. I was hoping to avoid auditions – it’s the one part of the process that I really don’t enjoy. But with so many choices that look promising I might just have to break down and do it.
One actress responded for the role of The Hot Chick. I was pretty forthright in the casting notice – a hot chick who is willing to show a lot of skin (but without any nudity – it would have simply been too gratuitous and distracting). I thought that I might have to break down and put a casting notice on craigslist but it looks like I was saved.
Secured the primary location for the interior shots. Still need to get clearance for the couple of shots I need out on the streets of downtown Athens.
A buddy of mine, Eric, is also submitting a flick for this contest. He and I sat down Friday and Saturday night and threw around some ideas for each other. He expressed some doubt over the viability of what I’m trying to do, and he may be right. He feels that I should go with a simple concept with only 1 central character and go for a good “oh ****” moment. His concerns are valid, but still, I like the challenge of what I’m doing. And what I’m doing is trying to create a pivotal scene from a much larger story – a story that hasn’t been written yet and only exists a loose set of notes. I like the idea of dropping the audience into the middle of something bigger, like when you tune into a movie half-way through and for those first few minutes the story grabs you, and for the most part you can figure out what’s come before, and when that first scene is done you want to see what happens next. Yet, the scene stands alone when viewed separately from the rest of the story. Now, I’m about 90% sure that I’ll **** it up. And 9% sure that I’ll pull it off but will screw something up when I go to upload it for viewing. That last 1% is the likelihood that I’ll forget to plug the XLR cables.
So, onto finishing casting and rewriting the script, then storyboards and test shots.
8/6
So I decided that I would enter the next fest, and when it was finally announced my brain shut down and I couldn’t think of a story idea. I wound up keeping a log (manly way to say a diary) of ideas and random thoughts on the entire process. It read like something Lawrie Brewster would write after being bitten by Woody Allen (that is by means a slight against Mr. Brewster – his production logs and commentaries are always an interesting and enjoyable read – mine were more on the neurotic side) . Instead of boring you with the details of that diatribe, I’ll summarize the process.
The problem wasn’t that there were no ideas, but that there were too many ideas. Most were more comedic than anything. For the past few years I’ve been working on a script called ‘Steve the Zombie’, which is a very deep and thoughtful look at a zombie trying to get laid. At first I thought that MonsterFest was the perfect opportunity to finally make this story come to life – just boil it down to 6 minutes and go for it. But to execute it the way I want to, well, I simply don’t have the funds.
There were some other ideas, including using Chuck Norris an the monster. Imagine a bunch of teenagers together one night, and one of them is dared to say “Chuck Norris” into a mirror 3 times…and then they are picked off one by one by disembodied roundhouse kicks to the head…until there is only one left, who finally meets his doom when strangled by a red beard.
A while back a friend of mine asked me to rewrite a feature length vampire movie based on a rough first draft he had written. I wrote a treatment for a new story – revamped the characters and created a more structured plot while trying to maintain the overall feel that my friend wanted. While writing the treatment I developed a scene that was fast paced, tense, and funny. Like any good scene, it had its own beginning, middle, and end. As I wracked my brain trying to decide on a movie, I remembered this scene, wrote a quick draft, and now I have my entry.
Whether I can pull off a fast paced, tense, and funny movie…well, probably not. But it will be fun trying. Spent the last several days just trying to come up with a title. Some prospects were ‘Bram Stoker’s Twilight’, ‘No Country for Sparkly Vampires’ (another Twilight jab…my wife loves the books and movie…egad), ‘Three Men and a Vampire’, and so on. Since the movie is not meant as an overt comedy, I shied away from those and went with something tied to the location, Athens GA.
And now on to the fun parts…re-writing and re-writing, location scouting, putting together a semi-competent crew, casting, test shots, figuring out effects, rehearsals, and maybe if there’s time, shooting the damn thing and editing it.
Oh yeah, it’s a vampire flick.
Poster and other stuff soon to come…pretty damn excited to have moved from lurking to actually participating. There are some damn good filmmakers around here…
8/10 – Put up a casting notice on a couple of the local boards and have had a few responses. Everyone wants to be the vampire. Literally. Have had no one send in anything or meet the description of the 3 main characters (which the only real description is that they have to look young enough to pass for 18-19 years old). Those who have responded for the vampire role all have very impressive resumes and most look like they can bring a unique visual to the character. I was hoping to avoid auditions – it’s the one part of the process that I really don’t enjoy. But with so many choices that look promising I might just have to break down and do it.
One actress responded for the role of The Hot Chick. I was pretty forthright in the casting notice – a hot chick who is willing to show a lot of skin (but without any nudity – it would have simply been too gratuitous and distracting). I thought that I might have to break down and put a casting notice on craigslist but it looks like I was saved.
Secured the primary location for the interior shots. Still need to get clearance for the couple of shots I need out on the streets of downtown Athens.
A buddy of mine, Eric, is also submitting a flick for this contest. He and I sat down Friday and Saturday night and threw around some ideas for each other. He expressed some doubt over the viability of what I’m trying to do, and he may be right. He feels that I should go with a simple concept with only 1 central character and go for a good “oh ****” moment. His concerns are valid, but still, I like the challenge of what I’m doing. And what I’m doing is trying to create a pivotal scene from a much larger story – a story that hasn’t been written yet and only exists a loose set of notes. I like the idea of dropping the audience into the middle of something bigger, like when you tune into a movie half-way through and for those first few minutes the story grabs you, and for the most part you can figure out what’s come before, and when that first scene is done you want to see what happens next. Yet, the scene stands alone when viewed separately from the rest of the story. Now, I’m about 90% sure that I’ll **** it up. And 9% sure that I’ll pull it off but will screw something up when I go to upload it for viewing. That last 1% is the likelihood that I’ll forget to plug the XLR cables.
So, onto finishing casting and rewriting the script, then storyboards and test shots.
Last edited:
Brian P. McQuilkin
Active member
Reserved again -- for what I don't know...
Rodney V. Smith
DVXFest Promo Guru
Blood. Vampires. Athens. I'm there. Looking forward to it.
Mike Manning
Well-known member
Great title... though I'm a little disappointed you aren't making the Chuck Norris film.. FYI...I might steal that from you!
Brian Parker
Well-known member
Nice...Big vamp fan and if it's Athens, you already have a great location. Looking forward to it.
Brian P. McQuilkin
Active member
Thanks guys! And Rodney -- really loved Strange Days of Joey Davis -- can't wait to see what you put out this time.
The Chuck Norris idea -- I sent it to the mods to see if Chuck qualified as a monster in the context that I intended to use him and still haven't heard back. I was going to do it as a second entry that I could just have fun with.
I heard that he once killed 2 stones with 1 bird.
The Chuck Norris idea -- I sent it to the mods to see if Chuck qualified as a monster in the context that I intended to use him and still haven't heard back. I was going to do it as a second entry that I could just have fun with.
I heard that he once killed 2 stones with 1 bird.
Brian P. McQuilkin
Active member
Well, with work (which suddenly got very busy over the last few months), and helping Eric with his George Romero homage-opus (Rest In Peace), I just never had time to work this in. Maybe next time. Looking forward to seeing everyone else's entries.