Underground Weight

[NaturallySelected]

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[FONT=&quot]UNDERGROUND WEIGHT[/FONT] is a story that follows the paths of four people on their journey to get up and out of a life at the bottom of society. The first is of a pair of friends, Alex and Luce who are two gutter punks spending their days scrounging for change and spending their nights sleeping under bridges. When the drug harvest season comes in, these two must decide how to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. But can they trust each other now that there is real money on the line? Next is Les, he used to have a house and a family, but now he sleeps in his car with his dog and makes his way hustling pool games at local bars around town. When an opportunity lands in his lap to perhaps get his life together, can he resist the demons that lie inside him that put him on the streets to begin with? The third is Ian, who drives a taxi around town. After rescuing a prostitute from a bad john he becomes enamored with her. Now he has a chance to work for her pimp, knocking on doors and collecting debts. While this gets him closer to the girl and more money is his pocket, will it also lead him down a darker path than he wants to take?




Due out in the SUMMER of 2009, UNDERGROUND WEIGHT is the writing and directing debut of Marc Anthony Nolan. Taking place in CHICO, CA it plans to take the viewer on a tour of life from the bottom up.

Official Website coming soon.

 

[xyouthx]

sounds like a good plot, awaiting updates.

 

[NaturallySelected]

Thanks, that little write up describes just the beginning of the movie though, it goes deeper from there.


I recently had my first preliminary meeting with the possible AD, DP and Unit Production Manager. It was basically explaining to them what lies ahead, a brief synopsis of the story, what material we will need to accomplish the movie and what my influences/style for the movie are.

It went alright, the bad part is that I don't have anything script-wise to show them right now. I have around 40 pages of material written on another computer which is in the crapper right now. (Long story, lets just say to never trust the people at Nerds on Call) I do plan on getting that material salvaged sometime next week so I can get back on the screenplay and pound out the rest of the first draft. Plus side is I know I have a lot of workable material already down that I really like, and with a full story outline finished (finally) the rest should fly off from my fingertips in a matter of weeks. Then come the revisions.

I started contacting people in and around Chico (the city being filmed and featured in the movie). This includes the local theater houses, one to get actors and two to hold the casting sessions. Also I've contacted the local famous Sierra Nevada Brewery to try and find out how much it will cost to have their beer shown and talked about in the movie (Also to get use of one of their beer trucks for a scene). And I have contacted the local City Chamber of Commerce to get permit information. It's been a week since I left messages for these people and I have had only one reply. So I guess I will need to be persistent with trying to contact them.

I have had a lot of conversational agreements from local business owners for being able to film on their property, but now I must get them to actually commit and sign a contract. This includes a large number of bars, a few restaurants and convenience stores.

I still have six more months of preproduction, then three months of actual shooting and finally a nice long seven month post. I've padded the timing on the production and post schedule's until I have an actual shot list and shooting itinerary. Hopefully I will come in under on both, mostly the production. But since I know I can't film every day for extremely extensive hours I know that making sure it's a big window now will save me possible shock later on.

The movie is aimed for close to two hours in length, and I know that is long in the independent film world (as everything I have read says it shouldn't be longer than 90 minutes), but the script is rich with greatness and paced very fast from beginning to end. One of the main inspirations for this movie is Casino, by Martin Scorsese, great film. It is 3 hours long and yet goes by quite fast, because of the pacing and how it is shot and edited. The style of how that movie is put together pretty much reflects how I envision my movie. This is why I am breaking another independent film rule and trying to include as many different locations and scenes and possible.

I just today contacted to get music licensing quotes. This has always been a big problem as I have a lot of different music I would love to have in the movie and with a limited 10K budget for music I won't be able to get everything I want. So I am going to the local musicians to see if I can get them to come on to the project with there own material and as well possible collaborations to create specific tracks for the movie.

With a total budget of only 100K though I know all my dreams won't come true. I still want to make it the best film that I can. The confidence I have is hopefully infectious to others involved.

Anyways, I gotta get to bed, I will write more later as preproduction continues.

-M