3:10 to Yuma and James Mangold

Continuing with my habit of listening while I work to director's commentaries on DVDs of movies I admire, I was treated to a doozie last week. James Mangold's 3:10 to Yuma turned out to be a great film, and he's got a great director's commentary on there to boot. In fact, he has so many great things to say about movies and the filmmaking process, I have delved into Mr. Mangold's back catalog as they say, and it's like going to film school. (In a good way.)

I'd highly recommend to any aspiring screenwriter or director that they go and listen to Mangold's director's commentary on 3:10 to Yuma, Copland, and Identity. I also have Kate & Leopold and Girl, Interrupted in my Netflix Queue, but they haven't come in yet, but I'm sure the commentary will be as entertaining as the films themselves.

Until you can get a chance to listen to some of Mr. Mangold's Golden Verbal Nuggets (I should trademark that name...) I will put a few of the more choice ones here.

"Some directors put a lot of emphasis on special effects, and that's the thing they want you to remember when the film is done. The specatacle. But the one special effect I want in any of my films is a quiet interaction between two characters."

"I want there to be moments between characters that are just so quiet and so intimate. I keep telling them to make the moment smaller, get quieter. I don't want a lot of extra lighting in my scenes. If my director of photography can get a shot in available light, it frees me up to get the shots I want without a lot of prepwork. It drives the sound guys crazy, it drives the lighting guys nuts. They complain. But I figure, we have the best sound guys, the best lighting guys, these hugely expensive cameras. I know we can get what we came to get. And when you get it on film, the moment is there."

Referring to the moment between Russel Crowe's character and Christian Bale's character meet in a bar near the start of 3:10 to Yuma, and reprise that scene in another bar later in the film, he says, "The tenor of that conversation is completely different, and it shows how much these characters have grown. If those two scenes had been identical with no change to the characters, I would have viewed it as a failure."

And lest we forget...

I took an evening out from my Moon Town madness to work on my novel. I really haven't been multitasking as well as I had planned. I had planned to work on Moon Town a couple of nights a week and the novel the rest of my evenings. But you know, I loves the movie biz, and just can't seem to make myself stop working on that animated Lunar goodness.

Meanwhile, we're rounding 3 and a half years and heading for 4 on this novel, and I just can't bear to think of this thing dragging on for another year.

So I sat down with it. Ripped out the Problem Chapter for the umpteenth time. Rewrote it for the umpteen-fiftieth time (I think that's a number). Finally - finally, I say - I think I have the problem licked. I just couldn't get the characters to the place where they can do and say the things they need to as the novel turns and heads for home.

Now, they are well placed, and tomorrow night, I can begin that home stretch. (Details when we do the NUMBERS).

Ahhhhh.

Three Adverts

OK, so let's say you're Swiss. You're sitting there, just trying to relax after a long day of, uh, fixing clocks. You're watching TV and enjoying a fine snack of, uh, chocolate. But was ist? Your favorite programme is interrupted by adverts!?

Yes. You can thank me. As some of you may know, I recently worked on three adverts for the Swiss real estate company Homegate through my friends at the production house Bully Entertainment right here in Charm City (that's Baltimore to you Swiss...) I wrote the three ads (working off of ideas from the client) drew storyboards, directed the animation, and even built all the environments. The talented artists at Bully built the characters after my original designs, and the talented Stephen Karp animated everything. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing. Me likey.

What's that? You want to see the adverts?

OK. But you'll need Quicktime to watch 'em. See below.

The first was about a mouse who's grown too fat... I apologise - we don't have English translations yet, so you'll just have to endure the gorgeous female German voice at the end. Heidi Klum, anyone? Ah, a man can dream. But for those of you who don't sprachen ze Deutsche, the basic thrust of the tagline is "House too small? Maybe it's time to move..."

The second advert was about a cuckoo who has a tough gig. I'm showing you the French version because the timing on the last joke is better. To those of you who don't parle vous Francais, the gorgeous female voice at the end is saying something along the lines of "Tired of your commute? Maybe it's time to move..."

The last one is about a Penguin who's thinking "There goes the neighborhood". The german at the end says something like "Neighbors got you down? Maybe it's time to move..." For all its simplicity, this one is my favorite, particularly the igloo gag at the end.