land is green and skies are blue

When we were in New Mexico last summer installing  a show I remember looking up at the huge unobstructed sky and saying "If I had that much sky I'd think there was something living in it too," finally understanding the alien culture of the Southwest! The only thing living in our sky is birds. And that man we saw when we were building the set who was outfitted in a homemade flying machine, it looked like a go-kart with a parachute attached to it! I swear! We started taking down the metal pipe part of the wall this week, the more dangerous portion of our outdoor sound stage that begins 16ft off the ground and reaches another 16ft up, slowly reclaiming our sky...

perpetual and furious refrain

After the gallery show in New York we're headed out to Berkeley California to install a museum show that opens May 2nd at the Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archives. I have never been to the westcoast and definitely have some sort of Gold Rush- land of possibilities nostalgia for it for no particuar reason. I also think everything is beautiful there and there's healthy, tasty food on every corner and, especially in San Francisco, it is perpetually 1967. How off am I? We'll see soon enough! The museum show is going to have a bunch of film shorts, a few mechanical sculptures and a screening of Gravity in June. The giant tub that was delivered a little while back is for one of these sculptures. Basically we are going to make a sort of record out of it with these 8 foot tall wooden characters attached that "sing" out of wooden phonograph horns as the huge tower rotates. I am the resident primer paint coater around here so I've been spending some quality time with the beginning stages of these wooden guys & gals lately! Yesterday while painting a parade of the neighbors chickens (this is the reality of free range: chickens all over the place) came by to help me out/be shooed out of the basement.  I wonder if they are laying eggs in the yard? A REAL Easter egg hunt?! Yes! I love how this place legitimately turns me into a kid!

"We didn't die in a car crash we met in a car crash."

2nd Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then trailer from Brent Green on Vimeo.

The lovely people over at Vice posted an interview with Brent about his filmaking you can read over here. It is one of the first in a series of Weekend Watchin' articles where they showcase a filmaker and give a brief overview of their work- I bet it's gonna be nicely curated since Spike Jonze is the unofficial king of Viceland! Above is a link to the second trailer for Gravity which the article also links to...! O, and when you go to the interview try not to get distracted by the dos & dont's...unless you have hours of time to waste laughing your ass off!

this is not my beautiful house

Today (it's been a few days now but I've been too busy to post anything) began Day One of bringing down the house...Leonard's house that is. As I keep sort of mentioning the main set house of the film is travelling around for some art shows in the upcoming year. The first stop is at the Edlin Gallery in New York City in April. Today I tried to devise a way to take apart the house so that putting it back  together would be the least painful. I remember watching these art handlers at a booth in Miami last winter as they tried to decode pages and pages of instructions on how to reconstruct this metal pole house neon with chair sculpture (?), at one point I even joked "It's just like Ikea!" to which I was greeted with cold stares. Very cold stares. I totally comprehend those very cold stares now! Triangular piece C1a is totally an extension of Wall C2 in the back of the roof of the elevated bedroom tower...duh! So much work, so so tired, so didn't go to architecture school...what will Day Two bring?

man (& woman!) with a movie camera

While in New York filming some stuff on Monday we  stopped by the studio space of a fellow filmaker friend to make use of her projectors to finally get a peek at Jem Cohen's footage he shot for Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then. Martha Colburn, who ever so graciously let us take over her studio space, is an animator/artist/filmaker who is probably one of the most influential moving collage artists working out there today! She shoots her animations frame by frame on actual film, manipulating paper cut out puppets or self solving jigsaw puzzle characters or altered photographs usually positioned in front of beautifully hand painted layered glass backgrounds- all coming together to make wonderfully stilted storyscapes. Thank you Martha for letting us woodsy goobers come over and teaching us a thing or two about film!

 As for Jem's footage...As for Jem's footage! Jem, are you reading this? Can I follow you around for awhile and try to undertand how you see the world so beautifully? Jem? JEM!? Really though. I don't think I have ever seen anyone so talented as to seriously convey what it means to live through mere pictures, isn't that what art is supposed to do? Especially film? Absolutely wonderful. **Note: These stills of Jems really don't do what he filmed justice since they were shot in between bursts of mouth gaping amazement and from a flickering film image.

my little corner of the world

As a former English major and a NY publishing ex-pat Brent's writing is definitely the thing that drew me to work on this film. Even though I know what most of the script is once in awhile I will hear a clip of edited narration and I will be totally stunned. One line from the film that I was unaware of until recently speaks of how we all sort of build our own world- which was definitely true of our character Leonard Wood who literally built his surroundings piece by piece as a means to escape and find comfort in a larger, confusing existence. I think this is the first time that the scope of what Brent was trying to convey was something he couldn't just build himself which led us to a strange afternoon of filming in the macrocosm of New York City. We went down to Wall Street to film for a bit where we were met with a blast of sound echoing along the cobblestone streets only to round the corner and find the below scene. Brent sat on a bench with his camera, eyed at by the massive amount of post 9/11 security given his beard & general suspicious nature, while I did my best tourist impression in the rainy, overwhelming world outside of our own little constructed farm existence...

i'm a believer

 The Believer (the mostly ad-free magazine outlet of the Dave Eggers camp) just published an article on the film written by the ever-so-lovely Mike Plante! We picked up a copy while running to New York for some Gravity filming and the article, as is the rest of the issue, is pretty rad! We're still debating whether the dude on the cover is just Harmony Korine or a hybrid Brent & Harmony? Hmmm...

rain on lens, boom in frame

I first met Jem Cohen when I was a lowly intern at the NJ Media Arts Center (an amazing organization bringing a perfectly curated film series to NJ under the direction of filmaker Albert Gabriel Nigrin). We screened Jem's film Benjamin Smoke, a documentary about the title figure; a soulful man whose sexuality and wit formed his southern tinged/gritty ny music during a time of great uncertainty & sexual upheaval in the city. The film, which was co-directed by Pete Sillen, was unbelievable. I'm not going to describe it. You should just see it.

 When Jem was out here shooting some footage for Gravity he had a little trouble getting started saying "I like to shoot unhinged reality" (as opposed to the completely all engulfing alternate reality that Brent creates when making a film) which is completely true in all of his work. Jem takes a real life subject and visually uncovers the subtle depths and oddities that are inherent in everything, no matter how seemingly "normal." If this film viewer we had would cooperate (more on this ancient metal box of a machine later) we could watch his film but for now I have his polaroid portraits of me (above) to remind me of his greatness!

Pete's footage on the other hand we've been able to take a peak at and, as usual, it is wonderful! His style is more of an odd hyperealism, intensifying the things in front of the camera to a point of near surrealism. Pete took the above footage of me which I then shot off of the film viewer screen. The rest of his film is just as stunning too! So so gorgeous! Hopefully I'll have some more shots later (kicks film viewer to try to make it work better) but until then, I sit and wonder if my right side is my "good side"....? 

...you got your good things and i got mine

I briefly mentioned something about the heaven we made earlier. Yeah. That's right. We made a little heaven. It is 16ft up in the air, with a god looking down and angels flying about in a backdrop of little golden clouds and lightbulbs and wood. Leonard Wood, the real life person our main character is based on, was a very religious man. The box of music we have of his are all hymns he wrote, he was obssessed with making sure his cherished violin was donated to the church, his letters were constantly about his devotion to the lord- from what I can tell Leonard believed that maybe God could help everyone go on living, in life and in death. Most people would probably want to shy away from this aspect of a character but, when you live in a world where school textbooks are currently being edited to include Jesus, I think it is definitley an important theme to mention! Some of the best writing in the film, like in a lot of Brent's work, really explores religious fervor and, like is often my reaction to Brent's films, I'm tearing up just thinking about these beautiful lines...So today I had to take apart our backyard rickshaw heaven, screw by screw, mainly because it was huge and in the way. Now it isn't. Peace on earth!

let's go fly a kite

Today I set out to make a prop for one of the few small scenes we're filming to round out the first edit of Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then. The building started with me stepping on a piece of plywood with a three inch screw sticking out of it sending it right through my shoe and right into my foot. Not the best way to begin a project! After a band aid and a change into some work boots I headed back out to make my bird trap.... As I mentioned before my character in the film collects bird eggs for a living so I had this idea that she would attach a birdcage to a kite and lure them into a new home in addition to her trap door birdhouses. To film a kite in stop motion means two kinds of wire, a 16ft 2x4, some drilling, some metal cutting, screws and a lot of patience are needed instead of just wind! At least the weather is back to being a breezy pre-Spring mild so there's no kite flying lightning fears but the nice weather has awoken the neighborhood gun enthusiasts with the echoing Appalachian trail making them sound dangerously near!

in like a lion...

You never think about the wind speeds of where you live until you start building things off of the ground. It never occurred to us that air rips around one side of the barn creating a near vortex on a daily basis, that 30mph wind is a normal thing during even a mild storm, that about 20 feet off the ground gusts pick up so standing on the ground could feel completely different/safe. Yesterday, after some harsh loud noises, Brent looked out the window and said calmly "That's new," upon witnessing one of the set walls bent inward, pushing hard away from it's concrete supports. I really wonder how long it will be before the sound of creaking wood and bursts of wind don't keep me up at night...? This is the set wall that desperately wants to be on the ground and the back of one of the house facades that sometimes acts as a wind tunnel!

on location

This week was the first time that we loaded up the car with spotlights, extension cords and cameras to film in places other than our own backyard. We went to a hospital, a doctors office, some graveyards, even our local hardware store (which I think Brent was super excited about since he got to film a lot of stuff he has pictured filming during his years as a loyal customer). We were expecting some weirdness out here in the woods upon requesting to shoot in real world places but instead we were greeted with a lot of friendly excitement and enthusiasm! But that didn't stop us from leaving the getaway car running on the nearby dirt road farm that is home to the family plot seen below!

up in the air

Yesterday we filmed the scene I think Brent was most excited to shoot- the (stop motion) car crash. I think the main reason he was excited was because a lot of people kept saying he couldn't do it. I remember one kid actually saying to him "not possible" which,  of course, made him want to do it even more!

So we went about living out every boys dream of destroying cars, heavy machinery, fake blood and broken glass. Mike flew through the air attached to a crane. Brent (who I forced to put on gloves) broke apart windshields in between camera shots. Our friend Jane played a beautiful corpse. A local animator named Dan sledgehammered bumpers when he wasn't rotating crane baskets. And I, type cast, played a horrible driver. We all pretty much did a little of everything for the scene, with two smashed cars and a few band aids to prove it!  Our combined efforts really made a beautiful, tragic, amazing end result which I seriously can't wait to see on a big screen! 

they shoot horses, don't they?

The last week of shooting footage for Gravity has started! Maybe it's just me but I feel like a lot of conversations are starting with "Remember when we did this!?" and the general atmosphere is a bit nostalgic...sniffle...Anyway...we picked up Mike McGinley at the airport last night and are already putting him into action! Let's just say he is currently hanging from a crane in the yard (more on that later I think). Above is a photo Brent took of Mike warming up during another film shoot, a particularly freeezing film shoot to be exact, and below is a picture of  the local traffic on our way to pick up our fine actor!  I think we are all pretty exhausted so bedtime for Nervousfilms! Especially since we are up bright and early for some more crane action tomorrow!

we make car parts

Remember when I was saying how we couldn't get cheap, used cars out here? Yeah...we still can't. This means that we had put away our dream of older model cars and go for the dilapidated newer, uglier cars we keep in our own yard. Yes. We are guilty of the lawn car just as much as the next rural Pennsylvanian! The only difference with us is we tried really hard to get these cars off of our lawn! Both need some minor repair to run (which Brent  is seen working on in the below photo in preparation for the car crash we are filming this Monday) and even more repair to be legally on the road (which we definitely can't afford to/didn't do). At one point we even had a guy who was set to come and take one of the cars ("Hey guys! You know how to fix a car? Free Car! Over Here!") but he never showed up! On three different occasions! Again, I really don't get what system the car market is running on out here....maybe it's running on car parts? Let the smashing begin!

"in a hot tub with my soul mate" i wish this thing was a hot tub!

This morning I'm sitting here editing out some sound for the film and I hear a huge, amazing rumble. At first I am awed by my sound making skills. Then I realized there was a gigantic truck in the yard delivering this:

Brent has a bunch of museum shows in the upcoming year (the 81in x 60in water tank being a part of them) that are extensions of the film- I would say they are a mix of film clips and concrete objects but he seems to really be into the idea of moving objects lately so I dunno if concrete is the right word! 

Side note: It is really odd that he shoots film on a still camera and then makes these enormous, stationary objects take flight or spin or make noise. A machine already exists to make moving pictures and he chooses not to use it. Then he chooses to make this large, immovable water tank into a rotating wax cylinder. I guess he likes the difficulty...and there's something about the moving, urgency in these ominous, overbearing sculptures that is a constant theme in his films. I just never thought I'd see art and think "Watch out! That sculpture is going to get you! Do something about it! Do something!" He uses what he knows & sees to make things that move & are seen and I think he wants you to do the same...but this is just a guess! Ok...back to the sound...

if i were a carpenter

Photo by Ben Liddle

Every so often I will go into the yard, pick up a log, bring it inside and start going at it with a small drill or a grinder or some sandpaper thinking "Brent makes it look so easy!" But it is not easy. It is far from easy. I've seen him amaze woodcut experts ("You can't make those lines so thin!") and stun local carpenters ("I don't know why you are making this but it is pretty impressive!"). I think his outsider artistic upbringing actually makes a difference in the way he approaches woodworking and, now that I think about it, all of his art/filmaking...he starts a project with "I want to make this with this" and is totally oblivious to what he should use or what materials are supposed to do. It is actually amazing to see in action and I'm still not sure how he carves those wooden lines so thin...but he does! And it is wonderful!

A lot of the set pieces for Gravity are Brent carved sculptures. The piano is my favorite- he used it to lure me to the woods, sending in progress pictures while I imagined a life outside of my NY cubicle. He hand carved each key, the top is made from bended slats of wood, the base is smoothly grinded and stained boards glued together and, best of all, it works! The stars and moon in the film are also wooden- thinly routed down plywood with layered edges for depth. Most of the furniture- the chairs, the stove, the bed- are also handmade wooden pieces. Hell, even Leonard's house is a sculpture complete with ornamented window frames, oddly curved towers and stilted staircases! (I'll post more about the house later!) Only downside:  sawdust.

Apparently I am bad at doing his woodworking justice in photos...I think there are some much better ones on Brent's site though!