awwww yeahhh
We’re making videos again, so Buddy Guys is back! This one’s pretty local, so if people who live around us in Surrey/White Rock don’t like it, then we’re pretty much out of luck. So. That was smart of us.
Anyways, we’ve started making videos again! Yay! Please reblog this if you like it so we know if we should keep going :)
Now I’m not 100% sure what /Film’s Russ Fischer considers budget limitations, but whether or not he means a real DV Rebel-style or TV budget-style, this “sizzle reel” for a show called ‘Slingers’ is stylish, entertaining, and funny to boot.
A 1960’s style heist story in the ’60s of the future — the 2260s
A fun watch whether or not you’re a fan of Sci-Fi, check it out!
Episode Three of Sick Feats is up! Listen here, or download the mp3.
In episode three of sick feats, we watch + comment on the Spielberg/Lucas classic, ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, with a brief appearance by guest commentor Jackie Murchison.
Apologies for some of the audio issues; we recorded this episode in different cities and are working out the related issues.
sickfeats.mevio.com for more episodes; we’re now on iTunes and the Zune Store!
This weeks music: “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” from the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” album, available now in the Beatles box sets and as an individual album at a store near you.
So K$ (pronounced Kay Money), the suburban rapper who doesn’t have what it takes, now has his own video series, “K$ Pro Tips”. We filmed this one very quickly of course, and hope to make K$ videos a fairly consistent thing. Another brilliant part of the zero-cost online video world: we get to share characters while we develop them.
I’ve started a video blog!
What!
Yes, it’s true - I’m finding it hard to really get the time or energy to text-blog a daily journal of my progress re:projects, as well as ideas, insights, and observations. And it would be near-impossible to include my friends in those as well. So I’ve instead decided to keep a video blog as regularly as possible, and, while this first one is a tad long and rough, I swear I’ll get better given a bit of a chance.
For now, enjoy - see y’all tomorrow, most likely. Let me know what you think in the comments either on this post or over on YouTube!
Less than 24hrs after I told Ben Wright (star of such classics as our short films Open Doors and Like a Soapbox) my idea for a podcast for us to do last night, we are now starting what we hope will become a regular podcast - taking various popular DVDs and recording our own comedic insights and thoughts in the form of a commentary track. Today we recorded our first episode, and it’s a fun one.
I hereby present to you Episode One - Twilight, the film adaptation of Stephanie Meyer’s classic novel.
Neither of us had seen the film before, but we hope to provide both comfort and company for all those forced into watching the film, as well as a fun re-watching for fans with a sense of humor. It works as a standalone podcast, but is really a lot better when you have the movie to go with it.
Download the mp3 here (right-click and save as), and enjoy!!!
The musical accompaniment at the start and end of the track are from Childish Gambino’s “Get Like Me”. It’s a free download, so have fun with that.
P.S. if the tagline in the above image was more prominently in the film’s marketing, I would have been a lot more interested in seeing it earlier. The film didn’t follow through on the promise of that question, but it still seems like a really powerful theme to explore.
UPDATE: Episode Two is out and you can subscribe to us on iTunes!
[On how many times one should watch “Funny People”] Three. Once for the laughs. The second time to notice the details you missed when you laughed. And the third time just to make sure we beat Transformers at the box office. We must not let robots rule the world.
(500) Days of Summer
“Ikea”
I saw Transformers the day after it came out in IMAX - but I wouldn’t say that it was a film that I was anticipating in as much as I was more in it to be with some friends on the first day of Summer.
To be honest, there are only two films that I’m looking forward to this Summer that come to mind. The first, in more of a ‘curious to see how it’s done and hey the last movie was fun’ would be Harry Potter. The second, however, is one that truly intrigues and excites me in a way that no film has for a while. **500 Days of Summer**.
1. It’s a Fox Searchlight picture. They really do have a reputation for the best live action films, and I can’t help but think of them as the live-action Pixar in terms of cinematic quality. Ironic how much I love them since I’ve spent most of my life growing up being vilified by Fox NEWS (I’m Muslim), but as John Lasseter says, “quality is the best business plan”
2. The cast. Joseph Gordon-Levitt + Zooey Deschanel? I shouldn’t really need to elaborate, just watch **Brick** and **The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy** if you need convincing.
3. Writing. It all seems pretty original and fun, and, overall innovative and just non-standard. I’ve grown up with older sisters. I could outline a typical rom-com for you in an hour. This is not a typical rom-com.
4. Style. This goes hand-in-hand with the writing, but the visual style fascinates me. How the sets and costumes all seem to just… match. It’s like they’ve created a whole world for the story to live in, just adding to the originality.
The clips in this post hopefully give an idea of what the film is like - the trailer is pretty great too, and TrailerAddict has 4 pages full of videos on this thing. The film comes out on July 17th, although Searchlight usually rolls out their films over the course of a few months.
“Expectations Vs. Reality”
So the time has come to make me a nice big announcement. Starting at the end of this month, and working right through Summer ‘09, mkpmedia and I will be heavy into production on our first webseries, a 5-part comedic show called “School Daze”. Visit the site, makingschooldaze.blogspot.com, to stay up to date and follow along our unpredictable journeys through this.
This is going to be a real test of, well, everything - workflow, technology, creative and technical skill, business, marketing - I’m hoping all goes well and we can really learn a lot of lessons through this, and be in stronger and more confident place when we start our future slate of content.
Enjoy,
-Kashif
K I know there are typos, i’m on an iPod. Will be fixed soon.
At this time next week, we should (Insh’Allah) be done shooting a new short film, “The Impractical Job”. It’s the story of a man (Ben Wright) who decides to rob a video game store so he can trade the games back in and buy himself some tap dance shoes.
We actually filmed about 85% of it in March 2007, but, due mostly to technical difficulties and partly to insufficient effort on my part, it didn’t make it all the way to online release.
I’ve wanted to reshoot for a while now, and my lazy side just this afternoon forgave my proactive side for telling Ben that I was interested in reshoots over spring break and thus essentially commiting to following through. When the thought crossed my mind that I only did one fictional narrative film in all of 2008, and even that for a pressure-on 48 hour film competition, I realized I actually WANT to do this. I’ve been all talk, no action - exactly the kind of person I don’t like.
So as I kick into high gear on Montage 2009 (our district-wide film festval), I figure I might as well do the same on the film side while getting scholarship applcations sorted. I knew I worked well under pressure, I just didn’t realize it was so crucial to my sucess.
Screenplay rewrites tommorrow. Let’s do this.
