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I got back from the Lucas International Children’s Film Festival last week and had an unbelievable time. What an amazing festival. This was my first children’s film festival so I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I was blown away by the selection of films and the activities organized for the children. Every day, group discussions took place so that the kids could talk with all the filmmakers present and ask them questions about filmmaking or their particular film.

I never intended Birthday Girl to be geared towards children, but after speaking with some of the programmers I learned that it was one of the reasons why they chose it.

None of the films screened at the festival (at least the ones that I saw) were specifically geared towards children. They all dealt with very mature subject matter. The only similarities were that they happened to feature children in the lead roles. I think it’s amazing that the festival is encouraging kids, even as young as six, to watch relatively mature content. And why not?

Some of the hardest questions I got after my film screened came from the kids. For instance, a young jury member asked me why I would write a scene where a father allows his eight year old daughter to smoke. Kids pick up a lot of details that we take for granted so it was a great experience seeing my film from their perspective and hearing what they had to say about it.

The festival organizes a live German dubbing of each film while the film is screening. I have to admit this takes a little getting used to (watching a film in French, reading English subtitles and listening to a woman speak in German on the loud speaker). Your brain goes on overdrive until it figures out what’s going on.

Overall this worked out well for Birthday Girl. I was glad most of the jokes came through - even the subtle ones - and that the reading was done in the same tone as the actor’s performance.

I’m off to Strasbourg this week for the Strasbourg Intl Film Fest…

I’m working on two scripts simultaneously. One a thriller, the other a light comedy about two women and the adult entertainment industry. I was trying to find some good comedies to watch for inspiration about female friendship/bonding other than the SATC movie (which I found to be an abomination) and it didn’t take long to realise that there’s really not much out there.

And then I remembered Baby Mama. I don’t know what the majority of reviewers thought about this film but I haven’t been so entertained or laughed so hard since watching season 3 of the Office. Unfortunately it just made me realise how starved I am for comedies that appeal to women.

As story goes, it’s simple, conventional and pure Hollywood, but Tina Fey and Amy Poehler are brilliant as two diametrically opposed women living under the same roof.

What makes the film so funny is that it’s incredibly genuine (the conversations, the arguments, what they do etc). When Fey’s character goes on a date, Fey acts like a real woman, not some idealised version of what men want or seem to think women are like on dates. Not only that but she steals the scenes. She’s the funny one, she makes the guy laugh and he’s attracted to her because of it. It’s completely realistic but how often are we treated to a character like that in the movies? Can’t be that often because half the time I wanted to get up and hug my TV screen. It felt like something precious had just returned that I didn’t even know was missing.

Fey didn’t write the script (Michael McCullers did) but one can only assume that she and Poehler brought their female insight to their characters. It’s unfortunate that we don’t see more strong, intelligent, comedic female characters in films. It’s just a goldmine of opportunity not to mention potential profit. Last time I checked women make up fifty percent of the population.

More good news on the Birthday Girl front. Just got word that my short film was accepted at the Edmonton International Film Festival! The film will be screening Oct. 3rd at 7pm so if you’re in or around the area do check it out.

For those of you in Montreal who might be wondering about the Montreal World Film Festival, unfortunately the festival requires a Canadian premiere and since the film premiered in Vancouver the festival would not consider it.

Birthday Girl will have its French premiere at the Strasbourg International Film Festival!

No word yet as to when the film will be screening but as soon as I know I’ll post the info. This is SIFF’s first year running. Looking forward to being a part of it.

I’ve been checking out some photography exhibits over the past couple of months. Whenever I’m looking for inspiration in terms of style and mood for my films I tend to check out photography before I look to other films.

Although camera movement is essential (I took a course in university specifically on the significance of camera movement in film), it’s not the first thing I think about when it comes to aesthetics. When I’m looking for a style that represents the tone I want for my films, photography has always been my reference point.

Here are some photographers that I’ve recently discovered whose work has been hugely inspirational. Unfortunately, the specific photographs that got my attention at the exhibit are nowhere to be found online (or even in books on the collection of their work). I’ve posted some of my other favorites that I was able to find however.

Leonard Freed. Photo journalist who rose to prominence in the 1950’s and 60’s. I love Freed’s composition and sense of energy that he captures in his photographs.

Jewgeni Chaldej (pronounced Yevgeny Khaldei) Red Army photographer.

This is Chaldej’s most famous photograph. I can’t say it inspires me the way some of his other work does, but it’s what launched him to international fame.

Herbert Tobias German/Soviet photographer. Again, I love his framing and use mise en scene. The photographs feel effortless and simple yet structured and although he’s a distant observer you still get a sense of intimacy which I think is quite wonderful.

If you’re in Berlin, the Leonard Freed exhibit is on at C/O Berlin until October 5th and the Herbert Tobias exhibit is on at the Berlinische Galerie until September 1st. Both worth checking out.

Chaldej is no longer at the Gropius Bau but the Rodtschenko exhibit is definitely worth the visit.

A couple of weeks ago I was listening to Stephen Gaghan talk about Syriana, a film which he wrote and directed back in 2006.

The best advice Gaghan got on writing was from reading a biography by Henri Troyat on Tolstoy. Tolstoy famously wrote in his journal that to write a great novel there are four techniques which one has to master. For Tolstoy, the most important thing to master was not story, but rather, transitions.

How and when to start and end a scene. In film, transitions are everything. They keep a film moving and the audience interested. Transitions don’t just come into play in the editing room though. As Michael Brandt points out in a recent interview for Wanted, mastering the technique of transitions is what elevated him from amateur to professional screenwriter.

Here are Tolstoy’s four techniques (which according to him must be mastered in this particular order).

1. Transitions
2. Context
3. Character
4. Story

As Gaghan points out, following these four steps strips away formula and allows you to stay in the inspired brain (vs. the editorial brain).

For those interested, you can listen to the full interview with Gaghan here.

The cineplex is dominated by male protagonists. Films are mostly geared towards male audiences and men make up a large number of the writers, directors, producers etc., working in the industry. According to the Celluloid Ceiling report, Martha M. Lauzen writes that “women comprised a scant 15% of all directors, writers, producers, editors, and cinematographers working on the top 250 films of 2007.”

So it comes as no surprise that her recent study reveals the lack of female film critics in the top 100 U.S. Daily Newspapers. A discouraging but evident statistic:

Films with women filmmakers (directors and writers) and films with female protagonists and ensemble casts comprise a larger proportion of films reviewed by women than men. Thus, the under-representation of women film critics, writers and freelancers may cause films featuring females or with women filmmakers to receive less coverage.

Anne Thompson (one of my favorite industry bloggers) has a look at the study and a few comments of her own.

Let’s put it this way. Some men are better able to adopt the female POV, and tap into their femme side, than others. Many men are not trained to see things from the perspective of the opposite sex. All women are. That’s one reason why today’s movies are so geared toward men, while women starve for material aimed at them. Women are accustomed to going along and accepting slim pickings in pictures by and about men.

To add to Thompson’s statement. Women, from an early age, are raised to see things from a male perspective. Not just from cinema, but from all forms of mass media. Unfortunately, because of this, women tend to look at one another from a male perspective as well, which gives rise to the cattiness, competitiveness and dislike for one another that we are constantly hearing about, seeing and propagating (which is a whole different can of worms). It drives me mad and the way the industry is heading is certainly not helping matters.

On the iPod: Nina Simone: Feeling Good.

I was back in Montreal for a few days last week, hence the lack of blogging. I’m back in Berlin and suffering from two doses of jet lag. (I don’t think I recovered from the first bout of jet lag before I was back on plane heading across the ocean again.)

Anyway…. thought I would post a couple of items that I stumbled upon during the week.

Film: Matt Dentler (former SWSX Film Fest program director) now at Cinetic Media Rights discusses the future of online film distribution. The video is an hour long but well worth the watch.

Writing: Kurt Vonnegut talks writing with style. (via Kottke)

Entertainment: Spike Jonze’s adaptation of Where The Wild Things Are gets shelved with no official release date. It was scheduled for release this fall, then pushed to 2009 and now it’s no longer on Warner Brother’s release schedule. Patrick Goldstein goes into more detail about the situation. Quite unfortunate because this video got me very excited to see the film.