Dogs in the rain

A couple of hours later …

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I know that this is starting to look a bit like the diary of a film maker. Well it’s important for me to write up this process. One year from now I want to be able to read back what an insane time this has been and how things went. So the coming time the focus of this blog will be on the making of SweetArts.

The other thing is that I won’t have any time for anything else in my life for a while. Here are some random notes and thoughts again:

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Bob called me while I was drinking a juice in the Caffe Nero in Hammersmith. I walked out and tried to spot him. He told me to walk towards the tube station. I walked and looked. He was in his car he said. I scanned the area. Lots of cars around Hammersmith. I saw a man with sunglasses in an MG convertible with open roof. Funky car I thought. I scanned further while talking to Bob. I didn’t see him. I had a closer look at the MG. Really nice car. I looked at the man inside it. He was on the phone. A closer look revealed that his lip sync with the man I was talking to was near perfect. Wait a minute …

“Do you happen to sit in a funky MG?” I asked Bob.
“Yes!” he said with a friendly British voice.
“I am on my way to you now!” I said.

A split second I thought – am I actually going to step into a car with a man I don’t really know? Bob seemed reliable, and a car like this with an open roof, I could always climb out. I jumped in. We drove off, the wind trying to blow the worries out of my head.

And that’s when I met Bob.

Here is your regular short film production update. And really, I can’t quite believe all this is happening either.

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If there is one thing I learn it’s that nothing is as unpredictable as the process of making a short film. It might be back on track again now, and I am again aiming for a shoot at the end of August. If all goes well, I am going to take a week off there and shoot it five days in a row.

But seeing the nature of this project, tomorrow things might look completely different again.

For those not knowing anything about the film:

Dan (50′s) is an award winning romantic novelist, an expert on romance – in books.
Being a master with written words – Dan loves corresponding with June (50′s).
Until the day where June invites him over for tea.
Having a severe stutter, Dan has refused dating women for what seems like a life time.
Will he lose June or is a Jammie Dodger going to save the day?

More detailed short film talk for those interested »

Wrong Day Wrong Time

• I just took this picture, on my way back to the office after lunch in a posh burger bar on Portobello Road. It struck me how appropriate it was. This is the tape you get taped on your garbage if you happen to put it out on the street on the wrong day: Wrong Day Wrong Time. On this photo it is stuck on a role of carpet.
• Now why is that appropriate you wonder. Well my short film seem to have hit Wrong Day Wrong Time too. As in it is the middle of the summer and people are on holiday. So in stead of stressing about not being able to find any people, I move it ahead a month. This does not mean nothing is happening, something is:
  • tomorrow I have a coffee with a very experienced producer who will give me some advice
  • on Tuesday I have a coffee with a very experienced camera man and I am going to try to convince him to shoot the film. Not sure I will succeed but it is worth the try!

  Don’t worry I am not giving it up or anything. I am just being practical. And trust me there are some people who have a close eye on me making this film and there is no way I can get out it any more. Not that I want to. I want to make this film and will.

• It is incredible hot in London at the moment. Too hot for me actually.
• I hope the weather will be like this next weekend, as I have planned another coast weekend. We will return to Weymouth and visit:

  Chesil Beach
  Lulworth cove
  Durdle Door

  And OK, we also really miss Victor so we will for sure visit him too.

• I have also planned a week of holiday to the land of the many sheep. I will stay not too far from Coornagillagh (map) That’s in Ireland. I have been told there are lots of sheep, lighthouses, seals and loads of fresh air. More about that later, it will be in September and no I have never been to Ireland before!

  Depending on how the film shooting schedule is going to be, I am currently considering taking some days on the Isle of Man first, take the ferry from there to Ireland and take the train to Cork where I will be picked up for Coornagillagh. I really need to practise on that name!

• I saw 50 Ways to leave your lover yesterday. What a cracking cast, and despite the fact that in those 50 Ways Love did not conquer, it was a joy to watch. The Bush theatre is probably the smallest theatre I have visited in London, but it was a very nice intimate theatre. (And it was very bearable to be inside despite the 25 degrees heatwave we are having at the moment!) Shepherd’s Bush is an area where I wouldn’t want to walk around at night, but you can get a great pizza there which I ate right beside the drummer of the Dandy Warhols. I know, I know I am such a celeb junkie.

Don't Panic

But I am trying to fight against it!

WALL-E and Billy Mac

The very good

First a recommendation: WALL-E. Go see it. It’s a 10/10 film. It’s clever, funny, very actual, and it’s a roboromcom! Wall-E is such a cool character that I took the bus from the cinema to Hamley’s and brought him home with me. See how much a film can say without any dialogue. Great for both children and grown ups. Go see it! Go! Go! Go!

The maybe good

On the short film front – Sunday was a day of location hunting.

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Lovers at St. Pancras

I met with a potential assistant yesterday, we got along quite well, so I guess he is the person who will help me not going mental.

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The fear of the Cookie

And I forgot to add: I need a dog as well!

I feel like running away.

I have a meeting with a potential assistant this evening. And also hope to have a meeting with a potential assistant producer very soon. See, I am actually working on it!

And I will soon start the search for locations and actors.

Portland Bill

I think it is fair to conclude that the English south coast is beautiful no matter where you go. The same goes for the light houses!

More pictures, more words »

Playing with Words

• It’s popping up everywhere now, and it is intriguing. Feed your feed (or just a stack of words) into Wordle and see how beautiful words can be. (Unfortunately the page won’t let you save it as an image, but you can save it as PDF and blow it up and put it on a t-shirt. Or something. Actually I might go and do that. Or on moo cards.

  The words above are words from my feed, which means that these are recently written words on this weblog.

• Let’s get the fessing out of the way then. I have not written anything this week. But I have worked hard and serious and determined on the pre production of my short film. More about that later, but I now know that it will take about 5 days to shoot. Which is a lot!
• The weekend will again be a coastal one. At 5.30pm I will take the train from Waterloo to Weymouth where I will stay the weekend.

  Tomorrow I will be joined by a good friend and we will go and admire the long legged lanky grooviness of Bill. Portland Bill. We will also play frisbee!

  Extra bonus information: Weymouth is also the location where they have shot a lot of the exterior scenes for The Boat That Rocked.

• I want an iPhone when it is able to send an MMS. I am actually someone who uses that quite a lot! How can they launch v2 of the iPhone and still not have this function (all other phones can do it!) implemented? I don’t get it.
• May your weekend be sunny.

It must be a perfect moment to have a post about The Girl In The Cafe on tour, seeing as another important G8 meeting is held in Japan as we speak.

Now just in case you don’t remember what it was all about, here is a message from your Uncle Bill, as he can explain it much better than I can.

And let’s face it, he is also much groovier than I am.

More Bill:
Bill has also written a post on the Oxfam International blog about his experiences in Japan.

And Bill’s (and many other Oxfam ambassadors’) letter to the G8 can be read here.

And more on OXFAM.

OK so now you are up to date. The Girl in the Cafe, the film, is about the same things. And my DVD of this great film has been travelling for quite a while now to far away places (as you can see on the world map)

The DVD has visited 69 people around the world, and new participants are signing up regularly, with Greece, Singapore and Wales being new destinations.

And there are new reviews from a couple of people who participated.

Please step inside »

Cinema

It was a pretty rainy weekend in London this weekend so the cinema was the obvious place to hide. I do admit that I spend time in the cinema on sunny days too. But lately my sunny weekends tend to be spend on the coast.

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Bill Nighy as Lawrence in the Girl in the Cafe

Because he is such a great and groovy and intelligent man. Because it is such an important issue. Because it is so related to The Girl in the Cafe – we do a Bill post. How long has it been anyway!

Bill Nighy is currently lobbying with Oxfam at the G8, to make sure that the G8 doesn’t forget their promises about making poverty history.

Bill did an interview for the Andrew Marr show (Bill’s interview is about 30 minutes in the program).

You can see the interview here.

See also: Oxfam

Go watch the interview!

An update on The Girl in the Cafe DVD world travelling project soon to come.

Love+Rock: Speed dial no. 2

» Send it here

Entertainment weekly has published a list with 100 new classic movies, and it did not take long before that was turned into a meme. I could not not do this one, especially because there are so many movies I have seen on this list. So here we go, the bold ones I have seen. And feel free to copy!

1. Pulp Fiction (1994)
2. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-03)
3. Titanic (1997)
4. Blue Velvet (1986)
5. Toy Story (1995)
6. Saving Private Ryan (1998 ) (Have seen bits of it, but find it too hard to watch)
7. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
8. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
9. Die Hard (1988 )
10. Moulin Rouge (2001)

90 More to go! »

Seeing as this is a year without any Bill Nighy films hitting the cinema (So tough! But next year there will be five!), we have to make the best of what we do get. That is not too hard really, as in 122 days we will get Daniel Craig in the new Quantum of Solace Bond film.

It is great to see that Danish actor Jesper Christensen is returning (QOS being the follow up to Casino Royale) in this new Bond. So after running the trailer for a couple of times, and having a look at the poster, I must conclude the following:

• Awesome trailer (they will show it before Hancock (the new Will Smith anti superhero flick) which is the only reason I will go and see Hancock)
• Awesome poster. (I think this qualifies for me as the coolest Bond poster ever. Simple yet effective).
• Awesome visuals shots. (I love James walking up the hill, and also like the reference shot to Casino Royale, the one where you can see Daniel Craig half in the shade in the beginning)
• Awesome music.
• Awesome tuxedo.
• Awesome blue eyes.
• Awesome, ehrm, chest.

Yep.

The Police in Hyde park

That was it then, but it could not have been better weather for it. The Police played their final UK concert ever in Hyde Park yesterday, and according to the number of people wearing Police t-shirts a lots of their fans met up to say goodbye to them. It was a nearly 2 hour long extravaganza of their hits and apart from Sting having a beard making him 20 years older, and Steward Copeland wearing the complete wrong specs – it was good!

There were an estimated 35.000 people in Hyde Park, but we were surprised how relaxed it was. We were not very close to the stage, but the sound was good and we could sit/stand without having to touch our neighbours.

Just as good as The Police was to hear KT Tunstall live. She is cool, she is great live and I love her Eye to the Telescope album, which is on high rotation in my ears at the moment. I will certainly catch one of her concerts should she come to London again.

On Saturday I returned to Eastbourne and had another walk in the Beachy Head area. The weather was amazing, but the beach was nearly empty. Which made it safe enough for us to play some frisbee for a while which was fun at the time. Today I can feel pain in muscles on places I didn’t even know I had muscles. Don’t say it’s an age thing.

Oh, and we will soon be 2 + 1 + 1 = 4.

My journey to work

Random things about a randomly picked subject. Today: transport in London. And some fess up Friday too.

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Funky pebble

Does this pebble look like a face to you too?

And just in case the “mood of growing satisfying climax” made you wonder what sort of books I read – that’s a completely innocent Wallander thriller.