My Friend, John Rambo
Posted by Jeremiah on January 25th, 2008 @ 05:51 PM | Comments (1)

I just returned from seeing Rambo at the AMC in Atlanta with my younger brother and two friends. We’re all kids of the 80’s and fans of all three Rambo films. I think everyone can agree that the best one, when looking at them as a critic, is First Blood. But, everyone also seems to agree that First Blood: Part 2 is their favorite. It certainly is mine.

I was watching Rambo 2 a few days ago and was amazed at how many great quotes it has.

Rambo: To win war, you gotta become war.

Rambo: Sir, do we get to win this time?
Trautman: This time, it’s up to you.

Trautman: The war, the whole conflict may have been wrong but damn it don’t hate your country for it.
Rambo: Hate? I’d die for it.
Trautman: Then what is it you want?
Rambo: I want, what they want, and every other guy who came over here and spilled his guts and gave everything he had, wants! For our country to love us as much as we love it! That’s what I want!

Trautman: How will you live, John?
Rambo: Day by day.

Hot Asian Chick: Rambo, you not expendable.

These are classic lines from a film I’ve watched dozens of times. My brothers and I got the Rambo 2 toy gun set for Christmas one year. I still have it out in my garage. We took strips of red cloth, tied them around our foreheads, and played Rambo for hours. Good times.

When I saw Rocky Balboa, I must admit, it was nice to have Rocky back. I blogged about that a few weeks ago.

As for this newest Rambo, I did enjoy seeing Rambo again, but the film itself was way too violent. I don’t mind all the realism in a film like Saving Private Ryan because I know it happened. But Rambo is fiction. Sure the conflict is really going on over there but I’m not sure where it is and I’m not sure why they are fighting. All I do know is that they are despicable people who rape any woman (and small boy) in sight - and they hate missionaries. So yes, they deserve to have their throats ripped out of their necks. But I’d rather not see it. Hear it, okay. No problem. Let me hear the crunch.

This film sort of felt like it wanted to gross you out. There were times when it was difficult to watch. One thing I can say for it, it seemed to up the impact of the weaponry. I have fired an AK-47, the kind of guns that the Viet Cong were firing at Rambo in the 2nd film, and those things would make you pee your pants if fired at you. In that movie, they seem to be shooting pellets. In this film, every gun seems to be able to blow your head off. And people were scared of getting hit. Well, not so much Rambo, but everyone else. So I give them props for that element. Also, I wouldn’t mind Rambo’s violence so much, I mean heck, isn’t that what we paid $8 to see, but the despicable Asian men were just so… despicable. Lots of gun shots to little kids and women. I could stomach a few but they laid it on pretty heavy.

I’d say this is the worst of the four films, but when I say worst, I mean it lovingly. Even though Sly is pumped up on steroids, I still have to give it to him. He can make a decent film. And it was a visually stunning film. When criticizing him, just remember - would you rather see films starring Sly, or films starring Vin Diesel. Enough said.

One word to the wise: don’t take your kids to this film. It’s definitely a teen movie and up. Hundreds of people die and every time someone does, we are reminded just how much blood the human body contains. Also there is brief nudity when the despicable but still throat-wearing Asian men are raping every Asian woman on screen. And this goes on for several minutes.

Overall, I’d give this film two stars - but since it is a Rambo movie, I have to bump it to three. The music was great - again, Jerry Goldsmith’s theme was there. And the final 2 minutes of the film were beautiful. I would have liked it better if they had toned down the violence and explained a little more about the conflict going on but I did enjoy myself.

Post-Production Diary: ADR
Posted by Jeremiah on January 18th, 2008 @ 11:51 AM | Comments (2)

This week, Josh and I spent 3 days recording the ADR for our feature. For those of you who don’t know what that is, ADR stands for Automated Dialogue Replacement. (Or Additional Dialogue Recording.) Check out wikipedia’s article for more info about ADR.

This was a fun but tedious experience. We basically had the actors come in one at a time and re-record clean versions of their dialogue. I’d say 30% of the film needs ADR. There are a couple of ways to do it but we chose to loop the dialogue. The actor hears one line of dialogue play over and over again and they try and match it as best they can.

In some cases we tweaked the performance a little. Recording ADR was a fun little exercise in directing. You really see how the vocal inflections are determined by the actor’s emotion and how this can be changed by direction. They say actors hate to be given a line reading by the director. We did our best not to do this. And it was amazing how we could get our actors to give the right inflection by giving them a playable emotion or feeling to evoke. That was the fun part.

The tedious part was sitting in a cramped room for 10 hours a day hearing the same dialogue over and over again. Three days in a row. Our actors were really gracious to give us so much time. I think they are all anxious for the film to be complete.
We still have another couple of light days to do for the smaller parts. We’ll get to that next week.

____

On a side note, I just watched four films that I’ve never seen before.

1) The Outsiders: Coppala’s film starring every teen actor in the 80’s. I liked the film for the most part. It was a little slow and it meandered. I wonder if I would like it more if I had seen it earlier in my life. I thought the Karate Kid did a good job. But was it just me, or was Rob Lowe’s character waaay to “loving” to Pony Boy? That was creepy. I give it 2 stars (just because of Soda Pop’s love affair with Pony Boy.)

2) The Warriors: “Warriors, come out to play-ay.” A fun but very cheesy movie. Reminded me a little of Swartzenneger’s Running Man. I give it 3 stars.

3) Star Trek: The Motion Picture: I’m so glad the filmmakers of the sequels abandoned the 2001: A Space Oddyssey feel. Man, what a slow movie. And nothing really ever happens. The ending was interesting. Finding the ___ at the heart of V’ger. I won’t spoil it if you haven’t seen it. The only thing I really enjoyed about this movie was the score. Jerry Goldsmith, why did you have to die? Two stars. Would have been one but Jerry kept me going.

4) Sling Blade: I never got around to seeing this when it came out and have avoided it for years. I thought it would be like Of Mice and Men which almost caused me to commit suicide after I saw it. But, I finally watched it this past week and although the ending isn’t super happy, it isn’t as bad as Of Mice and Men. I went around doing Sling Blade impressions all week. I’m really behind on that trend. “I guess I give that thar film 4 stars, Mmm hmm.”

Jeremiah’s Best of 2007: At the Movies
Posted by Jeremiah on January 7th, 2008 @ 03:19 PM | Comments (2)

I’m working on the post-production of the film. We’re a few weeks away from picture lock (and I know we’ve been saying that for months.)

I got bored trying to figure out what to do about the ADR of the film and decided to write a top ten list. So here it is.

This is my top ten movies that I saw in the theater in 2007. I saw 30 films last year (but I shouldn’t count Live Free of Die Hard because I fell asleep in it.) Here is my top ten… and this doesn’t necessarily mean I think they are the best movies I saw this year, just the most enjoyable movie going experience.

10. Pirates of the Carribean: At World’s End - I didn’t think it was a great movie or even coherent, but I did enjoy it and the world is a fun one to visit for several hours.

9. Meet the Robinsons - I saw this in Disney 3D and I liked it a lot. The soundtrack is great and the storyline is fun (though a little predictable.) Tom Selleck’s cameo is awesome.

8. National Treasure: Book of Secrets - My father and I loved the first one so we had to see the second. And even though it is basically the first one told again with a different bad guy, I liked it a lot. It’s not Raiders of the Lost Ark but I certainly had fun.

7. Enchanted - Good movie. Good songs. It’s a loving spoof sort of like Galaxy Quest.

6. 3:10 to Yuma - A western starring Christian Bale. Did they make this movie with me in mind? Because Christian Bale is one of my favorite actors working today and I love westerns. They got my $8 at the theater and tomorrow, they’ll get my $19.95 for the DVD. I don’t necessarily think it deserves a lot of Oscar buzz. It’s good but it’s no The Searchers.

5. Rocky Balboa - It’s like getting a visit from your favorite dead uncle or grandfather. You thought he was dead, you missed him, and now that he’s back, you don’t mind that he’s a little gross and decomposed. You’re just glad he’s back. (Is that twisted?) I can’t wait for him to return again in January. Rambo - January 25th. I’ll be there opening night. Though I don’t expect it to be great.

4. Children of Men - Good movie. Amazingly similar to a screenplay we were writing.

3. The Mist - I loved watching this movie. The ending was great. I don’t usually like endings like that but this time, it really worked. And it was soo cool to see Tiffany Morgan and Brandon O’Dell on the big screen. They both have parts in our film as well.

2. Blood Diamond - I posted about this after I saw it. I was watching it today on my iPhone while sitting on the… er… couch. I like it a lot. It’s another film I can’t really explain why I like - like Bridge on the River Kwai.

and finally…

1. Hot Fuzz - Probably the most fun I’ve had at the movie theater in a long time. The writing is brilliant and the actors are soo funny. They make movies they want to see. And they do it with excellence.

Some honorable mentions are TMNT and Alvin and the Chipmunks. I had fun. They weren’t great but as a kid of the 80’s, you gotta love the Turtles and the Chipmunks. Disturbia was also very enjoyable.

Here are a few of the WORST of 2007 in no particular order.

Alien Vs Predater 2 - quite possibly the worst expensive movie ever made

The Last Mimzy - most definitely the worst kids movie ever made (Dwight Schrute, what were you thinking?)

Ghost Rider - Haha. I like Nicolas Cage but this was awful.

Spiderman 3 - Upon a second look, it isn’t as bad as I thought but when I first saw it, I was so dissappointed.

I would also mention a certain big budget film with these large robots that transform, but if I did, I’m sure I’d get hate mail. So I won’t. I just hope Stephen Sommers takes G.I. Joe more seriously. Wait, he made Van Helsing. So… Hehe.

So that is my top 10 movies I saw at the theater in 2007.

Goodbye 2007. Hello 2008.
Posted by Josh on January 1st, 2008 @ 03:32 PM | Comments (0)

It’s been a heck of a year.  This time last year, I never would have guessed that we would have directed our first feature in 2007.  Wow.  I can’t believe we did it.  It was easily the most difficult thing I’ve ever done.  I get so frustrated when I tell people that we directed our first feature and they say, “oh.  That’s cool.” and then move on to something else.  I want to shake them and say, “Thats it?!  We just climbed freakin’ Mount Everest and all you can say is ‘That’s cool.’  Don’t you realize what we’ve accomplished?”  But I’m too even tempered for that response, so I just swallow it and accept the fact that most people don’t have any idea what goes into making a feature film.

For those of you that do, those of you that were right there with us through the making of Dangerous Calling, I want to say a heartfelt thank you from the Daws Brothers.  We couldn’t have done it without you.  Whether you invested in the film, worked on the film, or were one of the few that understand the major accomplishment that is directing a feature film (and were nice enough to give us major props), we really appreciate all that you’ve done to make Dangerous Calling a reality.  We’ve been incredibly blessed to have you in our lives in 2007.

As for 2008, we have a few goals.  I don’t say resolutions, because if I could just resolve to get them accomplished, they would have been accomplished in 2007.  These are goals that we’re going to be working our tails off to achieve (all the while recognizing that we’re going to need God to be opening some major doors.)  Here they are:

• Sell the film - This is the big one.  I don’t mean sell the film and make our money back.  I mean sell the film and make a profit.  A nice sized profit.  Preferably early in the year.
• Get an agent/manager - You’d think having written and directed a feature film would help with this.  I’m sure selling it and making a profit would help even more.
• Write a couple scripts - One low budget one to direct as our second feature and one spec script to sell to Hollywood.
• Secure money for our next feature - At least half a million (preferably a million.)  I don’t see us directing another one this year, but who knows.  The year is young.

So there you have it.  First things first.  We’ve got to get DC finished.  Almost there!