12.23.2008

Dealing With Roadblocks

Hey true believers! You are the elite few if you are reading this post! The kind of dedication you guys have for checking up on a blog that hasn’t been updated for a good four months brings tears of joy to my eyes. Or perhaps this is your first time here because you were played a horrible prank by your friends who decided that rickrolling you just wasn't enough. Regardless, I will bring you up to speed with the film's progress. The few people who actually visited this blog have pointed out that it has been quite some time since my last update. I’ve been meaning to post about my recent escapade but never knew where to begin. So today I have finally decided to sit down and explain what happened before I took off for school.

Two days before I had to leave for my fall quarter of college I attempted to shoot as much footage for the movie as humanly possible. Unfortunately, I had the worst luck with authority that night as the law enforcers were out in full force and had nothing better to do than harass a couple of upstanding students. The following is an accurate rant of what went down.

The first scene that I wanted to shoot took place inside a mall. I attempted to do it all without a permit since I didn't run into any trouble filming test footage a day earlier. Of course, I didn't expect to run into any trouble since the rules of the mall fail to mention any ban on photography. Still, it's always a little nerve-wracking to see a large man with a baton walk in your direction. While I was setting up the camera, a security guard approached us and asked what we were doing. Surprisingly he was actually a cheerful guy and allowed us to go about our business since we were filming at a secluded spot during the ghastly time of 11pm.

The test footage I originally shot was with only one person on camera acting as a place-holder to make it easier for the cast to visualize what was going to happen during the actual take. After piecing together the footage, I had the timing down to approximately what I wanted the final product to mimic. Apparently I had miscalculated and the timing became a lot more complicated once we threw all the actors in at once. After filming roughly five takes, trouble came stomping through the set.

A bellowing voice shouted, "Just what do you think you're doing" in the most condescending way imaginable. I looked over my shoulder to see what looked like a young man in his mid 20's with a face full of anger. I explained to this security guard that I was filming a short film. Upon hearing this he screeched, "Well, you can't film here. Nor can you film within 200 feet of the mall". I explained to him that a different security guard had passed by earlier and gave us permission to film. This new guy looked at me as if I was lying and promptly replied, "That guy has no idea what he's talking about! You people have to leave now!”

In retrospect I should've asked him what he meant by "you people" since we were a group of Asians and he was Caucasian but hey, I don't want to be the guy that plays the race card. That kind of thing really isn’t my cup of tea, and I’d hate to think that other people have to forcibly act nice towards me. Then again, it’s probably because I’m not exactly a minority in our predominately Asian neighborhood. I didn’t want to argue with him over a non-written rule that he was so adamant on enforcing and decided to film elsewhere. I was desperate to get as much recording done as possible and decided that a change in location could work (albeit I had already planned every single camera angle I was going to use for the original mall setting). I told the cast and crew the new location and we immediately took off.

By the time we arrived on the new location it was already past midnight. Lighting was going to be a problem so I had one of our cast members turn on their car lights to brighten up the makeshift set. Just as he finished putting his car in place a security guard at this new location (a random parking lot) drove by in his little golf cart. He stared at us as if we were dangerous and floored it. I didn't think much of it at the time because it was late and there shouldn't have been anyone at a parking lot for a pearl milk tea joint anyways. Actually, the fact that the tea shop had security patrolling at all impresses me to this day. I just assumed the man was tired and wanted to go home. A few minutes passed and suddenly something miraculous happened! Our dark set was magically lit! Unfortunately for us, it was by a third party: a sheriff.

As his car approached, we decided that I should talk to the guy and explain what we were doing. Without warning the officer pulls out his loud speaker and forcefully tells me to step in front of the car. It was then I sensed that I was dealing with “one of those cops”. When I was directly in front of his bright headlights he told me to stay right where I was and he proceeded to phone something through his walkie. After he was done chatting with his buddy on the other line, he stepped out of the car and proceeded to power trip. I wasn’t allowed to say a single thing as the man had a nasty habit of interrupting my sentences and pointing at me with a stern look and finger.

Once he finished abusing his power and harassing us he told us to scram and waited for us to drive off. I’ll admit I was quite terrified at the time but thinking back on it I feel like I should’ve been slightly more miffed at the guy. Here we are in one of America’s richest, smartest, and safest cities. All of the public schools in our area are ranked among the top in the nation and the only violence that exists is on television. You would think that a group of nerdy and scrawny Asians from an affluent neighborhood would pose little threat to a hefty donut eater with a 9mm. But hey! Enough complaining! The poor guy was only doing his job right?

After our second failed attempt at filming we decided to give it one last go before calling it a night. We met up at a new location that was roughly 15 minutes away from the previous botched attempt. At this point we were all a little shaken and decided we weren’t in the mood to film. As we said our goodbyes, we noticed a bright flash of red and blue light. Apparently the source came from the same police officer we had met earlier. This bothered me quite a bit as I have never realized I was such a popular guy worthy of a good stalking. I still don't really understood the point of letting us go if he was only going to secretly follow us to our new destination. But alas my 15 minutes of fame were cut short because he apparently decided to set his sights on someone new and had pulled someone else over. I don’t really blame him for showing excessive force. I’d be bored to death as well if my job was to serve and protect in a city that doesn’t need any protecting. All the crimes committed here are digital. We Asian kids sure love to download!

To make a long story short, the first day of shooting went terribly. We ran into a total of three separate security guards, and one police officer within a time span of less than three hours. Sadly, I ended up with only 5 seconds of useable footage from one of the good takes. The night definitely didn’t go as smoothly and productively when compared to the test footage I painlessly shot a day earlier.

As grim as all this may have been, those 5 seconds have kept me going for the past three months at school and I have come up with a lot of ideas on using those 5 precious seconds to my full advantage. I’ve developed a new script that makes use of the complicated footage we shot, and it should blend smoothly with the rest of the film. Sure, the original story has been slightly changed but it’s for the better as it’s now streamlined and improved. These past three months have made me even more excited and anxious to pump the first episode out. Hopefully it will be completed in early 2009. Until then, don’t stop believing!