Club Revival - part 4

The Small Scale Production Process

[The following is all "old hat" to experienced video-makers,
but may serve as a guide for members of small clubs or ones with inexperienced members.]

It begins ...

It begins with, "Hey, let's make a storyboard movie, eh?"

Two alternatives emerge. Use a copyrighted screenplay / stage script and pay the fee ... or ... write an original narrative. Don't dismiss the first option out of hand, but if your club is struggling, the second one seems more practical.

In both cases the text will need conversion to a "Director's Screenplay Version."

And both choices will face two time-honored limitations: finding suitable, willing actors and finding locations.

Can we pull this off ...

Simply, "Can we pull this thing off?"

Before we get all "ambitious", be practical and realistic!

If the "writing" appears first in prose-form, the writer alone is first to "see" images and "hear" dialogue in her mind. She conjures up a plot-structure, puts conversation into the mouths of characters and imagines their body movements. However ... she may well write it in indirect speech and in the third person. That is fine for reading but useless for production. So assume that from the writer's vision comes a prose-written narrative, which will be the base for our Club movie.

A skit may be discovered by word of mouth, on a web-site, in a book of short "Party Jokes" and so on. Don't dismiss these out-of-hand. It is easy to be negative and refuse to touch "stale-looking" material - "these weary old, worn-out jokes can never cut it."  But bear in mind that you can still bring a fresh treatment to old stuff - add new twists and expand characterisation. If the club has not made a group movie for some time, there is a lot to be said for sticking with a simple, familiar plot for a first effort.

Reading into the bare bones script ...

Even if the "copy" is written almost completely in "indirect speech" (reported words), with only brief hints about "stage movements" and emotional responses, reading INTO the words of the play makes a difference. An imaginative reading INTO the given "script" determines what kind of treatment the script might receive.

• Who are these characters?

• Can we make a movie that an audience will "go along with"?

It's a "fresh" treatment of what you dig up that counts most. Will it become a farce with a spontaneous laugh from the audience following the amusing conclusion or will you generate from the same script something that inspires an audience to do some more thinking about what it has seen? Is there a subtlety?

So the writer meets with a group of Club members for discussion. From this meeting, in a realistic assessment, members make a measured commitment to turn the story into a Club Movie.

Transforming the story ...

Now, the writer's story has to be transformed into a Screenplay.

This secondary "writing" process possibly possesses some characteristics different from a purely prose version. (For example you would never ask an actor to say that last sentence and the Screenplay version would be: "Stories on a page are different from films on a screen." )

In the "re-write" version (the screenplay) the prose is transformed into scenes, some with spoken dialogue and some without. Visible actions are indicated, with "frames", with sequences and something else more elusive ... ideally it will capture what made the original so attractive.

A hundred readers of the prose version will visualize the story, its characters, its plot and setting in a hundred different ways, though with many commonalities. Viewers of the finished movie will be offered a more limited vision, as created by the screen-writer and director. How many times have you heard the cry, "I liked the book better than the movie." How many times have writers claimed "the director had got it all wrong?"

At this stage keep in mind that members may contribute, but ultimately the Director's vision must prevail. The Director's screenplay version is written with as much detail as possible, not only with its dialogue, but with directions for body movements, camera positions (point-of-view), "cut-ins", etc. Now is a great time to create a storyboard, using simple sketches which work like a comic-book to show each shot as it might appear in the finished film. This helps everyone concerned understand what the final film should be. It can also reveal problems in advance.

Rehearse and shoot

Assume the Club has acquired actors and location(s). The next step is to "play-read" the Director's Master Copy. Argue. Re-read. Pencil in agreed changes and estimate how long the final movie will run. It is nice to have the camera-person and editor present at this play-reading.

Remember, before the Club made that commitment to the narrative?
Recall how members knew that they had to have actors and a "workable" location?
Hopefully they made sure that the location could be easily lit, the room décor wasn't distracting, and that the "room acoustics" could be managed. (That may mean working "close-in" with on-camera mikes, or better, with a shot-gun boom mike on a boom.)  Keep things simple as possible and "focus" more on the artistic elements of production.

During the shoot, take a drink-break here and there, but don't linger very long, sipping away time and losing momentum. Order lunch in and get on with the shoot promptly - while everyone's "hot to trot." By 4:00pm, nearly everyone gets an attack of the "fidgets."

The director directs ...

It's nice to have a member with sufficient knowledge to take on the duties of Producer. She or he can ease the director's load a lot. But usually in an amateur club most of the responsibility inevitably falls on the Director's shoulders.

He deserves his lofty title, not only for his single-minded dedication to the movie, but for his ability to get the screenplay written and complete the shoot expeditiously. He or she must do so without upsetting club members or actors, and has to assume control of everything that happens on the set. Tact and diplomacy, a sense of humor, engendering good team relationships, timely praise and other subtle leadership skills are needed. He's in charge, and as many people know, managing artistic talent with finesse can be most challenging.

However well the club movie is received at its "premiere" showing, what matters at least as much, is the "club glue" that was generated through the experience, particularly by participants, but by all members basking in the warmth of belonging to an active video club.

Case Studies

At two of our club meetings, we knocked together Doctors' Jokes - thirteen members participating - 10 patients, a doctor, 2 camera persons, director and editor. Total six minutes. Pretty primitive stuff - but an effort for club members which has no acting experience. It was a great experiment in "club glue" . What is more it has been well-received - no rotten tomatoes yet !

If you can knock up a green screen (the exact color of green is not important, just try to light it as evenly as you can) you can have even more fun and demonstrate a potentially valuable tool to club members:

Green material fixed flat.	Actors perform in front of the green. In the editor the green is removed to reveal a still or moving image on the next timeline track.	The result is that the actors seem to be performing outside an old house rather than in the clubroom.

David's series on Reviving a Movie Club: "KISS, critical mass and the twilight zone >

David Fuller is a member of Victoria Video Club, British Columbia, Canada and Western Vice-President of SCCA (the Society of Canadian Cine Amateurs). His articles have appeared in a slightly different form in Panorama the magazine of the SCCA. We are very grateful for the permission of author and editor to reproduce his articles here.