Wednesday, August 29, 2007

I started watching "Bones" and now I'm hooked

If you give your college age daughter a gift card to Dunkin Donuts for breakfast one day, you'll never see it again. Or maybe if that's just if you give it to me...

I just saw a "It's ten o'clock. Do you know where your children are?" ad. They still have those?

So in my previous post I talked about how I feel that, since the last two of my three scripts have sucked royally, I really need to make the next one count. Lucky for me, the next one will probably be a collaboration piece with a friend who came to me with a great idea. But a thread sprang up on Wordplayer that has to do with self doubt that I've found helpful. Some people are like, "Well, get it out, even if it sucks. It's all practice." Other people are like "I've never understood that. It's only practice if you're practicing the right things and it will be good." Bill M. had a great response here about how everyone makes mistakes as they learn. Anticipate the mess, but don't get sloppy. I should know this. I've been writing long enough to know that what I'm doing now will not be as good as what I'll write later. It's part of perfecting the craft. Everyone's going to doubt now and then. It's all in about how you handle it.

Films/Theatre I've seen recently:

A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare in the Park - Good. I always enjoy Shakespeare in the Park, and I really liked the main story. I always have mixed feelings about the play within a play, because they did it really well and we laughed a lot, but at the same time you're like, why? I'm sure there's a grand interpretation, but that was the only time I got fidgety.

Trust the Man - Really, I want to love this movie. I like it. This is the second time I've seen it. It's just, can we deal with relationships and be funny without being crass? It's just the last scene - it saves the entire movie. I love that scene, it's perfect, especially what Billy Crudup's character says. This gives us an important lesson about the last scene and how crucial it is. It can swing your viewer/reader (as long as they've made it that far).

Mary Poppins, Broadway - Not my favourite Disney movie, but they offered us reasonable tickets. And I was absolutely delighted. Really a fun, amazing show, and even with all we know about the tricks of Broadway, I found myself wonder about how they did things. I definitely recommend it for anyone visiting New York. Great singing, great acting, great numbers. Not that I've ever had any experiences like that, a nanny in England...

Factory Girl - Sad movie. Fascinating and engaging (though here, too, are scenes that...) And Hayden Christensen looks great. ; ) Good movie, but definitely not a light one.

I have Russian Ark sitting by my bed. A movie shot all in one take, a choice that amazes me. I really want to watch it, but... I'm going to go back up my poor, beat up computer instead. I found out I'm eligible for a battery recall. That's great because my battery can only hold ten minutes. But it's not being recalled because it can't hold a charge. Oh no, it's being recalled because it tends to catch fire.

What can I say? It's a Mac. It's hott.

1 comment:

Josh Elder said...

Believe me, you haven't read bad screenplays until you've read the incoherent, rambling, amateur-hour stuff I was churning out back in college. But everyone has at least a dozen or so terrible stories in them. I like to think that since I've already gotten them out of the way, everything I write from here on out will be pure gold.

And I really, really did like the one screenplay that you've actually let me read, so you're already ahead of the quality curve in pretty much every way.

In other words: Stop complaining! You're already talented beyond your years, and you're only going to get better.