Rewriting, rewriting, rewriting . . .

I'm hip-deep in a rewrite of Too Many Tonys.

For the hypothetical people who actually read these, I'm sure you're wondering what happened to The Making of Citizen ZED.  The answer to that is--nothing. I'm letting it sit for a while.

The reason is two-fold. While I love ZED, the draft has some problems and I need to rethink some aspects of the whole thing to resolve them. In the mean time, I've gotten feedback on Tonys, from two different readers, and they both had the same things to say about it. Namely, they loved the basic idea, but there just isn't enough conflict.

Which I suspected, but I was hoping the basic story was enough to cause that to be overlooked. I guess not. So, I've made a pretty significant change to one of the central characters to up the ante and make the whole situation a bit more dire. My hero has more on the line now, both professionally and personally.

One criticism that's bugging me is one reader hated the title. She said it sounded more like the title of a family-friendly flick instead of a noir. So, I've been trying to come up with another title that's more reflective of the tone of the thing. Without success so far, I might add. I'm sure I'll come up with something--or I'll just let the title stand. It is descriptive of what the movie is about, the central problem of the whole thing.

I also got some feedback on my short script, "Niobe." The reader thought it read more like the second act of a feature, and that it would probably work better as a full-length film instead of a short.

A big part of that was the reader didn't figure out what I was trying to do with it, and that is my fault. Certain aspects of the story need to be clearer, more fully explained.

But the feature length thing? Hmmmm . . . I never thought of "Niobe" as being longer than twenty minutes, but the more I think about it, the more I kind of dig the idea. I think maybe there is enough story there to expand it into a full-length feature. It's something I'll be mulling over in the coming months.

In the mean time, though, I'm deconstructing Tonys, putting it back together, sanding it and using wood putty and stain and varnish on it, to take it from a promising idea into a project that would attract A-list talent.

After that? I'll probably turn my attention to ZED again. Hopefully by then I'll have some fresh ideas to deal with the problems and turn that puppy into something that someone will be willing to help me get made.

Also in the mix is my short short, "My Creature," that I hope to shoot in the next year or so. The script is done, but I've got some personal issues I'm going to need to sort out first before I can concentrate on going forward with it. Hopefully those will resolve in a way that will allow me to focus on it and get that baby made.

So, I've got a lot to keep me busy and out of trouble for the next couple of years, looks like.

Maybe even longer!

A few thoughts on the bad guys

I've been checking out reviews--professional and otherwise--of recent superhero epic flicks, and, to be honest, they have not been good. While most of the critics had their own issues, there was one common denominator that ran through all of the reviews I saw.

The bad guy. What the hell did he want? What was he trying to do?

It's like this--you get a team of superheroes together, or you have a situation that's so desperate you put a team of super-villains together, you had better spend some time convincing your audience that your antagonist has both a huge, sinister plan that makes some kind of sense, and is capable of pulling it off.

The bad guy wants to destroy the world? Why? Doesn't he have to live here, too?

The bad guy wants to rule the world? What does that mean? Does he want everyone to pay taxes to him? Does he want to be able to order everyone around? Does he want to have absolute control over each and every person on the planet? Again, why?

Because he's evil doesn't count as a motive. Even if he is evil--and I cringe when I hear characters defined in that way--even if he's crazy, he still has a reason for doing what he does. There's something, real or imagined, in it for him.

I'm willing to forgive the recent Ghostbusters film for having this issue because it's a comedy, and I enjoyed the cast so much I was willing to cut them some slack on this aspect of the story. However, for an action adventure movie it's kind of hard to overlook.

Not that I don't understand. Coming up with a convincing, scary bad guy is really difficult. I'm having that issue myself with a project--I need an incredibly powerful antagonist who had dark designs on humanity. And it has to be a global threat, not one aimed at just a certain person or persons. And he has to have a reason for doing what he's planning to do, and that's the hard one--there just aren't all that many motives out there for doing something like threatening all of humanity. Individual humans, yes, but as a species? No. Unfortunately, my protagonist wouldn't be interested in anything less. Damn her.

But you know something? You come up with a truly bad-ass villain, with a dark and global but viable plan, and with an understandable motive, and you got a story, baby! Most of the movie will write itself.

That's the basic problem, I think. Most of these films coming out now start with the heroes, and, let's face it, there just ain't all that many villains out there that Superman couldn't handle. You need to start with the guy Superman is going to be facing off against, and make him someone that Superman could possibly lose to. Make it so that Superman is required to deal with it. Or Batman. Or whomever.

Anyway, I hope all that makes sense.

Project updates - Citizen ZED

I asked a friend of mine to read an early draft of Citizen ZED and she didn't get the ending. Which is a bummer, as the ending is what makes it dramatically satisfying. So, I'm shelving it for a little while as I work on another project. I'll come back to it shortly, probably in the next few days, hopefully rested and ready to fix the problems with it. I still love it, and I think the story works, it just needs some clarification. There's something missing and I can't quite figure out exactly what it is. One thing I'm doing, which may help, is making a slight change of the title, to The Making of Citizen ZED.

The other project I mentioned above is a short short film I'm calling "My Creature." I actually wrote a draft of the script last week but it was too long and it just didn't work. After obsessing over it all week I finally figured out the problems with it, and hopefully this current draft addresses all of them. I know I'm a lot happier with it.

The plan for the short short is for me to shoot it myself, some time down the road. I plan to play a part in it, opposite my goddaughter. I've never acted before but this role is personal for me so hopefully I can pull it off. My goddaughter is an accomplished actor already,  so I'm not worried about that role. This will be two firsts for me--as director and as actor.

Of course, this is down the road a bit. I have a personal situation involving my day job that needs to be resolved before I'll be able to devote the resources I need towards making a film, even a short one.

I'll need to hire a Director of Photography and a professional to handle sound for "My Creature," not to mention I'll probably need to rent a soundstage, and some equipment and props. And get insurance for the production. Fortunately there are a lot of local resources available as a lot of movies and TV shows are filmed in this area. Atlanta is third in the country, behind Los Angeles and New York, in that category. Plus, I'll need to arrange transportation for my co-star and her mom. Accommodations won't be a problem for them as they can stay with me, or with grandma, who lives in the area.

As for me acting in this thing--I've always heard that every director needs to act at least once to understand what actors have to do to perform their job. This is as good a shot as any for me to do that. Also, if I do it, I won't have to pay somebody else to play the role. Save money!

Of course, that's assuming I find the money to do this thing. To do it right it'll probably take at least five grand. This, for a project that'll probably be around five minutes long. Yes, filmmaking is expensive!

So, after I finish this short short I'm going to go back to the feature. Hopefully by then I will have been away from it long enough for me to see ways to address the problems with it.

Here's hoping situations resolve themselves in a way that'll help me to go forward with all these grandiose, crazy-assed plans!