(no subject)
I mentioned that I would probably come post on here in a few weeks complaining about film and everything that goes along with it, but in the end, it would ultimately pay off. So here I am, no more than two days later, complaining about film, yet I know there will be no pay off.
This requires a lot of set up. The final project in my film class had six of the sixteen people in class pitching possible script ideas to be shot. Only four of the eight total scripts that were pitched were chosen, and mine was one of them. These were writer pitches.
The following week, we had director pitches. If you wanted to direct what you had written, you had to put a miniature presentation together and talk about visual design, ideas about characters, theme, etc., to have the class choose who would direct what project. So each of the writers pitched to direct their own piece (myself included), but there were also two other kids who pitched for my script. I won't put his name down for the sake of people who end up finding these public posts, but let's call him Balding Motherfucker as code, or BM for short.
Knowing that no one else likes the other two guys who are pitching, and thinking I have some kind of writer's advantage, I didn't put as much effort as I should have into my pitch. I will say that I still did a decent job, and it didn't appear half-assed. So BM pitches and has a shitty powerpoint put together for it, but honestly, it wasn't anything special. His powerpoint basically just had stills from other movies with his comments which were like, "I think the characters are like the ones from Ghostworld and Dumb and Dumber, I think the story has the tone of Napoleon Dynamite meets Rushmore." etc. It really didn't add anything. Okay, so here's the inevitable point: BM gets chosen to direct this script that I wrote and had all of these exciting ideas for. So now I'm fucked.
Here's where this is going to sound completely pretentious and lame because I'm using terms that are applicable to the art, but fuck you. A few problems: 1. BM is going to do whatever the fuck with it that he wants, destroy the script, do a terrible job of planning anything out, and in general be a nuissance to work with, 2. rely on me to get more shit done that I should be expected to do as Director of Photography (my new role and last attempt at trying to control anything visual I had originally planned for the film), 3. push people away from helping us out (I had a bunch of people from class who were interested in helping out after my writer's pitch, but once they found out that BM was directing, they all went to different projects), and 4. just being a general piece of shit.
Case and point: on a set, you're required to feed your crew because they're nice enough to come help you out on your project. They're arriving early in the morning and working long hours for you, so the least you can do is feed them. One of the nicer things to do is to ask if anyone has any special dietary needs that you need to provide for, such as vegetarians. When our professor brought up having a veggie alternative, 'ol BM started laughing and said, "YEAH! You expect me to do that? Ha. Yeah right. I'm not buying vegetarian food." That made me so fucking angry. I'm not even vegetarian and I think it's completely ridiculous. I don't think I need to explain how that makes him a dick.
There are many other reasons why this guy sucks, but that's all I care to go into now. The point is, I now have to work with this guy for the remainder of the semester on an extremely intense project. That means I'm going to be devoting the majority of my time to something that I don't believe in, respect, or generally give a fuck about. This also means that I'm one of the four people paying money to get this shit made, so I would assume that I'll have to put in a good four hundred dollars of my own money for this bullshit. It's a really hard thing to do.
I really can't express the extent of my anger and frustration with this situation. This class requires a lot of my time, and because of it, affects my other three classes. I don't learn very much in my other classes because I'm so invested in Film II, and that would be okay if I was getting out of it what I did for the first project, but the way this is going so far, there's no chance of that.
It makes me want to break down and cry. It's keeping me up right now. I was trying to go to bed, and the inside of my torso started to burn with rage. I just want to take a fucking knife and stab it through BM's ugly face.
The script is still being revised, and what's more irritating is that as the script is changing, BM keeps telling me, "Oh, well, this is sorta different than how I had envisioned it. I mean, I wanted to work on it when it was how you originally pitched the script." Motherfuck. This all sounds so petty and stupid. I'm trying to think of some universal comparison that everyone can relate to. I have never felt so frustrated over school work, but I guess there's a good reason for it. I've never really had a piece of school work that I could potentially be so proud of. In the end, these films are all pieces of art; not just something you're making for a grade. I genuinely end up caring about what I write, and what I can reproduce on film, and what I can organize, etc. It means a terrible amount to me, and just knowing that this whole thing is being built on the fucking Titanic from the beginning makes me want to shoot myself.
I shouldn't have to deal with this, but at this point in time, there's really no place for me to go. It's kinda like, do I want to pass this class or not? It makes me want to drop out of school and start working with people that I like (Alex, Jeff, Mike, Billy, BLAH BLAH BLAH). If I'm going to feel like I do right now for the next five or six weeks, I should be in great shape my Christmas time.
This requires a lot of set up. The final project in my film class had six of the sixteen people in class pitching possible script ideas to be shot. Only four of the eight total scripts that were pitched were chosen, and mine was one of them. These were writer pitches.
The following week, we had director pitches. If you wanted to direct what you had written, you had to put a miniature presentation together and talk about visual design, ideas about characters, theme, etc., to have the class choose who would direct what project. So each of the writers pitched to direct their own piece (myself included), but there were also two other kids who pitched for my script. I won't put his name down for the sake of people who end up finding these public posts, but let's call him Balding Motherfucker as code, or BM for short.
Knowing that no one else likes the other two guys who are pitching, and thinking I have some kind of writer's advantage, I didn't put as much effort as I should have into my pitch. I will say that I still did a decent job, and it didn't appear half-assed. So BM pitches and has a shitty powerpoint put together for it, but honestly, it wasn't anything special. His powerpoint basically just had stills from other movies with his comments which were like, "I think the characters are like the ones from Ghostworld and Dumb and Dumber, I think the story has the tone of Napoleon Dynamite meets Rushmore." etc. It really didn't add anything. Okay, so here's the inevitable point: BM gets chosen to direct this script that I wrote and had all of these exciting ideas for. So now I'm fucked.
Here's where this is going to sound completely pretentious and lame because I'm using terms that are applicable to the art, but fuck you. A few problems: 1. BM is going to do whatever the fuck with it that he wants, destroy the script, do a terrible job of planning anything out, and in general be a nuissance to work with, 2. rely on me to get more shit done that I should be expected to do as Director of Photography (my new role and last attempt at trying to control anything visual I had originally planned for the film), 3. push people away from helping us out (I had a bunch of people from class who were interested in helping out after my writer's pitch, but once they found out that BM was directing, they all went to different projects), and 4. just being a general piece of shit.
Case and point: on a set, you're required to feed your crew because they're nice enough to come help you out on your project. They're arriving early in the morning and working long hours for you, so the least you can do is feed them. One of the nicer things to do is to ask if anyone has any special dietary needs that you need to provide for, such as vegetarians. When our professor brought up having a veggie alternative, 'ol BM started laughing and said, "YEAH! You expect me to do that? Ha. Yeah right. I'm not buying vegetarian food." That made me so fucking angry. I'm not even vegetarian and I think it's completely ridiculous. I don't think I need to explain how that makes him a dick.
There are many other reasons why this guy sucks, but that's all I care to go into now. The point is, I now have to work with this guy for the remainder of the semester on an extremely intense project. That means I'm going to be devoting the majority of my time to something that I don't believe in, respect, or generally give a fuck about. This also means that I'm one of the four people paying money to get this shit made, so I would assume that I'll have to put in a good four hundred dollars of my own money for this bullshit. It's a really hard thing to do.
I really can't express the extent of my anger and frustration with this situation. This class requires a lot of my time, and because of it, affects my other three classes. I don't learn very much in my other classes because I'm so invested in Film II, and that would be okay if I was getting out of it what I did for the first project, but the way this is going so far, there's no chance of that.
It makes me want to break down and cry. It's keeping me up right now. I was trying to go to bed, and the inside of my torso started to burn with rage. I just want to take a fucking knife and stab it through BM's ugly face.
The script is still being revised, and what's more irritating is that as the script is changing, BM keeps telling me, "Oh, well, this is sorta different than how I had envisioned it. I mean, I wanted to work on it when it was how you originally pitched the script." Motherfuck. This all sounds so petty and stupid. I'm trying to think of some universal comparison that everyone can relate to. I have never felt so frustrated over school work, but I guess there's a good reason for it. I've never really had a piece of school work that I could potentially be so proud of. In the end, these films are all pieces of art; not just something you're making for a grade. I genuinely end up caring about what I write, and what I can reproduce on film, and what I can organize, etc. It means a terrible amount to me, and just knowing that this whole thing is being built on the fucking Titanic from the beginning makes me want to shoot myself.
I shouldn't have to deal with this, but at this point in time, there's really no place for me to go. It's kinda like, do I want to pass this class or not? It makes me want to drop out of school and start working with people that I like (Alex, Jeff, Mike, Billy, BLAH BLAH BLAH). If I'm going to feel like I do right now for the next five or six weeks, I should be in great shape my Christmas time.