17
Ok….it’s been a - dynamic week. Things have been a little hectic. Some job related, others project related.
Monday I was terminated from my job. This came as quite a surprise to me. I felt that it was entirely without cause. This was a feeling apparently shared by my boss’ boss. In a meeting with him yesterday I was assured that I was still employed. It isn’t appropriate for me to go into any kind of details about this situation, but I can say that the majority of my week has been about taking the necessary steps to contact those that needed to be apprised of my termination so the issue could be resolved. All seems to be working out on that front.
We’ve also run into some interesting challenges with the adaptation process of BoT. Sometimes things that work perfectly well in a book simply will not translate to the screen in an effective way. One such example is the time passage in the novel. There are quite a few very large jumps in time. Some can be resolved fairly easily, but others, such as Anna’s pregnancy and subsequent birth, present a bit of a problem. We are at a point in the script where, in the interest of moving the story forward, we need to get to Gehn’s birth rather quickly. There are a lot of events that occur after - and some due to - his birth. This puts us in the position of trying to figure out how to lapse 9 months in an effective way.
There are a lot of devices that have been employed in other films for these types of things. Unfortunately, none of them seem to be appropriate for the style of this film, and some are just down-right campy.
Common Devices:
- A fade to black followed by a fade in to the desired period of time. This is a pretty ambiguous device that really isn’t supported by the script.
- The above mentioned accompanied by voice-over. This is absolutely not an option. Voice-over rarely works and certainly is not within the style of this film.
- A time-passage as indicated by a change in season. This can either be a simple cut to an exterior shot in which the season has obviously changed or can be more elaborate such as the teddy-bear sequence in Amelie. Obviously, this is difficult when the story takes place in a cavern where there are no seasons.
- A montage. Um…no. These rarely work. More often than not, they feel completely cheesy. The rest of the time, they take you out of the movie.
So, yeah. This is a bit of a tough one. I’ve got a few ideas. One seems to be at least workable, but I still don’t really like it. I think I’ll just go with it for now and look for other options in a later draft.
A’Gaeris has finally been officially introduced. His presence is established relatively early in the script, but we’ve just now reached the point of really exploring his character and the role he plays in the story. He’s a lot of fun to write. Manipulation is always fascinating. It’s interesting - I’m not a manipulative type. I really have no skill for it at all, but I seem to be doing okay with getting into the mind of a manipulator…I hope. One thing about A’Gaeris is that he’s such a passionate person. That kind of energy is a joy to write. He and Veovis have that in common. I LOVE writing Veovis!
Anyway, it appears that there are some administrative things that need to be taken care of before I return to work. Being as how I have nowhere to be tomorrow, Patrick has invited me to his place tonight to do some more work and maybe solve some of these problems we’re facing with the script. It looks like it’s gonna be a sleepover. I love sleepovers! It’s too bad I didn’t have more notice. We could have made it a pajama party. I just didn’t have time to go out and get a onesie. A pajama party just isn’t the same without the little footie things. 
8:49 pm
Apr 17 2008
A montage only works if you attach cheezy 1980s music to it. For example, Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” while Gehn’s in his guild overcompensating by being Super-D’ni.
I also wish it was socially acceptable for adults to wear feetie-pajamas.