Meeting with Sam Harding

For the last two months I really struggled with developing my script for "See You Soon." More about this will be emphasised on with another blogpost.

Today, I met with the scriptwriter for "See You Soon," Sam Harding. He's now onboard with us, but had a few questions for me. Some questions included how much freedom he had with this idea. I said "anything, as long as it discusses human mortality and shows intercutting imagery between past and present."

It was decided that having the daughter die instead of the mother has more of an impact. There's something about a parent outliving a child that's a natural tragedy, which doesn't need further emotional emphasis. Jean Didion's "Blue Nights" demonstrates this, which is what I've been reading. With that said, we're going to approach the film with a lighter tone, and let the emotional development happen by itself.

Since that's all sorted out, we wanted to have a group meeting tomorrow to start throwing ideas around, so the Sam can brainstorm and get started. Simply because he wants to know what kinds of ideas to approach, with our expectations.

That means by this Friday we will have a description of all the characters and locations list, so that I will be able to start pre-producing the script. Hopefully we can start working quickly, because the deadline is in a month. My only regret is that I hadn't met up with Sam sooner.

Cyclical Themes

One of the ideas that I came up with over the summer, was this idea of a circular rig that will constantly revolve around one protagonist. This protagonist would be subject to a plot with a cyclical theme.

This was inspired by Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction” as Bruce Willis stands in a phone booth whilst the camera pans 360˚ around his conversation. 

The fact that we wanted to work with a cyclical theme to complement the camera movement meant that we were set up for a challenge in scriptwriting. Since having a cyclical theme and plot means there’s very little room for a three-act structure, we turned to Adam Bloom (an alumni writer from BA (Hons) Film Production) for help.

We discussed the idea with him and we were given the draft screenplay for “Last Call.” It follows the story of a basket case father, revealed to be in trouble, making one last phone call to his son before he commits a robbery. It was written well, but unfortunately the entire screenplay felt like a scene in a feature film. With this at mind, we decided not to go with Adam Bloom’s script.

At the moment the concept still remains unresolved and without a script. I will most likely explore this idea as an artistic side project, as opposed to a narrative.

Documentary Idea – Germany’s Graffiti Subculture

I used to have connections to members of a German graffiti crew, and was taught some of the basic rules of graffiti etiquette. These rules were extremely fascinating, and included the following:

• Paint the town as much as you can, the more you tag or paint, the more dominant your crew seems.
• Your tag cannot replace a “throw up.” In the same way that your “throw up” cannot replace a mural. Every design that is created can only be replaced with something bigger, or else the design of the perpetrator will be regarded as disrespectful.
• The ultimate form of achievement comes in the form of bombarding a train with a mural. This is incredibly risky, therefore respected. 

An example of a "tag." 

An example of a "throw up" covering "tags," but unfortunately also covered in "tags."
This would be considered disrespectful in Germany. 

An example of a mural.

A "throw up" on a Deutsche Bahn train.

As a fellow artist, I thought that this would have a brilliant topic to pursue, especially when I have the beginnings of a network for it. I would have wanted to pursue with the following questions:

• What are more examples of graffiti etiquette?
• What is it like to be a part of a crew?
• What happens when you get caught in Germany?

I feel like the listed questions will vary according to each country. For example, being a part of a crew in America has been seen as a means of “survival,” an example of which is shown in the following documentary:

"Infamy" a documentary on graffiti in the USA.

Since Germany is quite a strict and developed country, I feel that being in a crew is not just for a “means of example,” and is far more expressive in a country that is quite socially oppressive.

As a result I pursued this topic with my lead, but unfortunately it has come back negatively since my lead has left the crew lifestyle behind. I’ve been referred on to more people through the graffiti network but most are quite paranoid about being caught on camera, which is why it’s been difficult to confirm an interview into their lifestyle.

For now, until a serious lead comes up as interested in an interview, I will be keeping this project on standby.