M: So what was your movie about?
G: Domestic abuse.
M: Abuse? Why on earth did you make a film about abuse?
G: Because I have first hand experience.
M: Come on! You?!?
G: My father used to do things to my mum. It used to really piss me off. So I made a film about it.
M: Does your father know about this film?
G: Ya, he acted in it.
M: Sorry, say that again?
G: My father acted in my film.
M: As the abuser?
G: Ya. He was the most suitable for the role what!
M: How did you get your father to agree to act in your film?!!
G: I just asked him to act for me la… He didn’t know what it was about but he said yes. Then on shoot day only I showed him the script.
M: And?
G: And of course he can’t pull out then right?!
What artistic courage this young man has!!
(I must note that the years of abuse are long gone. G was perceptive to note: it all ended when my mother got a job and became financially independent.)
Posted in Everyday Heroes, Recipes for Creativity | Tagged abuse, courage, creativity | 1 Comment »
At 15, Beto began his film career as a stunt man. (Let’s ignore for a moment the fact that a 15 year old is allowed to do stunts on a film set.)
I learned a very important lesson from Beto: You can take the actor out of the stunt, but you can’t take the stunt man out of the actor.
On one of his off days, Beto decided to go play football with his friends. He came back to work the next day with a swollen hand.
Many hours into the shoot I noticed him discreetly nursing his hand.
“You okay?”
He smiled, “yes” and turned to show me a hand that looked as though a drunk plastic surgeon had just injected too much botox into. In fact, it looked like a baby’s bottom.
“Just a small bump…”
“A bump?! Your hand could be broken!”
“Hehehe…”
Hehehe?
I hear that this is how very committed actors can get. They lose unhealthy amounts of weight (Christian Bale), put on unhealthy amounts of weight (Charlize Theron), break bones (Jackie Chan), smash their hands on glass etc…
But it is really painful for the director to watch.
And with regards to Beto, this was not the only incident. A month later, midway into a stretch of football shoots we realised, while we are getting him to do continuous bicycle kicks (very hard on the back), that his right leg had been severely scrapped.
“Beto, what happened?”
“Hehehe…”
There it was again!
“Beto, come on man!”
My Production Manager filled me in, “he was playing around with the guys on the pitch during the break yesterday and…”
“So it’s no
t my fault?”
“No no no no,” he reassured me, somewhat.
A few bicycle kicks later, unable to bare watching him throw himself hard into the mud over and over again, my compassionate PM disturbed me again. “Manesh, how much longer are you going to get him to do those kicks?”
“Beto. How many more kicks can you do for me?”
With an open
and happily resigned gesture,“However many more you want.”
I truly take my hat off to this guy. A giving actor even when the camera is not on him, Beto is 100% committed to his work and has the most humble yet professional disposition. His work ethic reminds me of the quote from the Baha’i Faith, “Work is worship, service is prayer.” This guy performed his work with the utmost excellence and in the spirit of true worship.
Anyway, about 10 bicycle kicks later we changed scene and we went ahead to torture him in yet another way.
“Beto, in this scene I need the defender to shoulder barge you and then I need you to drop hard on the ground.”
“Ok.”
I jogged back
to my monitor and braced myself. Every single take (there were at least 10) we winced, jolted in our seats and ‘ooh’-ed watching him take a serious beating from a guy much larger than him! The defender would whack Beto. His neck and head recoiled at the impact, his body would lift a little into the air and twist. He would then fall hard on the ground with an all-natural grunt that would make even Sharapova proud, “uugh!!”
Next shot.
“Beto, I need this defender to tackle you from behind and then this other defender is going to step on your stomach.”
“Ok.”
As I asked him that question, I geared all my senses to pick up even an iota of hesitation. But there was NONE!
So Beto happily got his stomach stepped on about 15 times. Sure there was padding, but still!! The studs, the full weight of another guy…
Anyway, at the wrap party I made it a point to apologise to his wife. She gave me a look that threatened to unleash, in a single moment, the 3 months of violence we had inflicted on her husband. Didn’t she like the he was so macho?
“Beto, did you get your hand checked up in the end?”
“Ya, it was broken all along.”
I shook my head, too stunned to say anything.
And then he did it again.
“Hehehe…”
These actors I tell you!
In bed on the pitch with cameraman Chun
Posted in Everyday Heroes, Muses, Recipes for Creativity | Tagged actors, committment, pain, sacrifice | 1 Comment »
There was once where Ah Leong went for 3 months without seeing his 5 year old daughter.
Then she called one day, “Daddy, have you forgotten that you have a daughter?!”
He laughs out loud with an “Oh shit man!” as he tells me this.
I am, of course, perplexed. If my daughter said that to me, would I be so cool?
“And your wife doesn’t say anything?”
“She knows I is a Production Guy.”
I’m waiting for more explanation, but it seems that Ah Leong thinks I should understand by now! Maybe I’m missing something unsaid. The other guys around me are nodding knowingly.
Is that what they tell their families? Does it actually work?!
Don’t get me wrong, Ah Leong is dedicated to his job, cares for his team and is good at what he does. Besides being my durian and seafood buddy when everyone is late, he’s a master of location management.
His skill is extremely rare and highly valued – the capacity to convince people to allow us to turn their premises upside down, handle all their stuff with our grubby hands, sit on their chairs with our grotty clothes, tell them to keep silent under their own roofs and basically kick them out of their own houses as long as we need to.
Ah Leong takes them out for tea, tells lots of jokes and recounts many production anecdotes that keep the hosts entertained, distracted, placated, as we go about our risky business.
If you saw him work his magic, it would look like he’s having a good time, but he’s stressed to the max because he knows that the rest of the team’s business smells too fishy.
But back to being a ‘production guy’. Is it a synonym for ‘someone with no other purpose in life’?
Once Ah Leong got a terrible infection. It started out as a sore throat and fever. He had pain when swallowing (to a Chinese guy who loved his food, this is as good as a death sentence) but insisted on continuing with work, citing ‘no time’ as an excuse to not see the doctor.
“What do you mean no time to see the doctor?”
“Then the production how?”
A few days later he had completely lost his voice, hadn’t eaten in days, lost a lot of weight (except his tonsils which had impressively grown in weight and size) and was basically in critical condition.
When he saw the doctor he was immediately admitted.
“You want to die is it?” (yes, doctors do speak like this sometimes)
I believe the doctor told him that if he had waited even just one more day, Ah Leong would have either lost his voice forever, or his life (I think he would have preferred the latter).
“I almost died for production.”
Yes, Ah Leong is a hero. And I wish there was a medal for the sacrifices that production guys like him make all the time.
But surely art is not worth so much of one’s life?
Or is it?
Posted in Everyday Heroes, Now where do I put this? | Tagged filmmaking, location, near death, production, sacrifice | Leave a Comment »
Just a few names appear on the poster, but...
Movies tell stories.
But behind every production there are a thousand other dramas, many of them far more heart-breaking, inspiring and funny than anything ever put on screen.
Francois Truffaut once famously said, “I want a film I watch to express either the joy of making cinema or the anguish of making cinema.”
The next few posts will be dedicated to these joys and anguishes.
Because it takes a certain type to persist through the broken bones and overturned cars, to smile through the violent threats and sudden disasters, and to come out of the worst few months of their lives and say, “boy, let’s do that again!”
I know, we should really go see therapists.
Anyhow, the next few posts will be a celebration of the un-sung, un-credited heroes (at least on the poster), responsible for all the joys and anguish I had on this project.
To introduce some of them:
...but it really takes a whole battalion to make a good show.
Posted in Everyday Heroes, Now where do I put this? | Tagged production, sacrifice | eYouclublove Adultfriendfinder P1876463 Szh Pu List 0 1 1 You Club Love Good People We Meetp y Adultfriendfinder%20p1876463 You Club Love uYouclublove Adultfriendfinder P1876463 Szh Pu List 0 1 1 You Club Love Good People We Meetl u You Club Love