As I said in Production diary 1, the whole film was inspired by a visit to what will be our main location. This location is a mountain about fifteen minutes from home and had been a place I intended to visit for a while, as it has a stone age cairn on its summit. My first visit was filled with my babble of how I wanted to make a film there! It is a perfect mix of ancient and modern: geology, archaeology and technology. One of the shots I hope to be able to include is of a Neolithic (6,000 year old) stone cairn (that was originally a passage tomb) with a piece of modern engineering a few metres away. Our version of the film for the My Rode Reel competition is only five minutes and we have a lot to cover so it might not happen.
In the film, we follow the main character as he ascends the path to the summit and the struggle up the mountain parallels his internal struggles with his feelings about others and his own solitude. He pauses several times and each time he is haunted by a ghost from his past and, possibly, from his future. Each turn or twist of the road is a turning point in his thought process… but the clock is counting down!
Our second most important location in terms of time and budget is the National Outdoor Centre, Bryansford, Co. Down. This is the setting of the University on our story and its modern bright and airy building will look perfect on screen, plus we’re adding a few small things to enhance the retro-future look! Patrick has designed a University logo and we will be adding a few touches to enhance the sense of place, and of the alien nature of the planet the University is on.
Where possible we’ll be adding a few special props (see next production diary!) to make the sets even better but I’ll be doing a budget recap soon that will explain that budget wise, we can’t afford to do too much. I’m hoping the story, the music and the performances will pull us through some finical shortfalls.
The party scene (oh, yes, you guys don’t know the story yet ;-), and some of the other major scenes will be shot at RJ’s house – (thanks RJ!) and will be dressed as best we can. The music and a few props will make this scene as delightfully weird as I can get it.
The only location not yet decided upon is an abandoned house. It doesn’t matter what state of decay the house is in as we’re really dependent on two props to drive the story in this location. The scene is the only one that I hadn’t pictured in my head, but as I’ve found the perfect exterior shots for it, we can place the interior almost anywhere.
The scenery for the film will be magical and I’m hoping that we can show how fantastic the place we live in is!
Anyway, this was a short one. More soon!
Next time: Props
Are You There? A sci-fi Short Film 