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  •  On Kindle Feb. 20. - 342 pages.

    Download the first 30 pages free!

    Expanded and Updated for 2012

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  • Co-Starring with Roger Moore

                                    Co-Starring with Roger Moore

    A View to a Kill 

    Okay, just an extra. But what a fun two nights it was,

    and without having the responsiblity to direct for a change.

  • 'Limitless' Can Make You Great

    limitless BEST

    Besides having great editing and effects technigues to learn from, "Limitless' can motivate on our careers!


    This article contains many spoilers about Limitless. See the movie first, then come back to this article.

    Our hero Eddie gets access to 100% of his brain by using a smart pill called NTZ. He tells us via narration,"Everything I'd ever read, seen, and heard was now organized and available."
    Us in the real world can't access that much brain power, but with Google Search, smart phones, and some clarity of mind on our part, we can have tons of information ready to use, if only we make the decision to do so.

    "All fear and shyness was now gone," Eddie tells us. Yes, those are success blocks. But we don't need a pill to rid ourselves of those blocks. Classes, books, hypnosis, or just diving into where we have to go, can start eliminating fears.

    After hooking up with higher caliber friends (His useless relationships are "better forgotten and put away in mothballs", he says.) and going to Puerto Valletta, Eddie says,"Mere lounging wasn't enough." Yes, being a 'lounger' will not move us closer to what we really want. And in that scene Eddie says it: "Suddenly I knew what I needed to do. But it would take money to get there."

    Ah money. Here's where we lose a lot of people. My success teacher Dr. Paul Mastrodakus once said: "I can announce a seminar that says this coffee pot is God and I'll get 100% sign up. But any seminar that has 'money' as the subject, people just don't seem to want." I wonder why? Maybe getting money sounds like work. But money, that symbol of energy, is a must in the real world to accomplish our goals and live our dreams.

    With increased brain power, Eddie apologizes to his ex-girlfriend saying, "My capacity for self sabotage wasn't boundless after all." He then asks her, "Why did you stay with me for so long?"

    When she asks when his book is coming out, he replies, "Next year," and then immediately asks her about her job. It seems our hero has got off of his own problems and is now giving out interest to other people.

    In the beginning of the film, when Eddie is standing on the ledge of the building ready to jump, he talks about "Wanting to make an impact on the world, instead of the pavement." When explaining his book in the bar, Eddie mentions a 'utopian society'. So we can guess that his final goal might be helping the world.

    When Eddie is accused of having 'delusions of grandeur' he retorts with, "I have an actual recipe for grandeur." Ah, a plan. Definite plans get definite results. Indefinite plans do not get 'indefinite results', they get NO results. Eddie says, "I was clear. I knew what I needed to do, and how to do it."

    Notice the first thing that Eddie does once he's on NTZ. He cleans up his 'base of operations, his apartment. Where have you heard this before? Okay yes, actually he first smooths over his bad relationship with the landlord's wife and helps her write her law class paper. Eddie is a giver.

    Next as the 'enhanced Eddie', he gets a hair cut, new clothes, exercises, and starts learning things like languages. Yes, sounds like the rules of living the James Bond Lifestyle. And then he finishes his novel in four days. This is possible without NTZ if you type 5 pages an hour,16 hours a day, for four days = 320 page book.

    Yes, all this can be done without the NTZ.. It just might take a little longer to reach the success level that we want.

    Eddie says, "There are moments in your life when you cross a bridge and know that your old life is over." This can scare some of us as it gets us out of our comfort zone to accept a change, even a positive change. But if a new life means, not having to run to the bank in 100 degree weather, because my car is broken, to make a $20 deposit to cover my over due electric bill, then I'll take that new life.

    And while a high level of success is necessary to express our true selves, Eddie cautions us with, "We are all wired to over reach. Look at history, all the countries that ruled the world. No one stopped and said, 'We've got France, Poland, a big Swiss bank account. Let's not invade Russia in the winter. Let's go home, pop a beer, and live on the interest.'" Yes, better not fulfill the 'Peter Principle and rise to our level of our incompetence.

    We see that Eddie can access classic literature when he compares Robert DeNiro's energy customers to "Oliver Twist begging for his bowl of gruel." Not bad to have an understanding of a few classics under your belt.

    DeNiro makes a good point about earning your power by experience. He tells Eddie:

    "Your super intellect is a gift from God, but you didn't earn it because you're careless with your power, flashing it around like a trust fund child. You never had to earn it year by year. You don't know how to assess your competition because you never had to compete."

    Finally Eddie overcomes his challenges to get where he wants to go, the US senate. His next step will be the presidency where he can do the most good. However, the now evil and manipulative DeNiro wants to control Eddie so Eddie can pass laws to benefit DeNiro's various companies. But now Eddie has learned to compete and gets rid of DeNiro with verbal strategy. Eddie won't be corrupted.

    Leaving the theater, after watching Limitless, I heard a patron remark, "I wish I had that pill." To me it sounded like, "I'm not going to even try to 'enhance' myself' like Eddie. I want a free ride."

    In fact, even on NTZ Eddie worked hard, studied, exercised, worked on his finances, upgraded his appearance, and more. Things anyone can do without NTZ.

    To me, real NTZ is water, as 90% of the human brain is made of it. Just Google 'benefits of water' and see the 10 things water does for humans and how much more we should be drinking.

    In fact, it's Eddie's 'baptism' in water, after he dives into the ocean, where he realizes his real purpose in life, which seems to unfold as: Improve himself to the point of being able to serve others and make a positive difference in the world.

    Finally like all success that we accept as ours, Eddie's success in now internalized and natural. When he speaks to a waiter in chinese, his girlfriend looks at him in awe. Eddie turns to her, sees her expression and says, "What?"


    END -

    Written in 45 minutes, without NTZ.


     

  • I directed 'Weapons of Death' in 35mm Panavision / Technicolor. Here's the trailer in square formate.

  • Directing The Fly actor David Hedison. "Help meeee."

             normal_david-hedison-voyage-1                        fly-full-cover

    "Is it true that the 'early bird gets the worm'?" David Hedison said as he passed me setting up my products table.
    "Sure it is," I answered. "But who wants worms?"
    David laughed as he continued on to his table were, for the next two days, he would sign autographs at the 2002 SpyFest show on the Queen Mary ship. That's how we met.

    Later in the day as I was talking with him he asked where there was water, and I told him I'd get some for him. I returned with a couple of bottles of Avian while he was signing a photo for a fan and said, "Here you go, David. I had them laced with rum."
    "Rum? Why not brandy?"
    "Because rum is what you wanted to have your milk laced with rum when you played The Fly," I replied.
    "Oh, yeah. Now I remember."

    However, David wasn't at SpyFest in the capacity of The Fly. He was there because he played the role of 'Felix Leiter' in two Bond movies. Live and Let Die, and Licence to Kill.

    Most people know David Hedison from his TV show Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea where he commanded the futuristic submarine The Seaview along with Richard Basehart. He got his start in theater, then did his first movie, The Enemy Below with Robert Mitchem, about a World War 2 subchaser battling wits with a German U-boat commanded by Curt Jurgens, who would later show up in the Bond movie The Spy Who Loved Me.

    Five years later I hired David to play one of the leads in my audio-book McKnight's Memory along with Frank Sinatra Jr, Robert Culp, and Nancy Kwan. David did a great job and was fun to work with. As I gave all the actors the option of adding any dialogue or changing it to suit them, David came up with some great additional dialogue and phrases.

    During breaks I was always asking David about The Fly and his dinosaur adventure movie The Lost World, both of which I loved. But it wasn't until I was listening to the final trial CDs of my self-help course How to Live the James Bond Lifestyle that it suddenly hit me: David was in two Bond movies.

    Why hadn't I thought about that? Wow, was I so Fly and Lost World crazy that I forget he was also Felix Leiter. Hell, where had I first met him anyway? SpyFest, no less. He would be great to do an introduction on my Bond Lifestyle course. He could give his success ideas and stories before I started speaking.

    I approached David about it and told him, that on the CD, after he told the SpyFest story of how we met, including the 'laced with rum' story, he could use as much time as he wanted to talk about his phylosophy and his stories of the challenges he faced getting into the movie business.

    I gave him the paper book version of my Bond Lifestyle course to see if it was in keeping with his phylosopy, so he would know what he was representing. After reading it David said yes, and wrote up the intro that ending up being twelve minutes long. People that heard it were facinated by his emotional talk. As for me, I never get tired of listening to it.

    Then came the big co-incidence about six months later. Edd Byrnes of 77 Sunset Strip fame, as well as Grease, where he played the DJ Vince Fontaine, decided to make an audio-book My Casino Caper. I got the job directing it. Since David Hedison was a close personal friend of Edd's and was involved in the big hassell Edd got into when he won three million dollars in Vegas. So David came in to record how he helped Edd escape the criminal that was stalking Edd for his money.

    When the projects were finished my agent and producer Larry Metzger told David we had copies of all the projects as well as some coffee cups with the front covers of the audio-books printed on them, to give him.

    David invited both of us to stop by his house with the goods. He invited us into his beautiful home on top of the Hollywood hills, way on top. David said, "I got this while working on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea." And the good part is that I was able to keep working and keep it." Yeah, that says it for me, too. Keep working and keep the lifestyle you want.

    At his front door saying good-bye, I thanked David again for working on the projects. He replied, "It was my pleasure. I sure like listening to those audio when I drive around. And thanks for the work."

    I still remember him waving good-bye at the front of his home, and hope to be working with him again soon on my next project. I'll find a role for him in it, for sure.

  •          art_elvis_031408      Elvis Saved My James Bond Project

    Fear is the key on a new project. Embrace the fear and use it's energy.

    Twelve years ago I was driving to Los Angeles to record 'How to Live the James Bond Lifestyle'. Suddenly I got scared, thinking people would laugh at me and say, "Who does this jerk think he is, telling me how to be James Bond?"

    I felt like calling the studio and canceling my recording. But then by chance, the audio-book I was listening to in the car about Elvis Presley, came to the part where Elvis was preparing for his 1969 comeback TV special.

    He was very scared to go in front of millions of people after being away from live performing for 10 years. But he over came it and went out front of live audience, that would be televised to millions of viewers.

    Hell, I thought. If Elvis could do that, who am I to be scared of recording in front of the engineer in the studio? And so what about putting my book on Amazon? Elvis was risking getting laughed at by millions. So what if a couple of guys laughed me?

    The results: it wasn't refered to as 'The Comeback Special' for nothing. And as for me, guys DID laugh when they heard the title of my seminar.

    Now, years later, after teaching my seminar at the Learning Annex and getting great reviews on Amazon, my expression, 'James Bond Lifestyle' appears in magazines when referring to a rich lifestyle, as it spread via my project into people's minds.

    So, when business gets scary. Remember the Eagles' song: "We may lose and we may win though we will never be here again....... so take it easy."

    Or remember the first words Elvis sang at the beginning of his comeback show: "If you're looking for trouble, you came to the right place."

  • Direct Hits Like Clint Eastwood Does

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    All new film directors get excited about the powerful techniques that camera and editing have in the art of filmmaking. Yes, they can be powerful and exciting. For example, Hitchcock's 'Vertigo' shot down the stairwell from James Stewart's point of view. Spielberg's own version of that shot in 'Jaws' as Roy Scheider sees the first shark attack from the beach.
     
    However, you will note that Hitchcock's and Spielberg's best movies have the best stories. The best scripts.
     
    Director Clint Eastwood rarely uses trick shots, or complicated editing techniques, but has had a string of highly entertaining movies, one after the other, especially in his later years, winning two Best Picture awards with 'Unforgiven' and 'Million Dollar Baby'. Both of those movies have great photography, but no fancy shots or editing to speak of.  
     
    Put on a DVD of either 'Million Dollar Baby, 'Unforgiven', 'True Crime', 'Changling', or 'Mystic River', and I guarantee that you won't turn it off once you get to the 25 minute point. And it won't be because you're waiting to see the next camera angle, editing trick, or special effect. It's the story that'll have you hooked.
     
     
    Eastwood admits to 'staying out of the way of the story', and to 'not call attention to my directing'.  "Then what do you do?" he's been asked by interviewers often. "Oh, I just let the story tell itself," he answers. "And maybe find a place once in a while to punch up a scene."
     
    So how does he REALLY do it?  More importantly, how can new directors sustain a career like Eastwoods? What is his secret of directing?
     
    The answer is easy to say, but not easy to do. 50% of it is choosing the subject and story. 30% is casting. 20% is getting it up on the screen in an entertaining manner.
     
    New directors should put all the film techniques that they studied in film school on the back burner and concentrate on subject and story, not to mention the marketability of their subject and story.
     
    I fell victim to this 'excitement for technique over story' on my first movie, 'Drawn Swords'.  And worst, never gave a second thought to the marketability. I just wanted to follow my dream of making an 'American samurai' movie, even committing the worst crime of filming it in black & white to copy Akira Kurasawa's technique.  My story of three Japanese samurai going to England to enter a fencing tournament turned out to be merely an artful experiment (Or more honestly, an expensive 'home movie' filmed in 35mm Techniscope.)
     
    For my next feature 'Death Machines', I put every story angle to the marketability test and ended up with a Techniscope COLOR movie, that has cops, gangsters, white, Chinese, and Black karate killers, a Japanese Yakuza woman, a love story, giant fight scenes in a karate school, and police station, and blowing up a real Cessna airplane. It sold fast to Crown International.
     
    The story however, was just a revenge vehicle to thread all the marketable action together. But it was a big hit opening in 50 theaters in Los Angeles alone. It wasn't untill years later that I could come up with stories that were intriguing and suspenseful on their own. But by that time my only way of expressing them was through novelizing them and producing them as full cast audio-books with movie stars performing them. A great and creative endeavor for me, as I could use many of my movie heroes that I grew up with such as Rod Taylor, Robert Culp, and David Hedsion. But they were not feature films. Hopefully they will be.
     
    So all you filmmakers coming out of film school (My degree was in Film) with your editing and camera techniques under your arm and ready to film, put those on the back burner until you choose your marketable subject, an unusual and attention holding story, with a screenplay that will keep the viewer from hitting the channel changer button. In fact, I recommend you write your screenplay with a TV remote control in one hand. When you get to a point in your screenplay where you are ready to change the channel, it's time to pump up the story, or get another story.
     
    The main thing that I learned on my first feature is: After all the camera rentals, film editing, sound mixing, and film printing, you end up right back with the one hundred and twenty pages of the script you started with. And only that script (now on 35mm film) will attract viewers and hold them or not.

     

  • TheTimeMachine1960t

    From 'The Time Machine' to 'Famous Monsters' - My Mom Threw Out My $7,000 Magazine

    Film directors Steven Spielberg, John Landis, and Joe Dante were forbiddin during their childhoods to read 'Famous Monsters of Filmland' magazine. My friend Tony was caught reading the magazines by his mother. She sent him to talk to their church priest, who reported to her, "Don't worry. He's okay."
     
    My mother was no different. Even more so.
     
    At age 12, I loved the 1960 movie 'The Time Machine'. I had to secretly go to the theater because my mom wouldn't let me see movies with monsters in it.
     
    I tried to explain that this movie was made from a famous novel and the 'monsters', the 'Morlocks' were just a small part of the story. She said no, so I sneaked of to the theater to see it.
     
    I got the promotional comic book of the move which had a great color cover of Rod Taylor in his time machine, but because there was also a Morlock on it, she made me thow it away. (See above photo.)
     
    I wrote to the  'Time Machine' director George Pal for a photo from the movie. This was when no one wrote to a studio. What a miracle, he sent me a photo and a letter. My mom found them, tore them up, and thew them in the garbage.
     
    Four years later 'The Time Machine' was on TV and she watched it with me. 'What a nice movie', she said. Ah, a victory of sorts.
     
    With all my Time Machine souveniers gone I persisted on getting closer to that movie. In 1977 I got to meet director George Pal. In 2007, I hired the two stars of 'The Time Machine', Rod Taylor & Alan Young to narrated two of my novels turned into a audio-books. And my mother??? ......
     
    ....... Now we go to Science Fiction conventions together (with my dad) and I point out to her the first issues of the magazine 'Famous Monsters of Filmland' that she made me throw out. They are now ($5,000 to $7,000 each.) And we laugh as she says, "Well, we were so worried about you with those monster magazines and movies. We didn't know you were interested in the movies. We worried that you were interested in monsters."
     
    She did help me get into the movie department of college and paid for it. And I ended up directing six feature films and many documentaries. And my dad? We watched 'The Thing' many times and then got to meet the star Ken Tobey and talk to him about it.
     
    And the good news is that I'm still going to movie conventions with my parents. We just saw the new 'Wolfman' together. Violent as hell, but my mom loved it. Go figure?
     
    The moral of the story: Give your parents time to catch up with you.
     

  • m44467919 http://bit.ly/dkI9qj

    New 'James Bond Lifestyle Seminar' page using videos on facebook: http://bit.ly/dkI9qj

  • garage-20-zoom James Bond Lifestyle in Jesse James' 'Garage' Magazine

    At news stands now. Garage magazine issue # 20 recommends the JBLS sayiing:

     "The baddest M.. F... seminar of them all is 'How to Live the James Bond Lifestyle'."

    Hear Sample or Download.

    JBLS box