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  •        Directing Russ Tamblyn  

    I approached Russ Tamblyn first to play the main character of my audio-book "Rock Star Rising".  RockStar
    I enjoyed him in "Tom Thumb"     and  "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grim". 
    His athletic ability in dance and action scenes really excited me.  Then "West Side Story" followed soon after and I became a lifelong fan.
     
    I was lucky in the fact that Russ had just come back from a one year world tour with Neil Young. Russ had done all the choreography for the large show, directing new dancers in each city. By the way, Elvis Presley sought out Russ' help for his dance routine in "Jailhouse Rock".
     
    My agent submitted the script for the project to him and after reading it, he said yes right away.  He even volunteered to get a copy of the script to George Chakiris to play the part of a Puerto Rican gangster.  It was an unplanned dream to possibly have both leaders of "The Jets" and "The Sharks" in my project.  I assured Russ that I had written the novel six years before thinking of doing this project, so I didn't write the Puerto Rican part, to get the two of them together for the first time since "West Side Story". 
     
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    I had to wait for Russ to attend various premiers of "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants", starring his daughter Amber Tamblyn,  before I could set a date with him to record, but the wait was well worth it.
     
    In the recording studio  Russ was totally prepared and ready to go with all the actors he had to work with.  His character is the would be writer who goes in search of "Shane" a dead rock star (played by James Darren).  This meant that he would be the one that would meet up with all the other characters.  So he had a lot of scenes to prepare for.
     
    Of course, being an audio-book, the actors would have their scripts in front of them. But I wanted this to be a performance and not a reading, so that actors had to see their lines and then "live them".
     
    I scheduled Russ for four hours of recording starting with George and continuing throughout the day  with other actors coming in and out, sometimes having as many a four actors in the recording booth. Thank God it was large enough,  as four mikes had to be set up with the actors given room to do what ever body language they wanted.
     
    Russ and George had met on their own before the recording day, to go over their lines and make any changes they waited to make the words more suitable to their ears.  I encouraged this from the start, as I not only wanted the best performance possible, but I wanted to record a part of the actors personality as well as their character's.
     
    Russ was calmly professional and had to task of making his easy going character of Alan, come off strong, as he meets up with many intimidating characters. Strong women as well as gangsters.  In many cases his only defense is his sarcasm. This Russ did perfectly, playing strength in the midst of fear.
     
    After I was finished recording George, I had many of the actors standing by and asked Russ if he preferred to do the remaining scenes in continuity. I was surprised when he said, "No, let's just run all the scenes of each actor at once."  This saved us about an hour of re-set up time.  After we finished, I told Russ, "I really learned something today.  Even though, it might help the actor to do it in continuity, it's best for energy of performance to finish the main actors scenes with each of the supporting actors first."  I planned the rest of the recordings with the star actors that way.
     
    During breaks, Russ answered my questions about scenes from his movies.  And when I mentioned Demile's "Samson and Delilah"  made when he was around 12 years old, he mentioned this:
     
    In the movie he has his sling shot tied around his head and tries to rescue Samson.  Russ said, "Even now, when I get ready to leave the house my wife usually says, 'Did you remember your sling shot?' "

  •          Directing "Weapons of Death"

     

    I had just come off my recent success of "Death Machines" being widely distributed. I figured will all the quarter page ads in the papers, the Variety chart having "DM" as the #14 top grosser for the week, and some fairly good reviews, that I could raise the financing for my next film easily. 

     

    I wrote the screenplay for "Weapons of Death" in a one month period, completely by myself.  Defiantly the ultimate movie that was deep in my heart. My love of the old swashbuckler movies and Japanese samurai  and Chinese swordplay movies was all in the story.  The script starts out in San Francisco Chinatown, where the daughter of a wealthy business woman is kidnapped by a large Chinatown gang and taken into the Marin County hills and held for ransom. The gang, however, uses another gang of criminals to do the actual kidnapping.

     

    The woman sends for her estranged husband, whom she hasn't seen in fifteen years. He comes back and with his two sons and two guys from his son's martial arts school, they head into the hills to get the daughter back. At one point the kidnapped girl escapes and runs into a group of bikers and is single handedly rescued by a sympathetic criminal. The father and his team run into the Chinese gangs swordswomen and fight them. Finally there is a long running battle between the good guys and the Chinese gang.  As there are no guns allowed by the Chinese gang leader, most fighting is done with swords and various martial arts weapons.

     

    Having met and befriended so many martial artists when working on "DM" I could write the characters for the actors that I knew. Also, as I had always included myself in the cast of my 16mm movies and first feature, I wrote a character for myself. I mostly wanted to do as swordfight scene and a couple of stunts that I saw Douglas Fairbanks do,  which I'll describe later.

     

    With the screenplay finished, the search for financing was on. Or was it?  Would I, or should I continue with this?  I had financed and used investors on my first feature, "Drawn Swords".  It was a long "drawn out" production, that cause me endless hassles, large debts, many disappointments, and no income from the minor distribution it had.  I had worked six months to pay back most of the debts, but still wasn't completely out of it, even with my "DM" success.  Did I want to go through all that again?  Was this another swordfight epic that would get me much deeper into debt and end my dubious film career? 

     

    I remember so vividly looking down at the script that was sitting on my sofa.  Standing above it I thought about all the risks and hassles that could come with this project. I was still in debt over my first feature. Had no job and no savings. But I finally said to myself, "I don't care. Even if this movie bombs, even if I can't sell it, I will still have the movie. It will be made. And this was my dream movie. The one that I really want to make.  I didn't know it at the time, but I guess I was more of an "artist" than a film businessman, because completing that particular movie was more important to me for self expression than doing someone else's project (which there were none) or working my way up in the Hollywood system (which there were no open doors). So I said, "What the hell", to myself, picked up the script off of the sofa, sat down at my kitchen table and began preparing a schedule and budget.  The original title was "The Last Adventure" because I figured it would be.

     

                                            Pre-Production

     

    "DM" had been shot in two perforation 35mm Techniscope.  If this might be my last movie, I wanted to shoot in full frame Panavision. This meant twice as much film, and a more expensive camera and lenses.  I planned to make up for this by using less film and camera set ups.  To not have a mediocre sound track and music like "DM" had, I planned to take this movie straight through to the sound mix, giving it full effects and high level pre-recorded music.  I figured to get the scenes properly filmed, it would take six weeks.  I would use half the crew that I had used on "DM" as there would not be as much interior lighting needed.

     

    For the project, I teamed up with Rick Sydell who had done a good job on "DM" as the production manager. He would handle the accounting and arrange film, lab, and equipment rentals, along with location permits.  Except for the crew that was hired for filming, it was just the two of us on the production team. We did everything ouselves.

     

    Sid Campbell,  a high level karate dojo owner and teacher opened his unusual looking school to me and the first investments that came in were from some of his students.  When I had enough money in the bank, and money promised from investors to come in within six weeks, I set the date for one month ahead and started to work.

     

    Most of the cast I had written for and was available, so that came easy.  For the remaining cast I let the word out, at casting agencies and karate schools, and did open casting at Sid's dojo.  There I completed the cast, as well as got all the extras I needed.  The thirty swordswomen were made up of Asian models from an agency, mixed in with trained martial arts women. 

     

    Eric Lee would star this time, as he was a cover boy for many martial arts magazines and would help our cause for selling the picture.  One of the villains of the movie, the one that Eric would end up fighting at the climax was Gerald Okamura, "The Martial Arts Magician". He was named that because he was a master at using and making traditional martial arts weapons, as well as hidden ninja type weapons.

     

    I scheduled the filming to begin in October, hoping we wouldn't get into early rain, as most of the filming would be done outdoors.  I choose the biggest scene to do first. It was the opening of the movie taking place in the hills. This is where the Chinese gang is assembled.  The leader, his two main bodyguards, his twenty swordswomen, and fifty gang members, made to look like there was as a hundred.  They would all have special costumes.  Driving up in a van to meet them would be the six criminals.  Plus on stand-by to film the final confrontation would be the five heroes. 

     

    Everything was set to go, when the weather forecast called for possible rain. I whached the clouds form at night. I watched the TV weather forecast at 11pm that said, "Maybe Rain". When I woke up in the early morning and turned on the TV, I swear the written forecast said, "Go for it."  As I drove to the location, I saw the sun starting to break through the clouds.  That was the first time I ever paid so much attention to the weather.

     

    A few days before the shoot, I had received a call from a young Asian woman named Cynthia, who wanted to view the filming as she was interested in being a filmmaker. I said, "Your welcome to come. And why don't you be an extra as well and get paid." She said okay, and I told her to introduce herself during the day.

     

                                                Production

     

    When I arrived at the location, many of  the people had arrived and were in costume. I could see the swordwoman with their shinny blue Chinese costumes and the fifty extras all wearing black as I had told them to do. The cameramen were setting up. Make-up was already happening.  Actors had flown up from Los Angeles. They were all here 40 miles from San Francisco in my hometown hills that I had used for filming my 16mm action movies when I was in college.  "This is fantastic," I thought. "What an opportunity to make something really good."  I came to the instant conclusion to not just shoot a few master scenes. I would use the necessary film to get all the coverage I needed to make a cinematic film. And if I went a little over budget, I would make up the difference by selling part of my percentage in the movie. It would be worth it.

     

    The filming went just as planned, all in beautiful Technicolor, Panavision, and sound.  Even with the extra shots I finished up the dialogue scenes early enough to shoot some big actions scenes using all the extras. This was bonus material that I hadn't planned on.  Everyone had a great time.  The younger guys got to meet Eric Lee, Gerald Okamura, and other established martial artists who were happy to talk with all of them and demonstrate some of their techniques. The food arrived on time and everything was perfect.  Better than could be imagined.

     

    During the day Cynthia, the girl that had called me to be an observer, introduced herself and we talked briefly. At the end of the day, she wasn't there, so I called her at night and asked her how she enjoyed the day.  Her first words were, "Did you guys ever get it together?"  I explained how we got more shots than we had hoped for and how smooth it went.  But she didn't sound convinced, so after a short conversation we said good-bye. 

     

     I realized that she, like a lot of people, see these "Making of....." shorts on TV and have a pre-conceived idea of how a movie day goes.  They don't show you that it takes time to move the camera and set up shots.  But even though we did it faster than most, Cynthia thought we were armatures.  Indeed, even the young heroine in our movie, later at the premier said, "If I new it was going to be this good, I would have tried harder."  From that time on, I've told other future film directors, "Don't let anyone tell you what is professional or not, unless they've made a movie, or at least have been on a movie set.

     

    The second day on the location went just as well continuing with the large action ending of the movie.  Being it was a run and fight action scene, resolving all the lead characters, it would take many days and many locations to finish while still doing other scenes as well. 

     

    In the middle of the day, a young Kung Fu teacher came to me with the five students he brought. He asked to talk to me, so I said okay. The he comes out with, "We want to kill Eric Lee."  "What?" I said.  "Yes, our kung fu technique is better than his, so we should kill him in the movie."  I explained that even though their technique is better, that in the script Eric wins. But the teacher threatened to take his men out of the shoot if they weren't allowed to kill Eric on camera.  Even though his request sounded ridiculous, I said politely that It couldn't be done. So he took his students and one girl, who was playing a swordswoman and left. His students were sad because they were having so much fun and getting paid.  I suspect one of his reasons was that the girls playing the swordswomen were getting more than the extras, as per my deal with the model agency.  I not only paid the models extra, but any girl that was in that group, so the Kung Fu girl was making more than her teacher. That never came up, but maybe that was the problem.

     

    On the climatic fight between Eric Lee and Gerald Okamura, Eric cut his hand by hitting Gerald's metal claw weapon. We quickly wrapped it and soon Eric and I were speeding through the main streets of my home time to the hospital. Eric arrived in costume with his shirt off and make up cuts and blood on his stomach and chest.  The nurse started to wrapped them as we waited for the emergency doctor.  But we told her it was only his hand. The rest was make up. That was the only injury we had on the entire shoot, thank God.

     

    Another big scene was when the kidnapped girl ran into a thirty bikers.  One of the criminals enters their camp in the hills and is forced to fight them with a large sword and kill all of them.  Some of them try to hit him with motorcylcles and they crash, explode and burn. It would take four days to get the beginning confrontation dialogue plus the fight.

     

    I had real bikers mixed in with actors and stuntmen.  I was concerned that the bikers might get bored with the shoot, but that wasn't they case. What was their main concern?  "Hey Paul, do I die good."  "Yeah, you'll die good." I guaranteed many of them who constantly asked. 

     

    I wanted them to take the shoot serious so I got the idea to have all of them get made up by our make-up girl. Of course, most of them didn't need it, in this situation. But I made them go, even though some didn't want to. But my idea did the trick. They were treated like actors, so they became actors. One giant sized biker named Brian, (who looks excactly like this animation, beard, T-shirt ,and all) was really worried about if he died good or not, and was constantly asking me and the crew about it. I saved him for the end. He chased the criminal up a hill and the criminal picked up a  watermelon sized rock covered in dust, heaved it down on him, hitting him in the face.  Brian rolled down the hill and landed next to a burning motercycle amongst the other bodies.  He died happy, and most of all "good".

     

    The unique thing about this movie that, except for the high falls, motorcycle stunts, and a fire stunt, everyone did their own stunts. As I mentioned I planned to act in the movie as one of the five good guys.  I decided that I would be the only guy to have a gun. Audiences always say in a Kung Fu movie, "Why didn't someone bring a gun?"  So one of the bad guys has a gun and my character manages to come up with one pistol on short notice.  Audiences cheered as I mowed down the kung fu guys with my six shooter, always showing me reloading after firing my six shots.  I know that the audience likes to count and I didn't want to say that I had a twelve shot gun like Tom Laughin did in "The Master Gunfighter".

     

    I was not worried about directing myself as I used one of the crew to stand in for me as I staged the scenes, and then took his place for the shot. Besides I was only in a third of the movie because of all the characters.  I was a little worried that some might think I was not a serious director by also being in the film. But since I figured it might be my last movie, I decided to play out all my dreams. 

     

    Only my cameraman objected to me being in the movie.  Two days before filming started he complained, "What do you want to be an actor or director."  So I decided not to act in it.  However, with two days before the shot and being so busy, I couldn't spend the time to find someone to replace my character, so I was stuck with me.  But acting and doing my planned stunts in this movie has been the greatest satisfaction for me. Years later, it's not so much the fact that I directed it that people mention when they see it, it's the fact that I was in it.  So after that, I never listen to anyone who tries to talk me out of my dreams.

     

    At the end of the movie I run out of bullets and am forced to fight Gini Lau,  a trained martial artists, with a sword.  She finally knocks me out. But the quick fight is an audience pleaser, because when I run out of bullets I throw my pistol at her. In the movies no one is hit with a thrown pistol, but I hit her in the face with it.  The audience always screams, as she shakes it off and gets angry.  Of course, it was a sponge pistol with a great sound effect added.

     

    My two other stunts always gets a cheer from the audience. One is where I jump off a six foot high cliff, shoot a bad guy while in mid air, land, fall down, while I keep firing and hit more bad guys.  The stunt I'm really proud of was jumping on top of a railing of a footbridge that is 12 feet above a rocky stream.  The railing was only 4 inches around and I ran it with my leather boots in a wide shot that showed there was no net or mats below, just jagged rocks. When the audience saw that they screamed and people came to me later saying, "You should have never done that.  You could have been really hurt." 

     

    What I've never told anyone until now is that I used a trick that Douglas Fairbanks used in the silent version of Robin Hood. In that movie there is a giant curtain that is about three stories high.  It is pulled back and tied at the bottom. Fairbanks, who is above it, jumps down on the folded part and with one leg out in the air rides it down to the floor.  The trick was that he had a playground type slide hidden inside the curtain, which he just slide down. So what I did was, on the other side of the thin railing of the bridge, I had a six inch wide plank made for me and ran with one foot on that and the other foot on the railing. It was a little dangerous, but I made sure if I lost my footing to fall on the bridge and not off of it.

     

    The scenes that were shot in San Francisco's Chinatown had to be done without a permit. It is the one where the kidnappers come to get the girl.  Also there was an establishing shot of the girl walking home. As I was filming this first with my cameraman, I turned and saw all seven bad guys in their costumes walking down the street looking the mean bunch of villains they were suppose to be. "Hey guys", I said panicing and looking around to make sure they were no police, get off the street and back into the van.  Anyway, we finally faked the exterior kidnapping and got the hell out of there.

     

    We next filmed the title scenes of the van driving across the Golden Gate bridge.  This was done with the camera mounted in the back of a pick up truck.  I was the driver and really sweated it out going through the toll gate with the camera in the back looking like a mounted machine gun with the cameraman in a hooded jacket.  But we weren't stopped and got the shots we needed.

     

                                              Post Production

     

    The partial budget that Rich Sydell and I had raised, got us through to the end of production and the developing and printing of our film.  I spent the next eight months happily editing  my dream film, that turned out bigger and better than I had hoped, in my apartment.   I couldn't afford a flatbed editing machine, nor to rent an editing room, so I edited the whole movie on a pair of rewinds and a viewer. 

     

    I vividly remember that I started to edit the first scene in the movie that was a bar room brawl that introduced the lead criminals. I had started it like the opening of  where one of the leads enters drunk looking for a drink.  I happened to have my FM radio on at the time, and I swear the that announcer said, "Famed movie director of "Rio Bravo" Howard Hawks died today.  I was saddened and said, "Thanks for this scene, Howard."

     


    Later, for the final editing and tightening of scenes, I used a Kem flatbed with a Panavision picture head.  I also screened the film several times and made more cuts until I was satisfied with it.

     

    Unlike "DM" that had skimpy sound effects, "Weapons of Death" got the full sound treatment, sometimes running as many as thirty-six tracks at the same time, as we did in the biker fight scene.  We had separate tracks for footsteps, yells, explosions, sword swishes, sword cuts, body falls, music, wind, and more. All individually controlled by a professional mixer at a state of the art mixing room in the Saul Zantz Studio in Berkeley, where some of the biggest movies were mixed.

     

    Not wanting to have a big distributor take the movie and charge all their expenses against our 50%, we went with a smaller independent distributor that took several prints to each city, advertised, and then moved to the next. We broke a house attendance record  in a New York theater.  I called a friend there and asked how the movie played, "They were all cheering and yelling", he said.          

              

                         

     

    On every movie I made, my father would say, "I like the movies that shows the actors with their names at the end. " I would always explained that the optical work on that took a lot of money.  But on "Weapons" I showed all the actors at the end one by one. They would be in the middle of the action, then freeze framed and then their name popped on.  It cost three thousand dollars to do just that, but I got it done.  I didn't tell my father about it and when it premiered he not only saw the end title sequence, but on the roll up came the  credit, "Title design...Gus Kyriazi".  He was surprised and happy.

     

    The best part of "Weapons of Death" was getting to be close friends with Eric Lee, Gerald Okamura, Sid Campbell and others. We went on to do the comedy, "NinjaBusters" and became lifelong friends. Later, using them to do voice work my audio-books. They've continued successfully in the martial arts and movie business.  

     

    "Weapons of Death" remains my best movie, though I hope to top it was a mystery thriller that I wrote.  After watching Quentin Tarrentino's martial arts spectacular, "Kill Bill",  I told a friend, I'm sure glad that I did my martial arts dream movie. Otherwise I would be sad to see someone else doing his dream version of a martial arts movie, knowing that I had chickened out and not taken the risk to do mine.

     

    I can still see the script for "Weapons" on my sofa, with me standing over it, wondering if I should take the risk to make it or not.  Like Tom Cruise's friend in "Risky Business" says,  "Sometimes you have to say 'What the hell.'  Saying it gives you freedom. Freedom brings opportunity.  And opportunity makes your life.  If you can't say it, you cant do it." 

     

    So I had the the dream, the script, and no money.  What the hell !

     








  •          Directing "Omega Cop"  

     

    It was 1989 when Ron Marchini, the producer/star of "Death Machines" (1975) called me to direct "Omega Cop".  Fourteen years had past since we first worked together, and we had both learned a lot doing other films separately. 

     

                                             Writing the Script

     

    When I first read the script I figured it would be a 55 minute movie, 35 minutes too short.  The story started with a policeman of the future hero already out alone in the desolated city, with "Road Warrior" types living in it.  A city that, because of the broken ozone layer, had little food or water.  The hero was unable to return to his headquarters. He went through a solar flare which turned many people into killers.  So his police captain, Adam 'Batman' West  won't let him return to base.  This was not to be shown. This the audience would learn this via dialogue.  From there he meets a young woman and, after some adventures, helps her escape from the city.

     

    I could see that with a 55 minute length story that needed to be expanded, and a small budget, there was an opportunity of "building" a movie, more than just producing one. Meaning that with writing the extra length that we needed and figuring how much time the budget gave us to film, we could make the biggest looking movie we could, just by efficiently writing, scheduling, and budgeting the production.

     

    Producers Ron Marchini and Garrick Huey, had already set Adam West to be in the picture.  He would remain in the police headquarters for the whole film, which meant we could finish all his scenes in two days. It was just up to me, to write as many good scenes that I thought we could film in those two days. Also Ron was working on getting other known actors to play small or cameo roles, thus giving the distributors poster power. So now it was up to me, Ron, and Garrick to get as much bang for the buck as we could.

     

    The movie started already in it's second act, so I decided to add a first act to it.  And I wanted that first act to be big as the ending. The ending was kind of already there. Have the solar flare infected killers attack the police headquarters and have the hero, Ron, blow it up as he escapes, running away from the explosions and  fireballs.  That would be a loud, expensive looking, and exciting ending.

     

    I decided that the beginning act would have the hero, talking with Adam West in the police station, and then going out on duty with 3 other policemen. They would try to bust up a gangster slave auction causing a "Wild Bunch" shoot out. Three of the cops would get killed by the gangsters, leaving only the hero surviving.

     

    At the end of this shoot out we would actually show the solar flare, that would turn some people into crazy killers. It would also make the hero not be allowed to return to the police station because of possible contamination from the flare. The story says that some people are contaminated, and others who were inside, a building were not.  Also since the head gangster, with his three henchmen, killed the hero's cop friends, we would have a revenge story going, as well.

     

    The other change I made was instead of having the hero help one young woman, as the original script called for, he would help three.  The reason being, the hero would run into one girl at a time in his adventures in the town, until he had all three to take care of. Each new face would wake up the audience.  Also the scenes would be more alive giving the audience three girls to move their eyes around to, and often 3 camera shots for me to edit, making the movie more cinematic and faster paced.

     

                                                Pre-Production

     

    Ron's wife, Jo Anne Marchini (Executive Producer) did the casting for the woman in Hollywood, and came up with two pretty and talented actresses, with totally different looks and personalities. A great asset to our production. The third actress was found in our  location town of Stockton, California. She was of Latin decent and one of our crew members said, "She's more beautiful than Sophia Loren."  No one argued that point.

     

    Next came the use of the budget. How would we spend the limited money?  The first priority would be the famous actors.  Ron Marchini managed to get Troy Donahue and Stuart Whitman.  I had been a fan of both, so that was exciting.

     

     Stuart Whitman was an academy award nominee for best actor in "The Mark" (1961). He told me that he and Paul Newman ("The Hustler") probably split the vote letting Maximillian Schell  win for "Judgement at Nuremberg". When I first met Whitman, I asked him if he could still roll the coin over his fingers like he did in "Darby's Rangers".  He said he still could, and was impressed that I remembered him in it.

     

     When Troy Donahue showed up for his one day of filming, he was in the make up chair and I said, "Troy, do you recognize this?"  I did the Al Pacino speech in "Godfather 2" where Al's sister brings in a new boyfriend (Troy). "I don't know who this Merle is, I don't know what he does for a living, but if you marry him, I will be very disappointed." Troy was amused and said that his real name was, in fact, Merle and that he had met this heavy set shy kid in high school and asked him to join the drama club. Turned out it was Francis Ford Coppola. So Coppola hired Troy for the movie.

     

    With the three stars and other actors set, which took a big chunk out of the budget, I worked with Ron to see how we could best use the remaining money.

     

    I know from experience that the best way to save money on all aspects of the budget was to have a short shooting schedule.  If you can cut a week off the schedule, that's a week less salaries, hotels, food, camera rental, and all the incidentals that make rage on the budget.  So studying the scenes I'd have to film, and having done 5 features before on a quick schedule, I decided that, instead of five or six weeks,  we would film 21 days straight.  Just three weeks. A hard three weeks, but after that the spending would stop.  Ron agreed, after asking, "Do you know how much completed screen time you'll have to get every day."  I replied, "Four and a half minutes a day."

     

    The next decision was the film ratio.  On my best movie, "Weapons of Death", I shot an eight to one ratio. But that movie had 5 heroes and 7 villains to cover, plus very large scale action scenes.  "Omega Cop" only had one hero to cover, after his cop buddies were killed.  And even though I planned to film the "Wild Bunch" scene with three cameras, some in slow motion which eats up a lot of film, I figured I could do the movie on a 5 to1 film ratio.  I knew that the action scenes would be 8 to1, or more. But I could make up for that on the dialogue scenes by filming them at 3 to1. And title shots and traveling shots would be hopefully filmed 1 to 1.  So I had Ron order 7.5 hours of film, which would hopefully edit out to 90 minutes.

     

                                              Production

     

    I wanted to get the big "Wild Bunch" shoot out over with at the beginning when the crew was on full power.  That was filmed on the first two days.  With the three cameras going on most of the action, I got all the coverage I needed and was happy to get that large scene in the can, using lots of squibs, high fall stunts, and blowing up a car.  Our stunt man, Rick Slater, did a backward fall from the roof of a house to the top of a car.  I had three camera's rolling on him.  Ron and I both worried about Rick's safety. But Ron also said, he heard the high speed sound of the camera as I gave Rick the action cue, plus the other cameras filming.  And it took some seconds for him to start his fall with all that film running, so that was a secondary worry. Rick was okay, and I asked him the next day if there were any aftereffects on his body, but he said, he was fine.  

     

    Ron and I were both glad when that stunt was finished.  It looks great in the movie, as I cut that scene personally, as well as all the action scenes, using both the slow motion and regular motion shots. I intercut that fall "Sam Peckinpah" style with another stuntman rolling of of the roof of the building.  The final result was the highlite of the shootout.  We also had 50 extras running around searching for cover, trying to escape the bullets of the cops and gangsters.  All this was done in two days with the help of our special effects man, who had worked on "Bonnie and Clyde".

     

    On the first day of the shootout, with all I had to concentrate on, Ron came up to me and said quietly, "Paul, do you think you can kill off one of the cops right away?"  Why?" I asked, not wanting to deal with anything more than I needed to, as I was planning to kill off the three cops near the end of the second day.  Ron replied, "This one cop actor is making trouble and telling the extras they should all get more money."  "Oh?", I said. Knowing that this is what some actors like to do on their last day of filming. Namely, make trouble.  "Sure, I'll set up for that right now."  I had the cop run into the slave action scene, do all the standoff action, then fire his gun, then get shot, as three of his squibs and blood packs were in place.  I thanked him, said it was great working with him, and he was gone.  The other two cops got to be more in the action, as they were available for the entire two day shoot out.

     

    Later, I read that in the production of "The Dirty Dozen" , singer Trini Lopez was to be the hero in the big raid at the end of the movie.  He would fall on a hand grenade saving his fellow soldiers. But he caused so much trouble during the filming of the training scenes, the director Robert Aldrich, had him killed in the parachute drop.  He was out of the movie.  An important lesson for actors, who think they can't be replaced.

     

     Adam West was to arrive the next day where we would be inside doing the police station interiors.  A month earlier, during pre-production, our cameraman told me his brother could make a huge lighted board that could be put on the wall of the police station. I knew that would be a great asset to the scene, so I agreed to the price and told him to have his brother the go ahead with it.  Well, I was so busy with other details that I didn't ask how the big board was going. But I should have because when I arrived on the set to direct that scene, I asked the cameraman where the big board was and he casually said, "Oh, my brother didn't make it." 

     

     Well, what could I do?  I hadn't met the brother and I couldn't get angry at the cameraman as I wanted him to continue filming at his best.  So I had my assistants hastily put together the police station set, in the studio were were filming at, with desks, TVs, PCs, and whatever. The big wall would just be empty.  Fortunately, it had a rough guy design so it looked good.  I also tried hard to fill the frame with the actors, especially Adam West, to hide the fact that there was nothing on it.  However, it did fit the desolate style of the movie.  But a big lighted board would have been much better.  Why I was never told that board would not arrive, is still a mystery. 

     

    Adam requested to see me for a few minutes alone before filming and I wondered if he would have any unusual requests.  We sat down and he proceeded to go through the entire script with positive staging and dialogue ideas for, not only his scenes, but for scenes that he wasn't even in.  Also he wrote a prologue about how man did not take care of his environment and caused the greenhouse effect which resulted in the futuristic plot of the movie. 

               

     

    He volunteered to read that prologue and we used it, creating a theme for the film that we had never considered.  This lifted our action vehicle into a "message" movie of sorts, at least in the opening scenes. Troy Danahue and Stuart Whitman were equally as helpful, coming up with ideas.  It was not a case of actors showing up for their time, doing what's required, and taking their pay check. These professionals loved contributing, even to our lower budget movie.

     

    Ron Marchini and the three girls were making up bits to do and concentrated to get the scenes done in as few takes as possible. However, when one girl jumped into a jeep to drive off, I had to yell cut.  It was on a busy city street, but I waited till there were no cars before calling action. She, however, instinctively looked back to check for traffic.  I walked over to her and said, "The last women on earth doesn't have to check for traffic. Let's do it again."  We laughed, knowing that any of us would have made that mistake.

     

    The filming days went so fast, I swear, I would look up to check the sun and see it arching across the sky like in "The Time Machine".  And the three weeks went so fast, it was like watching the movie in 90 minutes. I didn't have to see the dailies, I already saw the completed film done live in front of me. 

     

    I did finish the filming on the 21 day schedule. If I had gotten off that schedule the results would have been to horrible for me to imagine.  Actors, extras, effectsman, everybody, showing up on the wrong days at the wrong locations because with the small crew, it would have been impossible to call everyone up about the schedule change. No, it was easier and necessary to stay on schedule. I did this, by getting the scene in a master shot, and then getting the other shots needed, as time permitted. But when it was time to move to the next location or scene, I did.  I also made sure to not work too late into the night, so that the crew could get enough sleep for the next day. Still some locals who partied at night, came to the set a few times as zombies. But we got all the scenes in good order and in 21 days, the big expenses stopped.   

     

                                               Post Production

     

     

    We edited on KEM flatbeds and I remember that the "Wild Bunch" scene took me a fun seven days to cut together. Once assembled I tightened it a little, but never changed it. I then went on and edited all the action scenes myself. What fun.

     

    Ron Marchini found some local guys who had a good recording studio, where good sound effects and adequate music were added.  My personal contribution for music came before the scripting. I knew we could buy "sound-a-like" songs at a music library for a good price.  So I found some '60's type music, and wrote in the script that the hero liked to play oldies music in his jeep.  So the opening credits have the two police jeeps racing each other through the desolate landscape to the Beach Boys sound-a-like song, "Dragging USA".  This made for a high budget musical opening, that we got for cheap.  I used three other songs in other situations, giving our production a shot in the arm at the right places.  Plus I worked it into a dialogue gag that is repeated.  As the hero turns on his jeep tape player, he asks the girl, "Do you like oldies?" She replies, "Why?  How old are you?"

     

    "Omega Cop" went theatrical overseas and direct to video in the states. I was very please with the artwork for posters and the video box, unlike on my past features. I'm very proud of "Omega Cop" as a producing director, getting the most on screen for the budget we had. The cast and crew were great, with the exception of that "big board" situation. 

     

    Best of all, Ron Marchini and I could get together and make a more overall satisfying film than "Death Machines" And this time, worked together with more confidence and enjoyment. Though I must add that on "Death Machines" we had really gone into uncharted waters together, with both of us wondering how the production would turn out.  But we came out with a completed film that hit the big theaters.  I'll just say that both those productions experiences were unique, with "Omega Cop" the topper. 

                                                    

     

     






  •    Directing "Death Machines" 


    It was 1974 when I met Ron Marchini, a champion karate tournament fighter. He had starred in a movie in the Philippines  and was now looking to produce and star in one in America.  He had seen my first feature "The Tournament" and some of my short 16mm karate dramas and decided to take a chance on me to direct his movie.

     

    My first movie, about three samurai in England, had failed to get a large distributor, so I had vowed to myself if I ever got another chance I would make my next movie so commercial that a distributor would have to take it. 

     

                                     Writing the Script

     

    Ron and I came up with a story that had three hitmen, one white, one black, and one Asian,  working for a Japanese Yakuza woman.   That would take care of three markets, as the black exploitation films were all the rage then.  We also included a cop, a love, and revenge story.

     

    We then added some bizarre action scenes, such as the three killers coming into a karate dojo with samurai swords and wiping everyone out. This was inspired from Kurasawa's "Sanjuro".   Also an escape from a police department by Marchini using karate.  On his way outside he steals a police car and crashes it into another car. I was driving the other car, as I didn't want to risk someone else. What the hell, I was only the director. I could be replaced, unlike the actors. We had to do the crash twice. Stupid me, no seat belts in that car, so I was tied down with a rope. What if the gas tank exploded and I'm tied down? Well, shows you how dedicated I was to making the best movie I could. I remember it was mothers day, and hoped that no one would be calling my mother with bad news.

     

    Another scene had a banker handcuffed to a  cabinet as a time bomb ticks off in front of him.  He struggles for 2 minutes to try to get to it to turn it off, but it explodes.  We also had a  small bar room brawl, a the three killers fighting bikers in a cafe, and finally, using a bazooka, the killers blow up a real piper cub airplane.

     

    Mixed in with all those big scenes  were minor action scenes of Mafia hitman being kill by the three killers who were about to shoot someone, such as throwing one off a tall building and landing on his own car that is being ticketed by a meter maid.  Another one is blown over his car by a bazooka. And still another has his phone booth crushed with him in it by a tractor.  I figured that with all these different types of action scenes and people, their would be lots of exploitable things for a distributor to put on the poster.  Little did I know that none of these things would appear on the poster.

      

    Ron could only come up with $70,000 to make the movie. But it seemed enough to get us through production. We shot in 35mm Techniscope that shot half frame, saving film, and developed at technicolor, giving us a wide scope screen. This would help "fool" audiences and distributors that the budget was bigger than we had.

     

    We had a six week schedule and decided to use Ron's home town of Stockton, California to shoot in, as he was a businessman there and the city fathers were trying to attract movie makers. So the town was wide open to us with full police co-operation.

     

    Casting was done all in the town using a local casting agent that had a list of  actors and extras from other movies that had shot in town.  The exception was for the Asian killer and black killer, Mike Chong and Joshua Johnson. The original Asian killer was to be Kung Fu kata champion Eric Lee.  He had been on many covers of "Inside Kung Fu" magazine and that would have helped our selling cause. But wouldn't you know it, Sam Peckinpah invited him to work on "Killer Elite"  shooting at the exact same time.  So Eric took the smaller part of the karate instructor who's dojo is raided by the killers.  Later Eric starred for me in my movies "Weapons of Death" (1980) and "NinjaBusters" (1984).

     

    My first concern was that in his fist movie "Murder in the Orient" Ron Marchini, though natural in his action scenes, had a wooden delivery of his lines.  At the time I didn't realize that it was mostly bad staging, dialogue, and directions that kept him from being natural. And me, not having the skill or confidence to fix this, we both decided that he and the two other killers wouldn't speak.

     

    Later on in "Omega Cop" (1985) both Ron and I had more experience in acting, directing, and dialogue writing so that his speaking scenes came off well.

     

    It was lucky that we found people that really looked the part of cops and gangsters. The gangster who is thrown off the building was actually a 3rd grade teacher. But he really looked like a gangster.  The part of the lead cop looked like "Barney Miller" a top TV show at the time, giving the audience someone to relate to.

     

    Finding the hero, who has his hand cut off by the killers and then pursues them was difficult. We needed a handsome leading man type in his early 20's who was good at action.  But could only find one that had was not an athlete, though he tried his best.   So I had to stage the bar fight that he gets into with him getting beat up and losing. But he gets the sympathy of the girl that way.  And instead of fighting the samurai sword swinging dragon lady, I had him falling down stairs away from her and the cop shooting her.  So basically the hero survives by his luck rather than by his action.

     

                                         Production 

                                              

    My crew were all 25 year old ex-Air Force buddies who were in the movie department with me for four years. I just about had a heart attack when two arrived with the giant grip truck pulling a generator.   It was a visual example of what a large operation this would be compared to my first smaller scale movie.  It was then that I learned that a movie company is really a moving company. Moving actors and equipment to the right place and at the right time to get the scene shot.

     

    The big choice for us was what to do about the many bullet hits and explosions in the movie.  To do squib effects you must hire a licensed "powder man", as they are called in Hollywood. He would be $250 a day, plus the explosive materials. We called a few effects men, but they gave us little time on the phone.  Then we called one named Dick Albains.  He was in his fifties and had his own effects shop. He spent a lot of time on the phone with me explaining how to fake bullet hits.  "What about using firecrackers", I asked him. "Oh, that would look so bad." he said.

     

    Finally Ron, and I figured out a schedule with the effects scenes all together, to save money, and hired him.  I told him later, "We hired you because you spent so much time on the phone with us."  Dick replied, "I try to help all producers out because maybe one day they will use me."

     

    So now we had realistic bullet hits and could actually blow up a Piper Cub airplane, that we bought minus the engine.  A duplicate was flown and then we pulled the other one by car and just before it lifted off, it was blown up. 

     

    Even though it was an ambitious project, thanks to the actors being local and showing up on time, good weather, and no accidents, we finished on schedule. 

     


    When I viewed the dailies of the bar room brawl scene I was shocked to see that when the  hero is knocked out and lying on top of the bar, from the camera's viewpoint, the beer spray coming from a broken beer tap, looked like it was coming right out of the tip of the hero's nose.  Why hadn't my camera man told me?  However, it looked so perfectly lined up that the audience thought that it was on purpose as a comic touch.  So I kind of got away with that. 

     

                                    Post Production

     

    We started the editing on our own, but Ron got anxious about being able to sell the movie, so we took it to Crown International Pictures  and showed them about 70% of the movie, including the airplane being bazooka and blowing up.  The president of Crown wanted the film immediately.  But this meant turning it over to him at once for their editors to finish.

     

    On one hand I wished I could have finished with all the editing. But on the other hand, I was relieved and excited that a mini-major distributor was taking the movie. I had told Ron  that we could sell the movie, if it had all those marketable things in the story, so he invested all the money he had available, plus took out a loan.  So I was off the hook, once Crown took it.  Looking back now, I realize what a risk taker Ron was and how he had faith in me to pull off that kind of movie, with that small budget.  Also Ron was a true movie fan. We watched many movies together at that time, to learn and to encourage ourselves for the task at hand.

     

                                       Marketing

     

    At that particular time, the Sci-Fi movies "Rollerball"  and "Death Race 2000"   were big hits, so Crown decided they wanted to present "Death Machines" as a Sci-Fi movie.  They asked us to shoot a new scene to tack onto the beginning.  Well, Ron and I were game to do it. Anything to get our picture in to the theaters.  So they gave us this scene where this mastermind man told the dragon lady that a special hypnotic drug would make her men killers on demand, "Death Machines", as it were.

     

    Crown gave us the modest budget to film in Stockton one day. I staged the scene like when the henchman goes to visit "Dr. No" and gets the spider.  So I had a single chair in the middle of a large event room in the dark. A light goes on over the chair and the Yakuza woman is told to sit down and then listens to the mastermind criminal talk. We were told to keep the mastermind in shadows in case there was a sequel and could use another actor.

     

    Once that was added to the movie, Crown made posters of a tower building with teeth, with people falling off of it giving it a sci-fi look.  On the tower were the words, "The Killers Of The Future Are Ready Now."  Similar ads were made for the newspapers.

     

    Six months later it was released in 50 theaters in the LA area. It ranked #14 in Variety's weekly top grossing chart.  Still the movie didn't do as well as expected because the sci-fi fans felt gypped that it wasn't science fiction and lots of the action fans didn't go because they thought it was sci-fi.  The theater owners complained.  So Crown had to make a new ad for the newspapers showing the karate killers faces, saying 'White Killer', 'Black Killer', 'Chinese Killer'.

     

                                    It Arrives in the Theaters

     

    When I saw the film in the theaters, I was excited and proud of it. But even with the extensive bizarre action scenes, it did drag a little at the fifty minute mark, when it got into the love story.  Also I had too many shots of the killers getting in and out of their car and walking into the house.  I guess this was because I had the use of Ron's Jaguar and the house looked cool, and the killers were the best part of the story, so I showed them even doing boring things.

     

    Ten years later, on the first day of shooting "Omega Cop" the same producer/actor Ron Marchini asked me how I wanted him to drive his jeep into the scene. He yelled across the way, "Do you want me to come in fast or slow."  I answered back on my bull horn, "Fast! We did it slow in 'Death Machines'."  He gave a laugh on that one.

     

    I also got some disappointing surprises when first seeing the movie in the theater complete with music and sound. Crown hired a low budget effects company. They put in the sword swishes for the big dojo fight scene (the 3 killers used samurai swords), but they didn't put in body sword hits, so to me, it sounded like they were missing with their swords. This movie was made before samurai movies became main stream, so the effects men didn't know about this. Also the body falls were not loud enough. Still people have told me what a strong scene that dojo raid is.

     

    Worse was the black police captain who has a sign on his door reading "Captain Green". Well, his makeup under the fluorescent lights turned him green on film, and he gives a long speech with his name sign in full view. I figured they would correct his face color in the timing of the final print using the right filter.  But they didn't and audiences would yell out "Look! Captain Green IS green." 

     

    The real disappointing part of the movie was the music.  Crown used the same low budget company to do the music. It ended up being an irritating, repetitive, electronic score.  Many people have mention how much the music hurt the movie.  On my next movie, I made sure to take it all the way to the end using full sound effects and closely edited music from a good library. 

     

    I was happy to get a fairly good review in the LA Times on "Death Machines", saying "Director Paul Kyriazi captures a dusty petty ambience."  I'm still not so sure how good that is, but they spelled my name right and used the word "captures"  and "ambience", so I was happy with it.  Another fun review.

     

    Seeing the movie recently, I think that is was great for the budget, and some audience members loved it for what it was.  Somehow they really got into the movie and took it seriously.  I think if I could cut the "Death Machines" down to 70 minutes, it would really be a wild ride, just by shortening all the scenes thusly putting all the action scenes closer together.  But of course, 70 minutes does not make a feature film. It had to be 93 minutes, so that other counties could cut out what they wanted for censorship problems and still have 90 minutes.

     

    Because "Death Machines" played everywhere in many theaters in the big cities, I used that as a springboard to my next feature and others.  I guess the best part was being able to 'do it right' on the next picture with Ron Marchini, "Omega Cop".  Still on a low budget, but able to make better use of the money through better scripting and scheduling. 

     

    It is disappointing that the current DVD release is not in wide screen and made from the 16mm print.  I don't know why they did that.  But still Ron and I were lucky that Crown picked up the movie and released it so fast.  Still, I cringe at the thought that no matter how the movie is formatted in the future, Captain Green's face will always be green.

     

  •                         From Mess up to Producer

    In 1952 actor William Self messed up by putting an electric blanket on the block of ice that held The Thing..

     "I don't want to see his face."

     Thus melting the ice and setting The Thing, James Arness, loose.  Then, after 50 years of TV and movie producing, William Self messed up again.

     "Oh no. I did it again."

    It was at a 2002 "The Thing" halloween haunted house and William came.

    Isn't it great to be a film fan? 

    When asked recently what his ultimate goal was, Quentin Tarentino said, "To be a film fan." 

  •    Publishing vs. Self-Publishing 

    I get a lot of questions about how to get a publisher.  I have strong feelings about this.  You will send your manuscript to publishers that you can convince to receive it. It will sit there for months, even years, and nobody will read it. And if they do, they will want you to completely re-write it.
     
    And then they will tell you, it's still not good enough to publish. Or if you are very lucky, they will print five thousand copies, with a bad cover design, send you twenty copies, promise you a percentage of the profits and then send you nothing but receipts for their expenses.
     
    And then when you want to promote your book yourself, it won't be in the bookstores. And when you want your book back to put it out yourself, they will tell you that they own it and will not print any more and will not give it back to you.
     
    The worst story I heard was in Japan. Movie star Tatsuya Nakadai's  wife wrote a book about her husband. She gave it to a large publisher. They held it for seven years without doing anything with it. When she died, they immediately published it.
     
    Why go through all the above, when these days you can self-publish your book? (Not vanity press).  You can design your own cover, get an ISBN number, and sell it on Amazon and your own web site. And when you need more copies you can make a phone call to your printer and have them in two weeks. Your book will never go out of print. And you can revise it anytime you want.
     
    These days you don't have to print thousands of copies. You can print 200, or 100 or now there is even printing one at a time. They also have programs for your PC to lay out your book for printing.
     
    And then you will have something to hand out to promote yourself or just to share. Something cheaper than cookies to give to your loved ones on Christmas. And let me tell you it's a great and satisfying experience. And why wait like Nakadai's wife did?  Why not enjoy having your book out now with the cover design, paper, and type style you like.
     
    That's what Gene Simmons of KISS did. He first met with a publisher for his "Kisstory" book. But when he realized they would take him to the cleaners with their endless deductions, he published it himself.
     
    You probably won't make a profit. Or if you do, it will take time. But that's not the reason to have a least one book out that represents you, be it auto-biography, fiction, or whatever subject.  Just call up a printer and get the prices and facts.

  •             Scheduling, Budget, and Coverage
     
    When you approach the production of any movie you'll firstly be concerned with the budget. After all, to get financing you'll have to show the script and the budget. But how do you make a realistic budget?  Especially, if you don't know what the "above the line" costs are. That is the cost of stars, actors, and other producers salaries.
     
    A budget can not be made without knowing the shooting cost per week and how many weeks you will need to shoot. It's all simple enough. Same as doing a budget for building a house. Except for one large mysterious detail. How long will it take to shoot each scene. "Ah, there's the rub."
     
    This is why having experience filming your own movies is important, as filming always takes longer than you think. And when you get to more professional features, it takes even longer than that.
     
    For example, I did my 16mm action movies with just a camera. Then my first feature with a camera and reflectors (shot all outdoors). When I did "Death Machines" I went outside to greet the grip truck that had been driven up from LA. I saw this huge truck of equipment pulling a giant movie generator  and knew that my set up time would be more than just my cameraman moving tripod and reflectors.  I started to sweat, but I knew that I had scheduled for it. But still????
     
    For scheduling you have to go through the script, figure out how many camera set ups you will do for each dialogue scene, and how long you will spend on action scenes.   And then estimate the time it will take to get your camera coverage. 
     
    I found that it's best to use a standard block calendar  (not production board)  to make the most efficient schedule. Later you can double check it with a production board or computer movie schedule maker.
     
    The most important thing I can say concerning this is: NEVER get off schedule, as it's too difficult to reschedule actors and effects people. On lower budget projects, finish the scene no matter what. Many directors say, "Well, we can come back for pick up shots later." and find that they can't get that location again, or the actors again. Even if you have little time, complete the whole scene in master, so at least you've got it. Then if you have time, move in for your close-ups. 
     
    Once a producer, that had hired me to direct years before,  called me to finish a movie that another director dropped the ball on. The producer told me, "Paul, when the other guy kept not finishing scenes, I always remembered what you said, 'Close out the scene, no matter what.' ".  The other director had left a series of uncompleted scenes that were a big headache to finish.
     
    Once you get the schedule, you're budgeting should be fairly accurate. When you get on the set, get as much camera coverage as you can. But then close out all your scenes before the end of the allotted time, and then move on to the next scene.
     
    Bringing in a movie on schedule and on budget will be the most important reputation you can have in the film business. Marlon Brando directed the great "One Eyed Jacks" .  But was never given a movie to direct again,as it went from 2 months at two million,to six months at six million. 

  •  The Untold Basics of Directing

     

    When Clint Eastwood was preparing to directed his first feature, "Play Misty for Me", he asked his "Dirty Harry" director, Don Siegle for advice.  Clint thought Don would tell him about lenses or working with actors.  But Don said, "The most important thing is to get lots of sleep."

     

    I always tell that to my cast and crew and most abide. But there are always a couple that think making a movie is the time to party and after 4 days drag themselves to the set looking like zombies and are just as productive.

     

    More basics that go unheeded are: Get enough new underwear to finish off the production with. You won't have time to do your laundry.  Carry food and drink in your attache case because you never know when you'll get hungry or if the lunches will arrive on time.  Carry a wad of cash in your pocket (even your own) to buy off and bribe whoever you need to in order to get the job done.

     

    After the above is taken care of, you can then get to the more creative side of directing. But not before.  Best Clint Eastwood site.

  •    The Invisible Technician  

     

    That's the reputation Howard Hawks had. He directed  and produced (some say directed)  .   A must read for "The Thing" fans.

     

    As a director you'll have to chose if you want to show your technique like Brian DePalma,  or keep it invisible.

     

    Joseph Steffano  ("Psycho" screenplay) said, "I hate it when I can see the director directing on the screen. Hitchcock had technique, but it always fit the story. So you didn't see him directing."

     

    Getting back to Hawks, the opening of "Rio Bravo" (almost wordless) shows his invisible technique. You are too into the story to notice the low angle we view of John Wayne  from Dean Martin's point of view.  In the story, the drunk (Martin) must raise himself up to the level of Wayne.

     

    Click this link and see all the shots, and how they progress, telling the story without dialogue. There is point of view  , punctuation on the gunshot,   and atmosphere.  (Notice the bull horns next to Wayne.) All which are invisible, keeping the audience into the story.

     

     (like all movies) should be watched with no commercial breaks. So get it on DVD and notice how the characters, story, and camera all combine in one effort to show that no human is worthless, the self-reliance of Wayne (even though he is flawed.  He needs help,but doesn't want it, and is inept with women.) And how the other characters    come up to his level.

     

    Which type of director will you be?  Invisible or visible? Both have merit depending on the story and scene.  However, the  "Look Ma, I'm directing." style should be avoided if you want to keep the audience involved in the story.

  •   Screenplay Writing Part 2

     

    Getting your screenplay into the proper format is easier and quicker than every using script programs. I use "Movie Magic Screenwriter"   and it's a dream. You can start using it in 10 minutes of reading and just going for it.

     

    But before you start to go for the full dialogue script, get your scenes down on a piece of paper so that you can get your story order together.  Then you can look it over quickly, juggle and add scenes and see where your plot and characters are taking you by just looking at a few pages and getting a feel for the overall movie. And movie it is, not paper, not script form, but a tool for making a movie.

     

    Once you're satisfied with your story, plot, characters, acts, twists, and climax, then you can start doing the scenes with dialogue on your pc script program.

     

    And don't think you have to work on a script for a year. Great scripts have been written in weeks, the original "Manchurian Candidate"  for example.  And don't think it's such a big and troublesome piece of work. You only have to concentrate on and hold the audiences attention for 2 hours.

     

    Just remember to get your story in gear by the 20 minute mark. That's the time the audience expects things to happen. If you're doing "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids", the kids should be shrunk by the 20 minute mark. 

     

    And watch out for that deadly 50 minute mark. That's where the audience usually gets saturated with what's going on and gets ready to channel change or go for popcorn. So give them a surprise, or twist, or re-energize the plot.

     

    Endings are tough. But a rule of thumb is "The ending should be a surprise, but inevitable when you think about it later."  Not easy to do, but cool when you pull it off.  Best example: "Angel Heart" starring Mickey Roake & Robert De Nero.  You'll be totally suprised when you see what happens to Mickey Roake at the end.  But when you re-see the movie there are so many obvious clues to what will happen, that you feel like a fool for missing them. That's good writting.