The Hard 88 : true adventures in dissatisfaction: Archive

Jan 24th

2 notes

The Holiday.

Ah, Christmas. A long time ago, my favorite day of the year. Now, just another day, but with more driving than usual. When my mom died, whatever leftover feelings that I still had for Christmas died with her. My mom died on Dec 22nd 2010. This is my second Christmas without her. The only thing that I feel is a hollow ache inside. Nothing is ever going to fill that, there aren’t any...

Dec 26th

Nov 13th

...and another thing

I don’t know, maybe this just happens to me. So the other night I have a meeting with someone, and as I’m leaving the restaurant, I run into somebody else that I know. He’s sitting there with two people, one that I know, and one that I don’t know. I’m having a conversation with him, and the other person that I know is pointedly ignoring me. So I wrap up my...

Oct 19th

Oct 8th

Aug 6th

Regarding feedback: For the record, this is not exclusively about SON, and anyone thinking I’m specifically angry at them about that can relax. That is simply a contributing factor to a problem I’ve been dealing with for years. “Feedback” to me doesn’t mean ‘stroke my ego and tell me I’m great.’ It means I’ve reached a point in the story...

Jul 17th

Jun 10th

A Game of Waiting....

I started reading the Song of Ice and Fire series, beginning with A Game of Thrones, a little while after it first came out, back in 1997. One of the main reasons I started this series was the fact that I was sick of waiting for the next damn Wheel of Time book, by the late Robert Jordan, to come out. First off, let me say that I really liked the old Wheel of Time series, even though I have yet...

Apr 19th

Have you ever looked over the edge of a cliff, just to see what’s down there? This SON story has stomped a mud-hole in my guts, and has given me untold amounts of grief. I’m up one minute, down the next. I have it, I don’t have it. I have never worked so hard on a story as I have on this one. Just when I think it’s ok, certain people keep pushing me. Not to mention me...

Apr 16th

So much work, and not enough time to do it. I’m wracking my brain on this SON screenplay. The pieces are swirling madly around in my head like so many fireflies, but I’m having trouble getting them into the jar. I have lots of images, and at least 2/3 of a story, but the final piece still eludes me. OK, moving on. It’s too early to say much, but I’m working on a GOTY...

Apr 5th

Feb 1st

Marching orders!

RHINELAND is available on dvd 2/1/2011. It seems impossible to me that the movie is finally out. The struggle to get this thing done was a battle of titanic proportions. We fought against the elements, the budget constraints, and at times, each other. We shot for forty-two days over the course of three years. Literally hundreds of people worked on the project. At one time, the late George...

Feb 1st

Dec 4th

Once upon a galaxy...

One of the best books that I ever read about filmmaking is the Journal of making The Empire Strikes Back by Alan Arnold. I read it maybe a year or two ago, so it was very much like taking a time machine back to before STAR WARS was the complete success that it is now. At that point in time, Empire was merely a sequel to one of the greatest space-fantasy films ever made. It was an unproven...

Nov 30th

It is cold

…and also vaguely depressing outside. I can’t help but think back to five years ago, when I was preparing to hurl myself in the breach that was to become RHINELAND. My God, that movie was hard. When I was recently putting together the new teasers for it, I had to dig through a ton of footage. Just looking at it all, I’m still astonished that we pulled it off. I think I’m...

Nov 24th

St. Clair Saturday

I’m not gonna lie, it felt great to be out working on something new. It also felt a little eerie to be treading on the hallowed RHINELAND ground. I told Robert (George) when we were driving up the gravel road to park “Man, this place is permanently burned into my mind.” We shot out here for three winters in a row. I feel like I have intimate knowledge of every tree, rock, and...

Nov 13th

1 note

Random

I managed to both drag my lazy ass out for a run, and do 25 push-ups using the stupid handle things. Push-up with those things are a lot harder than the regular ones… This weekend is the first SON photo shoot. This time out, the two lead actors. Soon enough, I’ll round up the four supporting actors and do their promo stuff. Also: Location scout on Sunday. Still working on locking...

Nov 10th

scope mount

I have decided to make one of the supporting characters in SON a sniper. This will necessitate putting a scope on a Mauser rifle. I have three options for this, these being an m98, an m48, and a m24/47. For those of you who may not know this, the m98 bolt-action Mauser rifle was the primary battle rifle of the German army in both WW1 & WW2. Mausers also saw a lot of use post-ww2 in the...

Oct 24th

A mild panic has finally set in...

So, yeah. Here I am, inching my way through pre-production for Sound Of Nothing. As of today, I have no locations locked down. I find this to be slightly disturbing. Granted, I don’t plan on rolling on this until March, and at least I have the cast set firmly in stone. Although, my lead actor is planning a trip to Argentina, to “walk around the tip of South America, and hopefully...

Oct 22nd

Ruth

My friend Ruth died this morning. She was 49 years old. She had cancer. It was quick. I first met Ruth in a Wal-mart parking lot in the Summer of 1996. She was the sister-in-law of another friend of mine, and a group of us were going to Illinois, where I was running a once-a-month game of D&D. I don’t think that particular game survived much longer than that session, but from that...

Oct 19th

Oct 12th

New project!

I’m finally back to working on something new. Pre-production on SOUND OF NOTHING is underway, albeit moving slowly. I still have to lock down the production team, and have to finish location scouting. We’re going to do a table read of the script pretty soon, though. RHINELAND and GOTY are slowly moving along as well. I’m also working on solving my promotional woes. One thing...

Sep 7th

History of the World

OK, here we go… First the was nothing, then God said “Let there be light” and the world was created. Then he made Adam and Eve, and they had two sons, Cain and Able. Well, Cain killed Able, and then eventually the great flood happened, but Noah had built an Ark and put two of everything else on it. Time passed, and Pharaoh built the pyramids, but he used the Hebrews as slaves....

Aug 27th

Gen Con

Well, here we are at the Holy Land of gaming! Ate, drank, did the “Filmmaking 101 pre-production” panel. Pretty good panel, had a good time with the other filmmakers. Currently hanging out with Sis, jGrimm, and D-rock. (in Sis and jGrimm’s fancy hotel room) Sis was showing off her stolen Roman glass from Macedonia. The phrase “Magical Discharge” was just bandied...

Aug 7th

Running in South City

On Macklind: First I hear a thump-thump of feet, then the jangling of a chain. A fit, beautiful girl, running with her dog, passes me like I’m standing still. Bitch. Down Loughborough: Three teenage boys walk in line down the side walk. They see me, I see them. Neither party changes course. At the last second, before collision, Both I and the far-left side kid move a half-step to either...

Jul 15th

Jul 14th

Continental Hitchhiker

So RHINELAND is gonna screen at the Yellow Fever Film Festival in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I’d like to go, but how the fuck am I gonna get there? For Nivy and I to both go, that’s two thousand bucks. Anybody have some frequent flyer miles out there that they want to donate? Or how about some cold, hard cash? Still, it’s good that the ‘ol war movie is getting some play....

Jul 11th

I’m working on new crap. I’ve got a new blog going on over at Posterous- DICEBLADE. It’s going to be dedicated to more gaming-related stuff. Film stuff, too, and even gaming-related film stuff…for instance, there’s a lot of GOTY activity going on right now. Apparently, Gary Elmore is also trying to get VOID DRAGON ENTERPRISES off of the ground, that sneaky bastard. ...

Jul 10th

I’ve been running again, probably for close to two months now. I had been thinking that for this current round of exercise, I’d simply lay off the weights and instead concentrate on pushups and roadwork. I thought it would be the same as just lifting, maybe even better. It wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong, I like running. It’s a good activity, it really let’s me...

Jul 3rd

Pointing out the (not always) obvious

Early last month the 88mm team did the 48hr Film Project, technically for the 8th time. We won two awards, Audience Choice and Best Original Score. When I walked out of the Tivoli Theater after the awards show, I was severely, wretchedly depressed. Normally, I send out a congratulatory email to the cast and crew after the 48, thanking them for all of their hard work and effort. This year I...

Jul 2nd

Jun 27th

Pain and associated thoughts

There’s probably not a day that passes in which I don’t wake up in some type of pain. This is nothing new to me, so you can hold all of the “old age” jokes. I’ve suffered from back pain for most of my life. It comes and it goes, like most things do. Currently, my right elbow and left shoulder are troublesome. The elbow hurts especially, for some reason. My left calf...

May 22nd

When it rains....

…It rains shit. So, yeah, my car is fucked up, and OF COURSE, the dealership is claiming the issue isn’t covered under the warranty. So that means goodbye, four hundred bucks. There’s a host of other assorted bullshit that goes along with this story-but really, why get into it? What I should be doing right now is lifting weights and then going for a two-mile run, but instead...

May 14th

Mother's Day 2010

At the beginning of March of this year, I was feeling creatively dead inside. No new ideas, no fresh thoughts, nothing. RHINELAND was as done as it was going to get, having been picked up by VCI Entertainment for distribution. Game Of The Year, having been crushed and rejected by the festival circuit, was now starting to make the rounds of the convention circuit. The web series, Sound Of Nothing,...

May 9th

RHINELAND production diary part 6 (the end)

Season Three or, “It ain’t over yet, suckers” In July of 2007, RHINELAND premiered at the St. Louis Filmmaker’s showcase, and totally blew the crowd away. We ended up with a new executive producer from Hollywood (whose name I won’t mention here) and at his urging, we went back out into the wilds of Missouri to re-shoot some critical scenes, plus add on couple of new...

Feb 27th

RHINELAND production diary part 5

The Re-shoots The Summer has passed. We’ve had a wrap party at the lead actor’s house. The Cinematographer cut a trailer, and so did I. The cut slowly takes shape as the months pass, and the team works on the 48hr film project again. This time, we come away with nothing. I’m feeling restless about the movie. By the time we have a rough cut together, I’ve decided that we...

Feb 26th

RHINELAND production diary part 4

FEBRUARY 26 2006 Day 19 St. Clair, MO Big Battle, day two. We’re still on the left side of the hill, but now we’re doing bunker-assault stuff. This is our first three camera shoot. This involves timing an actor throwing dummy grenades with the pyrotechnician setting off the explosion. After the explosion goes off, there will be a certain amount of smoke, but not enough to look...

Feb 23rd

RHINELAND production diary part 3

JANUARY 15 2006 Day 10 Desoto, MO More explosions today, this time with extras. We shot some more foxhole scenes, and did a bunch of explosions, some mighty big and impressive ones. This was one of those rare days where almost everything goes right, and we finished up pretty close to on time. JANUARY 21 2006 Day 11 Desoto, MO This is our first day using a jib. (for those who may not...

Feb 21st

RHINELAND production diary part 2

JANUARY 7, 2006 Day 7 St. Clair, MO I decided to rewrite the scenes planned for today. Originally, everything took place in the woods around an abandoned German bunker. I decided to change this for two reasons : 1. A lot of shit happens happens in the woods in this movie. 2. We would have to build a bunker. Now, building a bunker is hard work. Really, really hard work. I know this because we...

Feb 19th

RHINELAND production diary part 1

Well, I know that technically I need to put up the next part of the AMPHETAMINE story, but being as the war movie is getting distribution, I figured I would re-post this. Originally, it was on MySpace, but nobody uses that damn thing anymore except for bands. Enjoy! RHINELAND production diary History & Perspective I’ll start at the beginning. Well, not the BEGINNING, but close...

Feb 17th

motion sickness

So here’s where we’re at, fellow citizens: RHINELAND is definitely, one-hundred percent getting distribution. This has meant an ass-load of work of the past few weeks for Don-O, myself and the rockstars over at WPC. As a matter of fact, I’m burning off a dvd of a (hopefully) fixed mpeg-2 of the RHINELAND deleted scenes as I type this. While all of this fabulous stuff is...

Feb 14th

Directions to the 88mm show

coming from the west: I64/40 Take exit 37B Grand Make a right onto S. Grand Make a right onto Lindell blvd Make a sharp left onto Olive st. The Centene Center is a white building on the right 3547 Olive coming from the east: I64/40 Take exit 38B Market Make a left onto Market Make the 1st right onto S. Compton Make the 1st right onto Olive Keep slightly to the right to stay on Olive The Centene...

Feb 6th

88mm Benefit Show!

Cinema St. Louis presents an 88mm benefit screening of two never-before-seen versions of GAME OF THE YEAR and RHINELAND! When: Saturday, February 6th Time: 7:00pm Cost: $10.00 Where: Centene Center for the Arts, 4th floor (located at 3547 Olive blvd St. Louis MO 63103) The show starts with GAME OF THE YEAR, which screens from 7:00pm to 8:30pm, Followed by RHINELAND which screens from 9:00pm to...

Feb 6th

So here I sit...

Nivy is at home with her parents and siblings, and I just got back from my Brother’s house, after dropping off my mother at her home. It’s 8:30 on Christmas night, and I don’t have a damn thing to do. Well, I have things that I should be doing….but it is Christmas after all. Somehow watching “Red Planet” doesn’t seem appropriate, and I’m not in the...

Dec 26th

Christmas 1982

Now that it’s well behind me, I feel that a childhood full of deprivation isn’t such a bad thing. Going through it sucks, sure. But the stories are much better when you’re an adult. Not that I was really deprived, mind you. I had a roof over my head and a family that cared and provided for me…I just didn’t get everything that I wanted. Being as the big day is upon...

Dec 25th