The Lucky 7

Cucalorus Film Festival

18^th Annual from November 08, 2012 - November 11, 2012
Next Deadline: June 20, 2012

Fee: $25 (FREE for local filmmakers)

Reason for this festival: This is our regional film festival selection.  It is appropriate for our film because the festival is local and supports local filmmakers.  It is unique and accepts a wide variety of projects. And helloooo it’s Cucalorus.

Praxis Film Festival

Just held January 21, 2012

Next Deadline: TBA (Look into 2013 submission)

Fee: FREE

Reason for this festival: Praxis is our free film festival selection.  We are submitting to them not only because they are free but because they love UNCW students  and are also regional. We like them because they are really into supporting undergraduate film students with little resources.

NextFrame International Student Film & Video

Held July 1, 2012 – May 1, 2013 (Year-round traveling festival)

Next deadline: May 15, 2012

Fee: $20 with Withoutabox Account

Reason for this festival: Next Frame is a good choice because they aim to expose cutting-edge student work, and I mean come on, our doc is most definitely cutting-edge student work. They are also a touring festival, so there are opportunities to network with people all around the country. 

Athens International Film + Video Festival

39th Annual from April 13, 2012 –April 19, 2012

Held April 13, 2012 – April 19, 2012

Next deadline: TBA

Fee: $40

Reason for this festival: This festival is good for our film because they look for works that utilize nonfiction material to construct a story, an argument, and/or a statement about the real world.

RiverRun Film Festival

14th Annual from April 13, 2012- April 22, 2012

Next deadline: TBA

Fee: FREE for NC students

Reason for this festival: The RiverRun International Film Festival is a good festival choice for us because it is regional.  It also accepts documentary shorts and looks for films that offer an insight into the lives of people.  Looking at previous film submissions, they selected films with similar qualities to our story.

Ivy Film

11th Annual from April 9, 2012 – April 15, 2012

Next deadline: TBA

Fee: $20 for regular deadline with Withoutabox Account

Reason for this festival: They accept entries for undergraduate documentary productions both short and feature length.   They also offer multiple deadlines to submit your film in case you are running behind and cannot submit it by the regular deadline.

Angeles Student Film Festival

Held October 8, 2011

Next deadline: TBA

Fee: $35-$45

Reason for this festival: Angeles Student Film Festival is a good festival for us because they are looking for documentary entries that “explore, not exploit”.  Our film also contains themes similar to those that Angeles typically programs.

Festival Rollout Schedule

Festival Budget

a producer looks back...

Budget for Doc

245

kickstarter.com

Finalized Shooting and Equipment Schedule

Shooting Schedule:

February 10 – Noon; B-Roll of workers, new additions (bus and office), graveyard and sets

February 17 – Midmorning; B-Roll of bus/ new additions

February 24 – Midmorning; Junkyard tour, B-Roll

March 9-18 – Midmorning; Film inside of Dales house, Junkyard pick-ups, B-roll

April 13 – Late afternoon; second junkyard tour and "less touchy" interview, the "Friday evening gathering" or the Holden Beach men

April 14 – Midmorning; formal/ sit-down/ "sticky" interview

April 20 – Time TBA; Final shoot/make-up/catch-up shoot.

**Note: the exact meeting time will be discussed on a weekly basis, however, we have a general time of day that we will be heading there each visit.

Equipment :

February 10,  -  T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat

February 17- T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat

February 24 - T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat

March 9-18 - T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat, Arri Fresnel Light Kits 

April 13 - AF100 (w matte box-for interviews), T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat, Arri Fresnel Light Kits

April 14 - AF100 (w matte box-for interviews), T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat, Arri Fresnel Light Kits

April 20 - T2i (w Follow Focus), Tripod (with baseplate), H4N, XLR Cable, Boom mic, Shotgun mic, Wireless Lav, Headphones, Lens Cleaner and Tissues, Highhat, Arri Fresnel Light Kits (depending on if we need more interview footage/house pick-ups)

Devotional Cinema Response

By Maryosha

Nathaniel Dorsky’s Devotional Cinema  is a very interesting book! I really loved his description of his first experience of seeing a film and how he felt after the theater.  The soda stains and popcorn pieces on the deco pattern carpet that your eye graze over as you leave the theater because your head is so full of emotion and shock after seeing a film in a pitch black theater that you cannot even hold it up, much less look others in the eyes.  That sense of quiet followed by the parking lot conversation of “so what did you think of the film” and a world that seems completely different after sitting in a theater are all feelings that we have all experienced, however, I personally have become so accustomed to them that I do not think about them in the way that Dorsky so beautifully describes. 

Another thing that Dorsky mentions that really stuck with me was a very simple face of matter that I had never even had the slightest of though about before.  In the section titled Intermittence he states, “On close examination, even our vision appears to be intermittent, which explains why, in film, pans ofter feel artificial or forced. This stems from the fact that one never pans in real life. In truth, when we turn our heads we don’t actually see a graceful continuum but a series of tiny jump cuts, little stills joined, perhaps, by infinitesimal dissolves” (pg. 30).  When reading this, and thinking about my own documentary that I am currently in the production stage, it makes me reconsider some of my own decisions. I do, however, think one or two nice pans that reveals space in a graceful way that calls attention to the technique and art within a shot is perfectly acceptable.  But if the pan is just a graceful or smooth “look” to the right or left of a character within a narrative then it is completely unrealistic and takes viewers out of the story.

Dorsky then continues the Intermittence section with montages which I have always found to be a little cheesy because I personally associate them with Hollywood dramas that have a scene of ‘making oneself better’ or ‘striving to accomplish the dream’ etc. But Dorsky brings up a really great point that when we look back on our lives, our day, or even that last task that was accomplished we remember it in a montage format. Look at the cliché “life flashing before your eyes” right before you die or have a close encounter, your entire life “flashes” before your eyes like a montage in a movie.

Overall, Devotional Cinema is a beautifully written poetic journey through film.  Nathaniel Dorsky has wonderful ideas and opinions on how to get the most out of films, making and viewing them. He concludes the book with a fabulous sentence, “the more film expresses itself in a manner intrinsic to its own true nature, the more it can reveal for us.” So I take away the overall mentality of stressing the importance of capturing the true essence of the story and sculpting my light in time. 

Gaby's Devotional Cinema Response

There are several ways I might apply the ideas that Dorsky spoke about in the book to inspire my own filmmaking, especially on the current documentary project. He stresses several times the importance of meaning and how to create new meanings in different ways, which I took to mean that one must not sacrifice meaning and emotion for the aesthetics of a film. Film has a way of moving people emotionally and is one of the reasons I found myself drawn to it in the first place. Documentary films allow you to tell stories that engage the audience and can even move them to action. As I would like to start my filmmaking career in social documentaries, I find this advice to be particularly useful. One has to be able to show the realities of your subject without alienating the audience and therefore evoke an emotional response within them. Dorsky mentions how some film has just become “mere wallpaper in support of spoken information” (29.) This can be readily applied to documentary filmmaking as many docs tend to only be informative without engaging the audience emotionally, and in turn tend to look as if they were news clips. Documentary films weren’t meant to be visual newspapers (with the exception of propaganda). Therefore, we should allow the film to take on a more poetic sense and find meaning through themes that would be explored in the film, without being constrained to them. To do that, I would use Dorsky’s idea of intermittence using techniques such as montage or moments where there is not much action or information. Though it is difficult for me to move away from wall-to-wall information, so I would need to be more selective in the information I want presented in my documentary that would be most effective and meaningful to allow for the moments of intermittence. This way, the audience doesn’t become too aware of the fact that they are watching a film with lots of information, causing an information overload for them and perhaps evoke a negative feeling towards the documentary as a result. Dorsky also explained how the use of the self-symbol could bring more meaning to the film without having the film explicitly state the meaning. In my current documentary project, we intend to use the juxtaposition of Dale’s life in prison and the constrictions of life in the junkyard.

Devotional Cinema by Nathaniel Dorsky

Response by Bethany Day

Reading this book was an enlightening experience.  A lot of what Dorsky talked about I had an idea of, or could relate to somehow, but he expertly articulated his thoughts and backed up his arguments with historical references. I like the structure of his book, and how he started out with the idea that “there was a concordance between film and our human metabolism… We are both appreciators and victims of material existence” (Dorsky, 17).  Dorsky makes a good point especially when he talks about film being a form of alchemy, a way to relieve repressed emotions and transform your way of thinking.  I thought it was especially interesting how he kept returning to historical references, including the reference to facts about Greek theories of medicine and how “it was taught that illness came from a dreamlike absorption, a state of imbalance” (Dorsky, 21).  I also thought it was interesting that in order to correct this imbalance, the sanctuary of Epidaurus was built in order for people to have “temple sleep” (long periods of relaxation) after performances.  This reference to the past is definitely applicable to the future and the effect films can have on their audiences.  I also found it enlightening that the author believes that in order to lay the foundation for devotion, the film must draw attention to the medium itself, it “must obey its own , materiality” (Dorsky, 23). 

I loved his continued references to different art forms throughout history.  His references made it easy to understand his argument about how people’s view of the world has become more objective over time.  I am glad he talked about imbalances, bringing up that a film needs to have an “awareness of the formal dignity of existence” (Dorsky, 26).  Single-mindedness is the other side of the imbalance.  These ideas made me think about myself as a filmmaker, and how I want to achieve a connection with my audience; allow them to see what I see and make them feel what I feel.  I want my audience to have a good experience.  One of my favorite lines is when he says that “concepts or spoken language are ornaments in the context of visual space” (Dorsky, 27).  It reiterates the fact that as a filmmaker you need to show the story visually, not just tell it through language and dialogue.  I agreed with his arguments about intermittence and how “allowing intermittence into a film activates the viewer’s mind” (Dorsky, 29).  I identified with relinquishing all control, and suddenly being enlightened by everything around you.  The world is ever-moving, ever-changing, and full of poetic images and language that one could only hope to translate or transform successfully through film.  The ideas presented by Dorsky in his book definitely made me look closer at myself as a filmmaker, and how I want to achieve the effects he mentioned.

Finalized Project Description

Stylistically, the film’s visual style will incorporate interviews that are shot using shallow focus with a tight frame around the subject’s face. In some instances, the composition will use the junkyard items to frame the shot. Static shots will be employed, using slow pans and tilts for revealing with a tripod to create fluid shots. The film will also incorporate experimental techniques such as playing with the use of light, and some animation interspersed within the film. Along with shooting digitally, our goal is to also use either 16mm film or Super 8 film, depending on the costs of the film and processing. If possible, the 16mm film will be hand processed in order to save on the cost of processing.

Visual themes to be used in the film will include one of man versus nature, juxtaposing scenes of Dale Varnam and the junkyard that he calls home. Narratively, the themes to be explored in the film will include the confinement of prison transitioning to the confinement of the junkyard. The question will be asked of how and when did Dale become a collector of eccentricities, along with where he fits within the community of Holden Beach and how his junkyard compares to other Junkyards within the Holden Beach area.

This film will be made to target an audience interested in art collections and the roadside attraction style, along with audiences who are interested in hometown celebrity personas with unique stories.

Funding for the film will be provided from investors from Kickstarter.com, along with the hopes of Southern Documentary Fund. The cost of the documentary without using film will amount to approximately $150 for gas and meals. If the documentary shoots partially on film, costs will be approximately $175.54 on 16mm and $160.92 on Super 8 for colored negatives and $15.32/ 100 ft for black & white (processing costs to be determined.)

The film will be distributed to multiple film festivals such as the Visions Film Fetival, Cucalorus Film Festival, River Run International Film Festival, Full Frame Film Festival, Athens International Film Festival, and many more!

Project Proposal

Our group plans to create a portrait piece on a man named Dale Varnam and his eccentric junkyard.  Located off of US-17 on the way to Holden Beach, Dale’s junkyard is full of stories.  Dale inherited the yard from his father and now runs it as his full-time job.  At first glance it becomes obvious that this is not your typical junkyard.  After fixing up old cars and other “junk” that Dale acquires, he then builds multiple life size scenes in front of the yard.  He adds zombie-like manikins to the sets to enhance the bizarreness as well as individual items that are completely out of place to reiterate the randomness of junkyards.  Dale goes as far as crafting cars to look like police cars but writes “Dales Crack Police” and “Crack Patrol” on them and stages a corrupt cop manikin in the driver’s seat with a hooker manikin on the passenger’s side.  As of now, if you round the corner to Dale’s, you will see a city bus with a giant crack rock on top of it, complete with a giant rolled up $20 bill.  These are just a few of the many scenes Dale sets up in the front of his junkyard, showcasing his creativity and sense of humor.  He does have regular junkyard items like broken down cars, bicycles, and old tires.  However, chickens and roosters are constantly roaming around all of them.  The chickens will makes nests and lay their eggs where ever they please around the yard, and sometimes Dale will go around and drawl faces on an egg here and there just to shock a random customer.  He is a character.

For our film, we want to tell Dale’s story in a visually creative way.  We want to venture into his past to reveal how he came to be where he is at, and how his previous life experiences helped to shape the person he is today.  We expect to encounter some ethical issues concerning the exposition of his past, and will have to make sure Dale is comfortable talking about past in interviews.  Stylistically, we would like to conduct interviews in tight, close-up shots. We also want to focus on him as a member of the Holden Beach community, and the compassion he shows towards his family, friends, and co-workers.  The film will look at the business side of Dale’s junkyard as well as we conduct interviews with employees.  Also, we might look at other local junkyards as comparisons to Dale’s.  We also want to try to incorporate aspects of Dale’s home which is located on the property.  Dale’s house is full of movie memorabilia, including Johnny Depp’s coffin from Sweeney Todd (allegedly) and props from Scarface which make up his dining room table’s center piece.  He even has a tropical themed room complete with an indoor hot tub.  Finally, emphasis will be placed on the junkyard itself, and how it is a direct reflection of Dale.  At this junkyard, every corner you turn you discover something new, and we are excited to learn more about Dale, from Dale, and share what we learn with you.