Things I've Learned...Fratto

Things I've Learned...
By Marc Fratto, Writer-Director of STRANGE THINGS HAPPEN AT SUNDOWN and LAST RITES OF THE DEAD
Put...that...coffee...down, now!
Here's a list of 16 things I learned while shooting Strange Things Happen At Sundown and Last Rites of the Dead.
1. THE IMPORTANCE OF STORYBOARDING
For my first film, I worked mainly with shotlists. My DP convinced me to work with storyboards instead for Last Rites of the Dead. It was a great learning experience for me, and I now will never do a film without storyboarding first.
Don't worry if you can't draw. I can't. I draw stick figures. But storyboarding really does two things. It helps you visualize the scenes as you work them out in your head. And it provides an easy to follow guide on the set, when setting up shots. It's much easier than fumbling around with the description of the shot on a shotlist. It's instantly visual and makes things easier on a chaotic set. And storyboard everything. Every shot in every scene.
2. USING TEMP MUSIC
Using music has helped me with the entire creative process, from pre-production to post. I would find something that embodies the feel of the movie. You I found that ambient new age is very helpful when doing horror. For my first movie (Strange Things Happen At Sundown), I used Peter Gabriel 's Last Temptation of Christ soundtrack, as well as some Dead Can Dance cd's. For Last Rites of the Dead, I used some ambient new age by Robert Rich, and some Classical (J.S. Bach, which we recreated for the soundtrack) as well.
I would play this music while writing the script, fleshing out the scenes, shotlisting and storyboarding and again while editing, using the same music as a temp score. It is really helpful in getting the creative juices flowing.
3. ENVISIONING THE ENTIRE FILM IN MY HEAD FROM BEGINNING TO END
This is something I did after i wrote my second film. On Strange Things, I always had a rough idea of what the movie would be like, but so much of it was improvised both on the set, and in the edit room because I never really took the time to sit down for a few hours and just picture the film from beginning to end in my head. As a result, the pacing was off, the films first half was slow and choppy and many scenes are in need of trimming.
However, with Last Rites, I did this dozens of times in the space between finishing a script and actually shooting the film. I run through the entire film in my head, shot by shot. See how it feels. Does it lag? Is the middle slow? Does it build up to the action scenes right? Is the ending going to be exciting? Do i have all my shots planned out right or is there something I'm going to need? Are the hero and villian developed right or do they need more scenes to get their story across.
As a result, Last Rites was a better film, tighter, sharper, and much much easier to put together in the edit room.
4. AUDITIONING THE SHIT OUT OF ACTORS
I learned after my first short, that good actors who can do exactly what you need them to do will make the shoot go faster and easier. Which is always valuable on a low-budget production. John Carpenter once said "Hire the right actors and 90% of your work as a director is done." No truer words have ever been spoken about filmmaking.
For auditions, I originally condensed the hardest parts of the script into a 4 or 5 page script for them to read. Heavy emoting, screaming, crying, all of this was in the audition. Subtle things are in there, as well. Besides finding good leads, it also gave me a good idea of who can do what when hiring for minor roles as well. Many actors told me that our auditions were the hardest they've ever had. But it paid off. One of the things my films have been noted for is the above-average performances of the actors.
5. NEVER HIRE FRIENDS, ONLY ACTORS
Because Actors treat this like a job. On my first film, I hired a guy to play a role that required only a day of shooting, and he was a friend of mine who had never done any acting. The role wasn't tough but it required him to be there all day. A week before the shoot, he called me to tell me he couldn't do it. He said that he and his girlfriend were going to Six Flags Great Adventure the day before, and thought they would be too exhausted.
Professional actors don't do that. (at least the professional ones.) Most of them show up on time, they are grateful to be there and they don't act like they're doing you a favor. And they make time in their schedule for additional shoots. Something friends are harder pressed to do.
6. ALWAYS ACCOUNT FOR NO-SHOWS WHEN CASTING EXTRAS
Something I learned on my first film. That when hiring extras and minor one-day only roles, there will be no-shows. It always helps minimize the no-shows when you are picking up the actors, but you'll still get a few. If I plan a shoot that requires 10 actors, i'll hire more so I'm not put in a jam. If I'm picking up the actors, I'll usually plan on 1 or 2 no shows. If the actors are meeting us as a central location, or transporting themselves, then I plan on 3 no-shows. If the actors are not actors, but models or dancers, then I plan on half of them not showing up.
And I always keep every no-show in a folder, so I don't hire them again. Ultimately, when I get an office, I plan on creating a "wall of shame" of actors and actresses who no-showed to our shoots.
7. WATCH BAD MOVIES
In film school, all they show you are the good films. I think you can learn a great deal from watching stinkers, and especially from watching mediocre films.
I found that a fimmaker can learn two things from watching movies that failed, especially if they are in the same genre of the movie he's doing. First, he can analyze where the movie went wrong, and how not to make the same mistakes. And secondly, he can get ideas from them, by simply thinking about all the cool things the SHOULD have done, but didn't. I've had many an idea spring out of talking about some peice of shit movie.
The first time I really realized how helpful this could be was while shooting Strange Things Happen At Sundown, and I was weeks away from shooting a scene where we get a look inside a vampire hangout. The description in the script was brief, without any real detail, so anything was up for grabs. I had gone to see Blade 2 one night, and after the film, I had this conversation with some friends:
"They totally blew that whole scene in the vampire club. They built up how scary the vampire club was going to be, and then they get in there, and all it was, was a people dancing and somebody getting a tattoo. How fucking lame! They should have shown people getting tortured, and blood being drained out of victims, people being operated on, and screaming!... hey wait a minute. That's a great fucking idea!"
And thus, I went home and put together that scene.
8. GET LOTS OF COVERAGE
On Strange Things, which required a great deal fixing in the editing room, I learned the value of getting lots and lots of coverage. This is a common mistake for first time filmmakers, especially ones who think that their movie is going to look exactly the way they see it in their heads. But then they get into the editing room, and find that a shot is fucked up, maybe theres a continuity problem with the actors position, maybe a scene just doesn't work, or it throws off the pacing of the movie and needs to be trimmed.
I planned for a scene in my first film to be shot in one long continuous take, so I didn't bother getting any additional footage. It was an easy shot. Just a wide shot of three actors in a hotel room. And on the set, the scene felt like magic. But in the editing room, when the scene was put into place, it seemed to slow things down. I knew it had to be trimmed, but I had nothing to cut away with. I wished I had done a couple of insert shots to cut away to, so that I could trim down the scene, but I had nothing.
9. TAKE LOTS OF PICTURES FOR CONTINUITY
Something I took away from my Last Rites shoot. Take pictures of the set, the placement of the props, of every single makeup job, of every ones wardrobe. It will make it so much easier to preserve the films continuity. Another thing. Take pictures of things like blood-splatters so that if you need to re-splatter the set or the actor, it will match.
10. NEVER SHOOT BLOOD SPLATTERING SCENES OUT OF ORDER
I had a few scenes on Last Rites, where an actor was shot or stabbed, and spent a few more scenes with the blood still on them. We had to shoot the later scenes first because of scheduling problems, and had to guess how the blood would flow. So we doused the wardrobe with blood and shot the scene. Then when we had to shoot the prior scene when they are first shot, the blood would never run the same way.
11. EDIT AS I SHOOT
Even if it's just a very rough edit. Of course, this is only possible if you have one of two things. Either an editor working off-site, or if you are shooting the movie the way many low budget filmmakers do; on weekends. But if editing your movie while its being shot is a possibility, then do it.
This is something that i started doing halfway through my first film, and it helped me a great deal in better plan out the shoots. I could see what mistakes were being made and how to avoid them. But more importantly, it becomes a very valuable asset on a low budget production. This way you can re-shoot things if necessary during the production phase (while your locations and actors are still readily available to do so).
12. PLAN ON DOING RE-SHOOTS
I remember talking to a filmmaker who was getting ready to do his first film, and I had already shot Strange Things at this point. We started talking about reshoots and he said "Oh, I don't do re-shoots. I never leave without getting everything I need." I said to him, "Don't worry, you'll do re-shoots. Trust me", explaining to him that doing a college short and a full length feature are two entirely different things, and that full length features come with a whole set of issues that arise in the edit room. Some of these issues are so strong, that the only way to fix them is to either mutilate the scene, or re-shoot, even if its only a few shots. (He has since changed his views about not doing re-shoots, now that his film is in post production.)
If you're editing your film as it's being filmed (one of the perks to shooting a movie on weekends) then it makes it easy to tell if your going to need to do pick up shots while production is going on. If you're shooting in one long block, and then editing after principal photography wraps, it's not so easy. But either way, always plan on this.
Sometimes you need to do reshoots just to save a scene. Sometimes you need to do it to save the whole movie.
If you lose the location, then plan on faking it in a new location. You can use a long lens and shoot closeups by zooming in from a distance. This will blur out the background (as well as narrow the background in the frame) and make it easier to fake a new location for an old one. In Last Rites of the Dead, we added about 15 or so pickup shots (all closeups) of various things. In some cases they were little things, like a hand grabbing a knife, or a closeup of a needle going into some ones head. In one case, it was a fairly elaborate shot of a rope being rubbed against a nail. These were all shots that we either didn't get on the set, or shots that had to be added in later to fix some continuity problems. All of these were shot in either my living room, or the producers kitchen. We used our producers hands and feet as stand-ins for the actors hands and feet. Everything was shot with long lenses in extreme closeup. And everything was lit just like it was on the set.
The shots are completely fluid. You cannot tell in any way that these shots were done on a different location.
If you lose an actor, that requires a little more creativity. a very large chunk of the film Evil Dead was shot in Sam Raimi's fathers garage using his friends in wigs to stand in for the actors who they had lost after their 3 month contract was up. (This was mentioned in Bruce Campbells book, "If Chins Could Kill").
Most important thing about doing re-shoots is that it keeps your film from looking sloppily stitched together in the edit room. Often, you can tell when a scene had to be saved by an editor, because it still looks messy and unfinished.
13. DONT SHY AWAY FROM A.D.R.
Additional Dialogue Recording can be your best friend. It will save your movie from sounding like shit, and enable you to shoot scenes on noisy locations without leading to you having a nervous breakdown. And also, the absense of a boom mic can help you be discreet if you're shooting in public without permits.
In Strange Things, we shot a scene where a character is on a payphone on a busy intersection. Of course, we had no permits, and also the intersection was so ripe with traffic that it would have been virtually impossible to get good audio. At the time, we never really considered doing ADR for an entire scene, but we had no choice in this case. So we shot the scene with the camera mic, and then had the actor recreate the audio in the studio, using the camera mic audio as a guide. It's easier than you think and no one can tell the difference.
Just make sure, as director, that you are there, and helping the actor during the ADR sessions. Don't just leave it to the sound guy to do. (You would think this would be obvious, but not in the microbudget world). Some actors are going to need your help.
I learned that some actors can mimic their voice to a tee. Others have a hard time getting the same feeling and inflection. The director will sometimes have to find all sort of tricks to get the actor to put in a good "performance" in the ADR room. (I've done things like shake or pull actors while they're re-doing their lines for a struggle sequence). It can take twenty minutes or be an all day experience, but in the end, it's always worth it.
And also, while they are there, (and if your movie has action scenes), have them do a few minutes worth of grunts, groans, screams, and moans. You'll always need that stuff to punch up fight/action scenes.
14. BE CREATIVE IN THE EDITING ROOM
Most of what I learned about post production, I learned editing my first movie. Especially because that film was a mess, and I had to get real creative trying to save it. I learned how intercutting could save a bunch of scenes that weren't working on their own.
I also learned never to get attached to a scene, or feel guilty about having to leave somebody's performance on the cutting room floor. There was a lot in Strange Things that should have been left on the cutting room floor, but I felt guilty about cutting the actors, after they had all tried so hard. I got over that one pretty easy.
Last Rites was relatively easy to edit by comparison. There were about 5 scenes that got cut, and it was done with no guilt (having learned my lesson well). I also cut out shots that took us forever to set up, without thinking twice. No matter how painful something is to cut, if the film is better without it, then it's better and it needs to go.
But even in Last Rites, where I had a more solid idea of what the film would look like going in, I still found myself having to jumble things around to pace the film better.
Now you may think this will never happen to you. That your vision is so rock solid, and that the script is so strong as is, that it's going to be brilliant as long as its filmed the way it's written.
But did you ever watch Taxi Driver, and notice how Robert Deniro's hair length changes repeatedly in the middle of the film from shaggy to buzz cut and back to shaggy again? It does this about 5 times. That's because there was a point in the script where Deniro's character close crops his hair. (if you download the original script, the reference to his buzz cut is in there.) However, when they put the movie together, something was obviously not working. Maybe the pacing was off, maybe too many scenes in a row inside his apartment. Regardless, the only solution was to chop up the middle of the movie and switch the scenes around. The film worked better, even if the continuity of his hair length was now off.
My point is, if the great Martin Scorcese had to fix his film in the edit room, chances are you will as well.
15. PLAN ON TAKING THE MOVIE BACK INTO THE EDIT ROOM, EVEN AFTER THE PREMIERE AND THE EARLY REVIEWS
After Kubricks 2001:A Space Oddysey premiere, Kubrick cut another 20 minutes from the film. Sometimes the film seems perfect in the edit room, and then you watch it with an audience, and it gives you a whole new way of looking at it. You can really sense where the film lags, and what's not working when there is an audience of antsy people around you.
Talk to people, get opinions and read the early reviews. (Reviewers are far more honest about your movie than your friends or actors). I didn't do this with my first film, and wish that I had. However I did do it with Last Rites, after finding, amongst the generally favorable reviews, the same criticisms over and over again. (Mainly an awkward third act and some performance issues with two of the supporting actors). I talked to a few reviewers that I knew well, and got some detailed opinions from them on what I could do to make it better. Then, I took the film back into the edit room and cut it down by 13 minutes. The second cut was a thousand times better, and the film was faster, sharper, the performances were more streamlined.
16. FORCING MYSELF TO CUT THE FILM DOWN
I would love to teach a film school course where I tell students to make a 10 minute short, and then force them to cut it down by 2 minutes. You'd be amazed at how creative you can be when you don't actually want to cut out anything substantial.
This is something I learned on Last Rites. On Strange Things, I was somewhat of an inexperienced editor, and didn't slice out nearly as much as I should have. I left the film at a nearly impossible length for a microbudget film, and parts of the film (particularly the first hour) seems to drag on.
However, on Last Rites, I was determined not to make the same mistake. After finishing my first cut, I decided that the film needed to be trimmed by at least ten minutes. There was no scene that needed to go, but the pacing of the entire film needed to be faster. So, I did this without actually taking out any scene, but making across the board trims. I quickened up the pacing on all of the scenes. Shorter beats between lines, shorter transitions in and out of scenes, cutting a lot of unnecessary dialogue and making the scenes quicker and punchier. Then I focused on anything that slightly bothered me, maybe lines that I didn't like the way they were read; a scene or shot that seemed pointless or an action that seemed silly. After it was done, the film not only felt better and was quicker paced, but the pauses, beats, and slow transitions that I did leave in had much more impact.
For more information on Marc Fratto, Insane-o-rama Productions and their films, go to www.insane-o-rama.com