Day... 3?

Oh my goodness. I am so tired. However, this blog has become my mission. I am going to give whoever cares enough to read this a full report on the going ons here in PR.

Today courageously took my camera with me, and abandoned my fear of imposing at home.

I awoke at 7am to go with my aunt, soni, to the dock where there will be a kindling the romance scene between the leads. The actress will jump in the water, and so my aunt and I had to make sure the water was safe... "Y'know how actors are" says my aunt. so we jumped in, and the salty water satiated my need for coffee.

I also got this really nice picture of my auntie, the lead actress, and the director.


I don't know what to say about today. Honestly, it was quite slow! since we're getting finished up with costuming up the shooting locations, we just needed some final touches. Because of the lack of things to do, it took everybody 10 hours to do what they could have accomplished in two... Or maybe that was just me.

I bummed around a lot, sort of doing things that were mostly unnecessary. My one task for the day was to clean the bathroom in the schizo-apartment-location. Bathrooms are naturally disgusting, but this one... god... not only was it disgusting, but it was impossible to clean. Rust had made its home in the crevices of the tiles, and dirt had mingled with bacteria and god knows what to create a nice little paste of concrete muck.

Anyway, between my bursts of inspiration to clean that crap off the floor, I had long, long breaks. I even picked up a convenient cigarette habit that would give me an excuse to go outside. The apartment is so dark and dreary, and so the outside was much needed therapy.

This is a picture of the artists bedroom, which we decorated in typical schizo-ocd style. The real artists (the twins) were there when I got there, and were wearing the same clothes as when I ran into them at subway last night. They said they hadn't slept yet, and had been painting all night and finishing the collage which you see in the left portion of the room. That section is the fictional studio area.

The area was so dark that I couldn't get a picture of their art up close, but hopefully i'll find their stuff online or something so I can show you their amazing work.

In that dark and dreary house, I basically just mopped, talked, and walked around aimlessly. Then we ate lunch, drank wine, and went to the other set. I wasn't given any instruction, but decided to homey up the place, since in my mind, the character is living there and would therefore make it homey. Right? Well, I put a mosquito net shower curtain around the tub which is awkwardly in the middle of the space. It was blue, and emphasized the color scheme. Then, we were told to take down the tinting on all the windows, but not completely. so the production assistant and I (volunteer interns) started cutting shapes into the screens reminiscent of the mise-en-scene in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. I ended up getting really intricate with it, and made an abstract cat. I think I miss Luna, mi gato negra.

I was really proud of it, and was really tired by the time the Art Director came in and told me that it didn't fit the story. The mise-en-scene was not a romantic presentation of squatting in a warehouse. It was sposed to reflect the harsh realities... of squatting.

I think squatting is romantic, although I don't think it's actually possible, and if it were possible, and if it were as elaborate as the fictional one already was, then it would be cozy, since she'd probably be spending a lot of time there! It is human nature to home-ify and decorate your immediate surroundings! It is not a romantic idea!

Anyway, she told me that all the patterns had to come down. The asst.producer and I both agreed we would take down the cat and my other one of the dancing people last, as well as his symmetrical pattern ones. They were our favorite and we just couldn't take it upon ourselves to destroy our creation...

My aunt came and saw it and said "Wow! It looks awesome!" as did a few others. I bitched about how it had to come down. Everybody encouraged us to fight the power.

As we finished taking down our mediocre artwork, the director walked in with my aunt and, to our relief, liked what we had done. Hopefully it will get to stay. I will continue to fight the good fight :)

However, I for the first time today, felt the need for more power and independence in work. I felt jealous that the director got to decide what stays and doesn't. Although this film is very collaborative, the director still has the final say. I guess that's good because otherwise we won't get anything done and we'll just debate all day long, but in my idealistic world, there would be a communist film project in which everybody is director!