It's a wrap! almost. Let's party!

I was a little nervous going to the wrap party. I didn't know what to expect, whether or not I was going to be under dressed. My first night in puerto rico i had gone to a party dressed in a t-shirt and jeans and turned up completely under dressed, and I didn't want to repeat that experience.

Rafi had said he wanted people to wear white. It wasn't a dress code, but I wanted to comply with it any way. I liked the idea that the crew would be dressed in the color of purity, after a collective exorcism. When I got there, everybody was dressed so beautifully. It seemed a little bit like a cult, and when I mentioned it, Rafi was like "yes! The cult of MIENTE!" It could definitely be a cult. There's a brotherhood, we're a family, it's a little incestuous, very spiritual in a new wavey style, and there's a definite hierarchy. I think we could definitely qualify as a cult.

It was funny to see everybody dressed up, not in their work clothes. some people set themselves apart from work by dressing nicely, and some people incorporated their work clothes into white-wear. The funny thing is that since it was such short notice that we should wear white, not everybody could comply. But the ladies who didn't wear white wore blue (like Paola) and the men who didn't wear white wore brown (like Henry.) We mingled, drank, ate, and were merry until the early hours.

Earlier that day I had put my pictures on a cd at the request of my aunt, and now they were going to be projected for everybody to see. I handed the cd over, and while it was being prepared into a slide show, I became very very nervous. All of a sudden I felt like I was exposing myself to the crew, showing them what I do behind my lens when I go into my dark little corner and stop interacting with people. The camera had been to me like what sunglasses are to Elton John. A strange coping mechanism and an inanimate object turned friend that helps you get through awkward, scary, boring times. Having a camera is like dancing around in your underwear late at night, when nobody is watching. Looking at people through a lens is an extremely intimate yet simultaneously voyeuristic moment. Its kind of my secret:

I'm looking at you.

Now it was being projected to all the people that I had been watching for this past month, to all the people I had briefly fallen in love with while looking at them through my lens. I didn't even have to do anything, though. I didn't have to prepare, warm up, breathe, drink water, go to the bathroom, jog, stretch... I just had to hand over the cd. My work was already done, every night at the end of the day when I would edit the pictures and decide which ones I liked.

I was excited, too, though. Laura and sonnel were there, as well as a bunch of other photographers and artists. What a perfect opportunity to get criticized or propped. The reception was really encouraging. People Aww'd and Wow'd in intended places, and some came up to me and were like "I always saw you taking pictures, but I had no idea that they were good!" and most of all, Laura Magrudel, the still photographer for Miente, told me I had a good eye and that meant a lot to me.

miente. MiEnTe! MIENTE!!!!

It's been a while since I last blogged. so much happens every day, and at the end of the day my thoughts are all a jumble and I don't really know what to write.

We spent 3 or 4 days in Henry's apartment (the days merge together in my memory when staying at one set). I realized we were nearing the end. We filmed Henry having a frantic episode. His world is falling apart and he is beginning to realize Diff isn't real. He's desperately trying to hold on to Diff, but he's not appearing any more. Paola comforts him. His mother confronts him about not taking his medication. Paola meets the mother and there is a moment in which these two women connect, and the mother realizes that Paola is going to take care of her little baby now.

At 5am we filmed a scene of the sun rising on the roof. It is the final scene and it is beautiful, although i won't upload pictures because I don't want to ruin the ending for you.

We spent our time on the set doing interviews. I became more incorporated into the Making-Of crew and held the boom mic. We interviewed the script writer who is from Chile and is incredibly animated when he speaks. I'm not sure what he was saying, but it was very fun watching him talk. Later on he saw the footage with the composer and they were both very impressed. The composer couldn't wait to make the music for Miente.

The highlight of the three days at Henry's was hanging out with Mariana. since Estefania has the key to the actors apartment/trailer replacement, we were always walking her back and forth. We hung out with her in her apartment and had a bunch of girl talk sessions. We talked about what its like to have kids, different styles of acting, what film festivals matter, politics, Cubans, Obama, Hillary, and a lot of other stuff that five minutes later I couldn't remember because we were so busy talking that I couldn't convert our conversations from short term memory into my long term memory! It's such a shame that this happens.

Nevertheless I gained an understanding of the psychology of acting, which was really interesting. For example, Paola enters Henry's life through his heart while Diff enters Henry's life through his head. Paola necessitates a sensual and emotional style of acting, while Diff, although focused, is less emotion and more physical. This creates a difference between how the actors adjust from In-Character to Off-Character. Frank is more likely to make the switch from Diff to Frank easier. Mariana has been in character for an entire month, though, even on her days off.

To top it off, Paola looks so different from Mariana, wearing more make up, being skinnier, dressing more elaborately, etc. Now that Paola's term is coming to an end, how will Mariana become Mariana again? Well she had to start by cutting her blue hair and dying it back to black (Amy Winehouse style.)

Anyway, the last big day of filming was yesterday. We went to an abandoned building covered in graffiti. It was beautifully urban, in exactly the fairytale style that one would imagine. We filmed the scene where Henry and Diff meet (which happens to be Diff saving Henry from being carjacked in a sketchy alley.) We also shot scenes of Henry freaking out looking for Diff because he begins to realize Diff isnt' real.

The scene was. so. strong. I had another one of those moments in which I stood by the monitors clapping silently, really excited, amazed, and completely trippin' to the scene:

Before the scene started, Henry was bouncing and hopping around like a boxer. He was going to be running in the scene, and he was working himself up.

I thought to myself jeez, that is a little silly. Does he really have to be bouncing around like a boxer? That's a little over the top... it's just acting!

Rafi yells action, and Henry runs into the spotlight, graffiti lit up in yellow Tungsten lights replicating street lights. "DIFF? DIIIIFFFF!" He pants, distressed, freaked out, in the midst of the realization that he's slightly crazy. "DIIIIFFF!"

Behind him, you see graffiti of a black angel, below is LIE, which the prop master Bryant and graffiti'd earlier that day. But in my trip watching the monitors i became conscious of another "lie" written subliminally and accidentally on the lower left hand of the screen. It wasn't on purpose, but it appeared. That accident really excited me, and elevated my respect for this movie by a hundred times. It's genuinely turning into a crazy movie.
By the way, the guy who did the PHET! graffiti happened to show up on set right when we arrived. When we needed to cover some panels, we utilized his help to do some work for us. He worked really quickly, and made some pretty cool stuff. He's a regular visitor of this abandoned building, and we noticed that he had covered every single wall. In particular, he covered every prominent wall which we were filming! We tried to do an interview with him, as a funny little cameo, but the making-of camera had to be used on set, and since we went overtime by two hours ($4000) due to Oscar being sick and needing a doctor, we couldn't keep the light on after shooting was finished to do the interviews. We then came up with the idea that my pictures should be included in the making-of footage to get in clips which the video couldn't capture!
Like this one, which the video camera couldn't capture because not enough lighting was available. This is Bryant, the prop master, making the guitar more breakable. We thought we only had one take to smash the guitar, but on the first take, Diff didn't smash it very hard. It was more like a tap, and it broke a little bit. It wasn't dramatic enough. so when we did it again, he really went for it, and sMAsH!!!!

It was brilliant, and we all got really excited. Clapping, whooping... the whole shbang.

Wakeful dreaming and Nightmare sequences

We've had some very exciting days lately. We went back to the Hollywood video rental club to shoot a scene of when Paola comes back to return the rentals and henry sees her blue hair. Diff is also in the store, and later on there is a brilliant scene in which henry is doodling a picture of paola, spills some carbonated beverage on it, and smears the blue green colors and then vamos en un viaje as the sparkling water dilutes the colors.

The twins were at the video club earlier that day, adding colors to 70 photocopies of the pictures of paola. They were very stressed out as they frantically prepared all the copies. They needed so many because they didn't know how many takes they would need. But honestly? 70? It ended up taking 3 or 4 takes to get not only henry to spill it naturally (it was really funny when oscar made it look really purposeful that he spilled the drink...) but also to make it spill beautifully so that you really go on a trip when the colors spread magically throughout the paper.

Rafi, the director, was outside directing through a walkie-talkie, and since we were only recording the image and not the sound, he started narrating a very sexual experience tha thenry should have with the image that he was playing with once the drink spilled over it. The camera man, sonnel, started making comments about how sexy it all was, and it was very, very hard for oscar to not laugh. Everybody else was laughing, but impressively, he only smiled a little bit... enough to make it look like he was really enjoying himself. i think the making-of crew got it on tape, so hopefully we'll get to see a repeat of that.

The film crew was also compiling films that they had all worked on together which they found on the shelves of Hollywood Video. some of them looked really crappy, and they told me that they were really crappy. But some of them apparently turned out quite well. One of them was bad boys two! :P

The next day we went to the fortress! if you have been READING (and not commenting to reinforce me) then you know that last time when we were at old san juan doing the Bar scene, my battery died and i couldn't get a brilliant picture of El Morro. Well, this time we went to san cristobal, which is not El Morro, but just as beautiful. I got a few good pictures, which I shall post on flickr. We were there to film the nightmare scene.

A make-up specialist came in to work on the faces of Jane and Paola who were to look like the walls of the fortress. Rocky, moldy, deathly, etc. Using latex and other materials, he created the illusion that their faces were peeling off. Very, very impressed. Apparently he had worked at some drag shows doing the make-up for performers, and even performing himself! He had worked on Isla films previous production, Manuela y Manuel, which was about a guy who always felt like inside he was Manuela and not Manuel, but then marries his best friend who got pregnant during a one night stand and now needs to face her family. Checkiado! (i'm learning some genuine spanglish here.)

We filmed Paola running down the halls in a white frilly dress, screaming and being frantic, and then a shadow of her ex husband with a huge knife, trying to kill her, but being a shadow, he couldn't really permeate the barrier that exists between represented and representation: human and human's shadow.

sadly, at the time when they were filming that, I was cutting long red strips of fabric, and so I didn't get any pictures of the shadow play, although I sneaked a peak for myself. After that we filmed Jane being murdered by the ex husband of Paola! Very abstractly, Jane was dancing on a pedestal, and samuel comes and stabs her with the knife, pulls out a red satin sheet from her stomach. At first it's agony, but Maine (who plays Jane) said to Rafi before the shoot

"I think Jane enjoys the death. At first it hurts a little, but she's such a free spirit and she's lived such a full life, she's okay with it, and it becomes like a sexual ecstatic feeling, sorta like 'que buenooo!'"

Maine was amazing. The control she has over her body was really impressive. I guess she is a dancer and performer for a living, and that's what she do, but damn girl. Anyway, enough colloquialism.

The art department showed some real teamness when setting up the flashback sequence.



We created two versions of the same room. One nightmare version, and one erotic bohemian version.

Apparently Henry and Paola are hanging out when they fall asleep to enter this nightmare sequence. I think all of this is henry's nightmare. In our fictional, non-dream world, Paola has jane's guitar, doesn't want henry to play it, henry asks why she keeps it around, and paola says she doesn't want to forget Jane. Henry asks to hear about this jane character. When he falls asleep he walks over to the bed, pulls the sheets off, and finds jane and paola canoodling under a see-through sheet. they pull him in, and then he is trapped! oh noo, he can't get out of the see through sheet! very dramatic, very dream-like.

He runs naked down the hallway. and his mouth is also sewed shut.
He got so dizzy doing the scene where he had to look like this. breathing was hard, he couldn't talk. he had to breathe really hard because he was scared in the dream, and breathing hard and fast for a few takes made him hyperventilate. Another trooper moment :P


I'm not sure what else there is to tell you. I've had today and yesterday off and I have been chillaxing on the beach. I did a body drag on my cousins kite board today, and played ukulele on the 15th floor of a beach side condo. And I had pizza. Grreeat. I get up in 7 hours to... i can't remember to do what, but my first challenge is getting up at 7am.

We only have 7 more days of shooting. It's going by really quickly. I can't wait to be home, though, even though i wouldn't mind my new home being Puerto Rico.

Here is my picture of the day. Angel, our scenic painter, was goofing off and I took a picture. He complained about people with camera's and how you have to be careful around them, and for that reason I am posting him on the blog to broadcast his goofy moment to the world.

Oasis del Diablo

Between the natural humidity and heat of the Caribbean, and the artificially induced heat of the set lighting, I don't know which one was more painful. We arrived at El Batey, a local bar in the tourist area of old san juan, and began to set up. The original "El Batey" sign was covered with a sign that our scenic painter had made, which you can see above, stands for Oasis del Diablo.

The walls inside were covered in graffiti in the highest of places. Whether it was decoration made by the owner of the bar, or drunk and determined bar goers, there was graffiti 15 feet above the floor as well as on the ceiling, which is impossible to reach without a utility ladder. Lighting the bar took forever, and everybody worked in a crammed space at a hurried pace. They hammered and screwed beams on to the ceiling so lights could be attached to them. My job was to graffiti those beams to make them blend in to the graffiti'd walls. When Angel, the scenic painter, handed me four sharpies, I couldn't have been happier with my job! I wrote little paragraphs of nonsense, political quips and attempted subliminal messages.

After the lighting was set up, the extras rolled in, wearing punk/goth clothes and looking quite hellish. The twins made a cameo appearance as well, and although their initial outfits didn't look very hellish in comparison to the extras (who i am sure dress hellish on a regular basis, as their hairstyles were immutably punkified) the twins ended up looking hellish enough when put in the setting of the bar.

It all looked very amazing, and very hot, and all the actors/extras were sweating and glowing in the red lights.


The scene we were filming today goes as following. Henry and Diff speak in spanish for the purpose that I do not understand exactly what is going on (enigma makes art), then they walk out of the single stall bathroom together, still stubbornly speaking spanish. Then Henry goes to the bar and orders a whiskey, and receives what he thinks is rum. He yells at the waitress to give him his whiskey, and the waitress, whose costume is magnificent (and includes a marilyn manson style contact lens with the black dot) yells back at him because she gave him whiskey and will not be talked to in this manner, and then begins to serve somebody else. All of a sudden, WOAH Henry reaches over the bar, takes his cigarette from the ash tray, and burns her in the hand.

Bryan, the prop master, had worked hard at making a fake cigarette. The result was so good, that in confusion, Henry took the real cigarette, and burned the actress for real! The genuine reaction to being burned was validated through the actresses ability to stay in character and continue the scene. But her poor little hand had a real cigarette burn on it :(

We finished at around 11pm, with some shots of Henry and Diff screeching their tires as they speed off, and the waitress comes running out, yelling and screaming, and being very, very cool.



since our location was right in the middle of the tourist area, I got to do some sight seeing! It looks like I won't even have to have days off, since working is showing me more of Puerto Rico than actual vacation would be (as i'd probably just sit on a beach.)

Estefania and I were sitting at base camp, fighting the heat and guarding the food against bums and tourists (silly tourists think that puerto rico put up a tent and catering for the tourists... who do they think they are?) and it came across in conversation that the totem that the illustrators uncle made was right around the corner. I had heard of this totem, which is a landmark for puerto rico, marking 500 years of history. I decided to take a break from guarding duties, and went for a walk. The totem is earth toned, and represents the layers of stratosphere (is that the right geological term? I don't quite feel like opening a new window and googling it...) in which puerto rican history is buried.

Once, when javier (one of the twins, whose uncle made the totem) was around the totem, a gringo tourist started climbing the totem, breaking pieces off along the way. Javier started chucking the broken pieces at the climbing gringo, his friends saying "no, no! you'll kill him if he falls!" but javier was mad, because there's this dude climbing his uncles sculpture. Eventually the cops come, and the guy comes down the totem, and as he's being escorted into the cop car, javier jumps through the crowd and bitch slaps the offender, and then disappears into the crowd.

The offender was kicked out of school due to all the bad press, and also met Jaime suarez, the artist, to talk to him about helping to restore the pieces he broke. Unbelievable to the rising twin artist, the established uncle artist is unaffected and even jovial about the event. His reply:

"I haven't gotten this much press in years!"

Below the totem, a fountain entertains children, while the children entertain tourists by posing for pictures. The kids thanked me voraciously after I took this one.

I continued walking towards the fortress "el morro", which is a cliche tourist area. so cliche, in fact, that a commercial has been made where the punch line is "Dondey estah el morro?"

as you can see, the sun is almost set and its moments before the sky will turn a beautiful purple. I have a long way to get close enough to the fortress to take my masterpiece picture, and i'm rushing to catch the perfect lighting. However, I get distracted by the view:



and as I try for another picture of this same graveyard, which would include a larger view of the ocean and maybe a backdrop of the fortress and the setting sun, but then, my nightmare comes true:

I AM INEPT AT CHARGING MY BATTERY

and my battery died.

Oh well! At least we're filming inside the fortress for a nightmare/flashback scene! stay tuned.

action!

I was too exhausted to write yesterday, so todays post will be about two days.

First, we went to the director's (Rafi's) moms house. she lives there with her second husband who is an architect, in a beautiful house. In the story, it's the house belonging to the guy who was an a*hole on the first day of shooting, in the video store where Henry, the artist, works.

Henry and Diff follow a car into the gated community. I thought maybe that was unrealistic, and asked the prop master if that wasn't unrealistic, and he said it's common for people to do that in Puerto Rico a lot and it's not that suspicious. Hopefully viewers in other countries won't think that it's unrealistic.

shooting was difficult because not only did it rain and for continuity we had to pat the car dry without cleaning it, but we were also shooting a violent scene in Rafi's mom's house. Diff and Henry creep down the stairs by the pool, and break in to the office. They filled a hallway and the office with mist so that the flash lights that they were carrying would look more dramatic. Diff toughens henry up, and they do their thing, find money, and head out. Then the daughter, who looks about 14 years old because of her height, but is actually 17, screams "Daddy! Daddy!" and then Diff elbows her in the face.

Rafi's mom was not only trying to keep her house in order, which is understandable, as you have a huge careless crew in your house, but she began to feel negatively towards the scene that was being filmed. Rafi didn't want to put his mother through that, and so we cut the close-up shot of the girls glass of milk breaking on the floor. We also didn't shoot the girl more than twice.

I understand this resistance completely. It can be emotionally draining to film certain scenes, perhaps bringing back bad memories, or maybe just filling your house with bad vibes. After the dramatic shoot was over, we burned incense to clear it out.

For many reasons that day, I wasn't very inspired to work. Usually, following my coworkers around on set isn't awkward and i can make it seem like I'm just going along with them. But with the architecture of the house being kind of convoluted, and my coworkers being very erratic, following them around made me feel like a lost puppy. so I stopped, and talked with Jane and Estefania for most of the time, until it became evident that we were cleaning up the house, at which point I began to help.

Next day: The next scene we shot was in the parking lot. Revenge is taken on the ex husband who violated Paola's space, and possibly her body but i'm not sure about that, as it was a super closed set that day.


Two stunt doubles came in and taught Henry and the ex (samuel) how to punch and be punched, kicked and be kicked. It was a very physical day, and oscar was a real champ. This seemed like his niche. His physicality was very becoming of him. I was given the mission of finding something to make his throat feel better, as it was getting soar. I found him some warm milk and a lemon. Then later on he dealt with having a sprained ankle, and ran well despite it. Trooper man.

Henry hides out and waits for samuel to come out of the elevator, and walk down the parking lot ramp, at which point he jumps out, punches him in the stomach, and proceeds to beat the crap out of him. Diff helps a little bit, but it's mainly Henry, being egged on by Diff. This is bloody samuel, smiling with Frances, one of the producers, after he's done with his scenes.

I only watched for a little bit, and it was exciting and painful looking at first, but it didn't require much acting. It was more like dancing the same moves over and over, and so it got quite boring and so after I finished painting a white wall green/grey, I went up to base camp and read a few pages of Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.

They kept moving the set around, but back and forth! It didn't make any sense. They started at the bottom of the set, and then rehearsed a scene, then they moved to the top of the ramp and filmed a scene. Then they moved to the bottom of the ramp again, and filmed that initially rehearsed scene. Then they moved to the middle of the ramp, and filmed Henry punching samuel in the face, and blood spraying all over the camera lens (a glass covered it, of course.) Then we moved back to the top of the ramp and filmed them running away from flashing lights representing a security guard. Then we went back to the bottom of the ramp and filmed them running away from the security guard. Then we went back to the top of the ramp to film them arguing in the staircase as the security guard calls for back up and tends to samuel.

Why all the moving around? I don't know. Estefania seems to think it's to keep the crew busy and make them feel useful.

In the midst of all of that, though, something very funny happened which I may call the highlight of my day.

We were shooting the scene at the bottom of the ramp. Diff and Henry were to finish kicking samuels ass with a final kick in the face. The security guard is to come driving in with her golf cart and her orange beacon of safety and security. she rushes to the helpless man, calls for back up, and begins to tend to him.

How this played out, though, was priceless. First take: Henry pushes samuel to the floor, kicks him in the face. The security guard makes her presence known and Henry and Diff run away. The security guard hops out of her car, smiling and excited, looks at the cameras and runs to the victim.

I was watching all this unfold with Jane, who looks at me and breaks out into song:

"He's dead, he's dead, he's very very dead! The bad guys went and hit his head. He's dead, he's dead, he's dead! Oh, goodness look at all the blood he's shed! He's dead, he's dead, he's dead!"

she did a little musical jig.

kindling the love

We shot on two locations from 7am to 7pm. The first location was shot underneath a bridge, which looked magnificent on camera, but not so much in real life.

Clint Mansell's Requiem for a Dream soundtrack describes in music and by association what the underside of the bridge looked like. Needles and broken bottles littered the floor, and I a little time cleaning up a bit per request until my paranoia of contracting aids made me stop and hope for the best for everybody who had to walk on the glass and needle warzone.

We filmed scenes of Paola and Henry being all romantic and sexual under the bridge. Henry brought her to this drug den to show her how visually stunning it is, because she's a photographer. she takes pictures, then tries to take a picture of Henry, and he's acting all shy, because that's what cute lovers do. And then they actually take a really cool picture, where Henry grabs paola by the waist from behind, swings her around so she's flapping around thanks to centripital force. i don't know if the picture turned out well, but it was a cool and creative shot that I had never seen any facebook pictures (You know, those pictures where your old high school mates have new girlfriends, and they're always at parties, wearing cowboy hats or cow suits, and drinking out of a red cup).

The streets were closed for us by two friendly cops , which I was surprised we had the power to do! The previously busy rush hour highway-like street all of a sudden became quiet and empty (enter twilight zone theme.) It was pretty cool to see what city-issued permits could accomplish, without funds...I wonder how much bureaucracy was involved.

Our badass handheld camera guy took this shot of Henry skateboarding (for when he first discovers the bridge, without paola maybe? Or perhaps as a break from the canoodling, for some action shots? I'm not sure...)


After we finished there, we went to our second location. It was the dock where my auntie and I had jumped in at the beginning of our trip.

There was an old, rusty, sinking fishing boat which I climbed on with Jaime... (one of the painting twins... somehow "painting twins" sounds like a freak show, and i like it. Because that's the theme of this shoot.)

We filmed some more canoodling, on the car (Henry's discovery of her Jellyfish tattoo, and his strange obsession with touching her body.) And then they slowly walk to the dock, interact with the props, and then Paola, because she's such a free spirit, and has been released from chains of her ex husband's abusive hands, she jumps into the water.



sadly we only got one chance to film her jumping into the water, as it would have taken her at least an hour to dry completely, and by then the sun would have gone down.... she was nervous about jumping into the ocean. The waters were rough and she was probably tired. It looked a little restricted.

And now for a little story:

Five nights ago, I was at the bar with a bunch of the crew, and Rafi (the director) gets this phone call from somebody called "Jane!!! How are you!?" I could tell she was a very special person from the way Rafi said to everybody, "Everybody! It's Jane!" and then how everybody responded "Jane!!!!! How are you?"

There was a lot of love. Who is this mysterious character? Is she working on this movie? Why isn't she here? Is she coming? Who Is she!?!? I need to find out, for the quality of my blog!

Today I had forgotten all about this mysterious character, as there was enough material to write about. We were shooting canoodling scenes, and moving fast in between takes. Everything stops. Jane is here. Hugs and kisses, the Making-Of crew goes wild like paparazzi, and I get dragged onto the bandwagon.

Who is she? she is Paola's ex-girlfriend. What?! somehow not knowing the script (because its in spanish) becomes like reading the novel version of this movie. It takes forever to unfold (not 3 hours) and I'm watching the movie with 100 crew members, who are playing it out for me like puppeteers and theatre workers, because they've all read the script (I think... otherwise their in as much of a surprise as I am.) We're building and constructing this movie around ourselves. It's a gigantic puppet show.

And Rafi is the puppeteer. Later tonight, we have a party to welcome Jane, hosted by my aunt sonia, the producer. I, being your official reporter, rush in to talk to Jane to get our story. she is the fourth element. she is air.

Henry is Earth. Diff is fire. Paola is water. Jane is air/wind. Together, they are the planeteers!!

The making-of crew wasn't here for this, and I'm sad I didn't catch this on tape. Jane (whose real name is Maine) is an Atlanta girl living in NYC. she used to be a part of Rafi's cabaret. she's a dancer. she's extremely elegant and bohemian at the same time. And magnificently so.

As it turns out, Rafi has his "children" which consists of a constant slow-turnover-rate troupe of improvisational cabaret dancers. He worked for a company for 11 years (if my memory serves me right.)

Jane says,

"Honestly, we were talking about it recently, and we all decided it was this: Rafi was like our father, and now all of us are abandoned orphans. Also, all of us dance a little differently than people who didn't work with Rafi. There's something more eccentric about us.

Rafi has the ability to bring out things in your dancing that make you think 'Wow, that was not me. That was something way else that HE is responsible for. Not me.'

Rafi is like a child with a toy house and all these toy people, who he can order around. He turns a bathroom into an oasis, because he has a way of communicating to you exactly what he wants."

(dammit, now that I formated, I don't know how to unformat...)

crap...

Well, gosh, that was quite a character analysis. stay tuned for more!

Am i delirious or is this truly surreal?

When we arrived at 10pm, the Casino was still in operation. Perhaps it was rush hour. Four elderly people sat around a black jack table. Business seemed slow, but the purple haired old lady seemed to be getting her fix of gambling. We waited... and waited. At 2am we were finally able to set up. We had 22 extras for the scene, who were friends of the movie makers. For example, sonia's neighbor, rafi's mother, family friends, etc. They got paid to be there as a guarantee that they would see the shoot through.setting up didn't take very long, and my help wasn't even needed, and so I continued to again do practically nothing besides take pictures and interview people for this blog :P

The actors, Henry and Diff, were rehearsing. Mariana (paola) did not have a scene to shoot, but she was here supporting them anyway. I had cut my hair the day before, since the closed set had banned everybody from doing anything on set... I was bored and it seemed like an appropriate thing to do in the spirit of Paola's character. The dramatic display of making herself over and renewing herself inspired me. i told her about it, careful not to boost her ego too much, and got to realize that she was a really awesome and nice person. Not at all a diva like I had imagined her. I think she just seemed like a diva because of her elaborate costumes and her concentration on set. I learned that argentinians dominate in the acting business, as they have a long history of theatre. she has been married for 6 years to a producer in advertising and they have a 4 year old son, who has a theatrical personality. she admitted to having good metabolism which strangely made me feel better about the 600 calorie donut i ate a few days ago.

I asked her if it was ever confusing to do love scenes, and if you develop feelings, and she responded that Henry and her talked about the scene, established where you could and couldn't touch, and she had asked him not to do the tongue thing. she seemed to have an enormous amount of respect for the aesthetics of the movie, and said that because of that respect, she thinks of it more as a choreography than as a love scene, dancing from place to place, moving your body in certain ways. It's all for the cameras.

Both Frank (Diff, seen above) and Mariana have proven to be amazing actors! I am surprised at how the producers got such talent, but I suppose the theme for the making of this film has been: "it's all falling into place."

I've learned, though, how fluid film production is in terms of "where is this going?" Because of Mariana and Frank's on screen charm and talent, the story itself has changed. Both of them have been incorporated more. The endings are completely dependent on how good the chemistry between everybody develops. The ending is still open to change! Thank the forces of nature.

I also had the chance to attack the photographer with questions during dinner. Thankfully her father is from wisconsin and she spoke english better than i did. It was a day of photographic break through's on my part, because i learned how to control the light sensitivity. I was feeling very comfortable with my camera and wanted to learn more about what it would be like doing it for a living. she had been a photo journalist, a freelance photographer, and a editor. she had shot weddings, funerals, politicians... I saw in her the excitement that i feel when i see symmetry and perfection, and i felt so validated! she also hates hannah montana, so we totally bonded :P

ONWARDs!

We did two establishing scenes in the lobby and then moved into the casino, where everybody gathered around one table and acted like they were having fun. The camera man, sonnel, was getting shots that were very frantic and grotesque. The footage will be edited to be slow motion, drunk, and beautiful in every way. The man in the middle of the man is playing Charlie, who is a chauvinist pig who Diff takes revenge on by robbing him and doing his bad ass thing.

This is Maripiri. she is the pamela anderson of puerto rico. she is a big boobed model that nobody takes seriously. she is perceived to be the ditzy model who didn't take the time to educate herself and look respectable. she was very nice, though, and I felt bad that I had heard all these horrible things about her :( But i ran up to her and said "ready for your close up?" and she struck this pose. so i didn't feel that bad because she's just a character, after all. As are we all.

It was getting really late... or early. I was getting tired. I even laid my head down on the black jack table and fell asleep for a few minutes while the Assistant Director yelled "Animo! Animo! Muy Energia! Ultimo! Mas! Mas!" To get the extras pumped up and to make them look like they were having fun. I felt so guilty that they were trying to be energetic and there I was, sleeping like a lazy ass college student on vacation in puerto rico. I walked around, found nothing to do, took pictures, tried to look alive, failed, and sat down again. The angel-like caterers came around with some sandwiches, and that suddenly woke me up! I all of a sudden realized where I was, and everything we were doing became very funny. I asked Gabo whether everything was really funny or if I was just delirious, and he replied "a lot of both." He had been knocking down Puerto Rican red bulls known as Cyclones, and was also a little bit wired, weird and delirious. I strangely and suddenly became a very prolific photographer in the next few hours.

The twins who were to be by Charlie's side and make him look sinful were amazing. Their energy was so amazing all through the shooting. They were exactly the way I would have imagined them . They were sleazy, beautiful, obnoxious, over the top golddiggers. The costumes were great, and they will look awesome in the final cut.

It was a really difficult shoot, and all the makers were frustrated. The lighting crew was having trouble because the existing lighting clashed with the set lighting (I think that's what the problem was) and the camera men were having trouble because the cramped space made it very difficult to get clean shots of the main characters. The extras were difficult to manage, and somehow it didn't flow as well. To top it off, there was a lot of difficulty with the Casino managers, since they had initially told us we could use their chips, and we didn't bring our own. They made the art director sign for 500$ worth of chips, and we had to shoot a scene before government officials came in to count the daily money exchange.... I don't really understand that part, but I hear it was complicated.

"It's a wrap!" Oh, music to my ears. Applause, hallelujah's, tears of joy, sighs of relief. I cannot believe that this is only the 5th day of shooting. 15 more to go!

lleneme con cosas bonitas

From 6:30pm to 6:30am. Jeez. It would have been awesome had it not been a "super closed set." Diff and Henry were painting a naked Paola in her apartment. The director and producers are not sure whether or not the final cut will include Diff painting as well. It may give it away. But when i saw the footage at 7am, I thought it was very sexy and maybe viewers would suspend disbelief and think it was just a super erotic three-some paint job.

Diff and Henry rubbed blue paint all over her body. Cut. The twins worked on the beautiful blue mess for a bit, and applied their intricate art work to her body and "filled her with beautiful things."

I spent some time cleaning the set before the filming, as well as bringing the props up from the office into the set which included her guitar case, Henry's bag, and his skateboard... all very cool props which i severely quiero. But then most of the crew just stood by in the office, hanging out, watching youtube videos, climbing trees (well, that was just me, as I very soon found out that the termites/ants in the trees were very vicious).

I had brought my ukulele, to the great amusement of my coworkers. On our way down to the ground floor in the elevator, a hula party erupted in the shaft. One of the twins was playing ukulele, the prop master was beat boxing, another twin was yodling, and another set of twins (the costume designer and the assistant art director) were being hula girls. All of a sudden the elevator doors opened unexpectedly into the midst of a tense scene on the 9th floor, where director, producers, camera light and sound crew were between shots in Paola's apartment. We had been caught red-handed. It must have been a strange site and good comic relief. The girl in charge of the making-of video got it all on footage.