The D-Word's life is one of glamour and riches, as only a documentary filmmaker can live it

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Re-Entry Blues
January , 1997
1:10 am

So, you don't really wanna know
what my vacation was like, do you? That's not what you come to the D-Word for, right?.

Well, it was great, thank you. Quality time with wife and kiddies is highly recommended (should you have a such a family unit).

It was the re-entry that was hard.

Debbie and I begin logging and screening full blast tomorrow. 100 hours of footage. Maybe we can get to 4 hours a day if we haul. Suddenly, so much work that needs to be done all at once. Gotta rush out transcripts if they're to be ready by the time we screen. I got a late start. Couldn't afford a professional transcriber-- would have cost thousands of dollars I don't have-- no time to do it myself. So I hastily got numerous assistants, can only pay slave wages so they feel bad, I feel bad, and it's going reeeaalllll sloooooowww...

Then an e-mail from Jane. Out of nowhere she suddenly has to have a full-blown proposal -- synopsis, budget, completion schedule, bios and the dread Director's Vision statement- by next Saturday when everyone who's anyone in Europe will be at some absolutely crucial conference or other.

And the webmasterful Brian Clark wants to help me expand and somewhat re-design this here web site, bless his soulful indie spirit, but it means pouring time-energy into this at the worst possible moment. Brian's in Orlando, I'm in New Yuck City, he thinks we can do it all by e-mail, me thinks me skeptical. We're on a panel together at Sundance in two weeks (more on that later) and he wants to get a beta site together to show off there. Sure, Brian. We can, at best, plan there. Or plan to plan there.

And then there's money. Or lack thereof. Meeting with my new accountant the other week forced me to actually add up all that I've spent to-date on the film. It's over $11,000. It's practically nothing when you consider I've travelled to San Francisco twice for two weeks, to Colorado for 4 days, shot almost 100 hours of footage and transfered it all to Betacam SP with vhs window dubs. On the other hand, it's $11,000. Not to mention, I owe my guardian angels at Arc Pictures, Larry and Jan, over 5 grand for all the post-production (they're willing to defer payment 'til I get some funding).

The pitiful truth is I have practically no money to my name. My personal and business accounts are all but tapped out. The Edgewise segment will bring in a good chunk, but it'll take weeks for my check to come in. The Sinimax payment schedule gives 50% upon signing the contract, which could easily drag on for another month. But it's not nearly enough -- that 50% may carry us through the summer, at best. We'll need much more from... where? Somewhere. Somehow.

Hey, is this the glamorous life folks or what???

So, there I was bitchin' and moanin' to my long-suffering wife, the newly tan, relaxed, restored Marjorie (who was hoping our week of carribeaner bliss would carry over, oh, say, maybe a day or so) about my woes. "Well, you better figure out a way somehow to enjoy this," she replied. Half sage advice, half threat.

Spoke later by phone to editor extraordinaire, Mona Davis (A Perfect Candidate), who will be consulting with me and Debbie from time to time. "Gee, you're just about to start editing, you're about to get funding from HBO, which most documentary filmmakers would kill for, what's the problem?"

And she's absolutely right. Marjorie, too. So easy to get caught up in the self-imposed pressures of indie filmmaking, forget that life is going by, the clock is ticking...

Resolution for the new year: stay focused on the positive.

There's so much to be positive about.

I look back at last year around this time and have to laugh. Hadn't even gotten on the Web yet, much less thought about doing a video diary/ road movie/ docu travelogue thru it. Once I did start browsing, I remember thinking I really wanna establish some kind of Web presence, but had no idea how that might materialize.

I proposed doing bi-weekly interviews with indie filmfolks to Karol Martesko for the Virtual Film Festival site. I'll do 'em by phone, don't pay me, just have it transcribed, sez I. Good idea sez Karol, too Web oppressed to ever follow up.

Now here I am, The D-Word, realer than real, a ton of footage in the can, Sinamax in hand, Mirrormax a callin', on an Indies on the Internet panel at the IFFM, being flown out to the bigfuggindeal Sundance Film Festival in two weeks to be on another.

I barely know enough html to post my journal entries, still depend on the kindness of my isp 'cause I don't know from ftp, and now I been branded: I'm the Mr. Indie Filmmaker on the Internet!

Geez. Ain't life ironical?

Happy new year. Oh yeah, another resolution. More regularlike postings (ha!).

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