Relaxing Before The Storm

This week began with a rehearsal. Simonne and Jac worked an afternoon rehearsing lines from 69 Année Érotique. Not only the lines, of course, but the way it should look, the camera positions that will be needed, the costume she will wear and the movements of the characters in the scene.

This is not common for Jac. He normally gives the script to his actors a week or so before the production starts. No rehearsals and when they are in the set the day of the shooting, he directs them to do what they must do.

For this new film, however, he has some special moments that require more preparation and careful thought.

Simonne and Jac were alone, no cameraman, nobody else in the set except the five cats, one of whom decided to have a cameo during the rehearsal.

Jac had to do the usual, set up the camera, the lights, the music, the drinks and found out he has a problem with the sound recorder and he might need a new one.

The rehearsal was over by 5, when Simonne had to rush out to do what she always does at that time of the day. Jac was happy with the results.

We’re preparing another post for our Patreon page, for the 6 faithful supporters who are enjoying the inside work of the production. We are concentrating on the background story for Yael and her followers. What do they know, what does Yael know about her family, her past, her ancestry, which is the stone upon which her story is based.

Some of that background will be in the dialogues, it has to be, but a lot of will not be, it will be the subtext for the actresses. I read a bit of what Jac is writing as the background story and it blew my mind. It’s a story in and of itself. It could make a great book, a Game of Thrones style TV series, a controversial documentary, all three into one. Really.

One part of a very intriguing paragraph:

Yael’s ancestor, known as Jana or Janai, is referred to as a Gevurah, a great lady, whose wisdom, sense of humor and irony passed from generation to generation of women who kept her teachings and writings in great confidence because they were aware that it revealed who wrote what their religious leaders call…

I dare not to say anymore than that. And I might be advising Jac not to reveal too much of that lengthy background story, even to our supporters… it is that freaking good.

We are seeing a ‘normalising’ of the situation. What I mean by that is that it appears that we have to face the reality of the new times. People are not spending the way they used to. That means that we have to look into alternatives to cover our regular needs, which means weekly and monthly payrolls for 9 people, world range operational expenses, cat food for five cats and most importantly, tons of litter.

One alternative is pretty obvious. We need to increase our outreach way beyond our regular outlets, like CF and GIMP. One regular phenomenon we see is that when someone new discovers our films, the newbie gets one film, timidly, maybe an obvious one or low priced, like Via Crucis of Jane. Later on, or next day, this person gets two or three… and before you know it, the new fan spent 500 dollars in our films in less than a week. We need to find 1000 of those new comers every couple of months.

There is what I can describe as a general apathy in many fronts. Maybe I’m justifying that by blaming it on the economic situation on planet earth. But maybe it is just that, apathy in our familiar fronts with the known exceptions of course.

We are sure that once Seditiosa is done, it will sell extremely well. And before that happens we have a bunch of projects to be released during the rest of this year and the next. We know that when we release all those films, they will bring in more cash. We’re planning those releases to start at the end of October, so we expect to have extra cash before, during and after the production of Seditiosa.

We had something like that when we were producing Maleficarum and the other movies in 2011. We had Sirwiñakuy in theaters and we released a bunch of Red Feline titles between 2009 and 2011, like the famous and a favorite of many Agent X.

This year, by the time we begin the production of Seditiosa, we will have some of the releases I mentioned and at least one film in theatrical release, Pygmalion. Will we repeat the experience of 2011?

I can’t predict the future, but who knows, maybe like it happened in the past, we will make three big movies in a row, like with did with Maleficarum, Barbazul and Le Marquis De La Croix.

In the next few months we’ll be producing 69 Année Érotique, Seditiosa and one film that has not title yet but it is set in Roman Times, like Seditiosa. The working title is A Roman Crucifixion Story. We will have the magnificent cast, the crew, the costumes, the sets, the props, so, why not?

I have to say that I’m disappointed by the lack of interest in places like CF and GIMP. I’ll keep posting in these places but I don’t see that as my main interest. I hav to admit that sometimes I don’t feel like visiting as often as I do, which is everyday. Que será, será.

I’m hoping the Patreon page will eventually grow.

We’ll launch the IndieGoGo campaign very soon and we’ll be getting in touch with past supporters, directly. We will be promoting it wherever we think will give some positive results.

And a final note. We were sad to hear that Jean-Luc Godard died (today, Tuesday) at age 91. He practically created the new wave of French Cinema and inspired many young crazy people to go and make movies, one of those was Jac and another was Amy who firmly believed that to make a movie all you need is a gun and a girl.