Via Dolorosa

We are on the path to the crucifixion of the Crucified Three. It is a complicated road, a stressful road, a via dolorosa… Making a movie is complicated in itself, making a movie with little money is more complicated, making a movie with little money and set in an ancient historic period is beyond complicated, making a movie with little money, in a historic setting, where three women will be crucified in front of a crowd is total madness.

But here we are, working on the pre production of Seditiosa, a film about a Female Christ, with a budget of less than 20,000 dollars and with the need to have costumes, props, sets, and a huge number of actors to play soldiers, nazarenes, priests and a bunch of other people. Total Madness.

Mel Gibson needed 25,000,000 dollars to make The Passion of The Christ and make it look the way it does. Well… with 25 million we can probably make a thousand movies, each with a budget of 25,000, more than what we have to make this one.

But here we are, moving forward to make this movie with little money and a big heart… and we’re doing that while making ANOTHER movie with a budget of probably less than 2,500. So far the cash spent in 69 Année Érotique is 2,073… right, that’s it, and it covers all the shooting until now. While the cash spent for Seditiosa as of now is 1,550 and that’s to cover some of the deposit money for the orders we made for props and costumes.

Total Madness!

Hey Margot,
Do you know anything about the loincloths in Seditiosa? I loved the one used by Yahel in the reaharsal — it gives the idea of some dignity for her.
daelan

The question came up in an exchange with our principal supporters, there are two of them, and we have frequent exchanges of ideas, suggestions, etc. They are the initiators of this project, thus they get updates all the time. The issues of the loincloths came up more than once.

In once such exchange I mentioned the film Perils of Jane, where Amy wears something like a loincloth before the end of the third part, after an intense flogging and after she’s crowned with thorns, very much how it will be in Seditiosa.
In Perils Amy is also dragged through the mud, the shooting was during rainy days, so she’s muddy all the time. At one point Jac positioned her on top of a rocky well, standing on the edge as if she was being presented to a crowd, like Yahel will be at one point. I shared a picture of that moment.

Amy was wearing a pink top that was whipped off her back and chest. The remains of that top got muddy and at the end it looked like a loincloth, but it’s only hanging in front of her, the back is gone. However, Jac likes the effect of it, the looks of it, so that’s one way of showing the loincloth under consideration.

Another way would be similar to what Simonne was wearing during the rehearsals for Monxa Mala, but smaller and it will be bloodied and dirty by the time she walks carrying her patibulum to calvary.

And of course there is the one Simonne wore during the Dialogue Rehearsal, which is a nice piece of cloth, which I think she wore in the film Monxa Mala.

In the video we made for the IndieGoGo campaign she wore it almost as an underwear.

Mila has the same cloth for her bit in the Dialogue Reheasal video but it looks different because Mila wore it in a different way.

She just wrapped it around her hips and tied the ends. The result is very alluring, sexy, while preserving her dignity, as it were.

There are those and many possibilities, but at the end it will be what they, the director and the actress, come up with. I’m totally sure it will be great.

Can you please say when the Seditiosa filming will begin?
Most of the preliminary stuff (set construction, props, and costumes) should have at least been ordered if not delivered by now. Would like to know a few mor details as to where we are.
Thanks.
wanttoknowmore

The pre-production is advancing at a normal pace. We’re getting everything we need and as far as I know there aren’t any problems in that area, everything is progressing as expected.

The set construction cannot be done until we’re at least two or three days from production. We cannot build the set too far in advance because we don’t own the property where we are going to be setting things up. Another and very important reason is that the sets are not going to be the kind that can stay put forever. They’ll be gone as soon as we’re done using them.

The props, particularly the swords and spears, take time, they are being made and we have to wait. They are not going to be metal, or plastic, the materials the crafts people are using to make them look the way they should need time to be set properly , the swords have to be painted a few times to give them the metal look they have to have.

We have the helmets and other attire, but they have to be fitted to the persons. Which means, once we close the deals with people who are going to be soldiers, executioners, sales people and so on, we fit them in their costumes. That will happen a few days before we start shooting too.

But we are also organizing the crew that is going to be working behind the camera, not only the technical crew, like the DP and Sound, but, most importantly, the people who are going to be building the sets, the crosses and particularly, the “market place“, that requieres a lot of work and materials.

This is a big production but with an extremely low budget and there are lots of details to take care of and that’s what we are working on now.

The weekend after carnival Jac and some of his team will be at the location, discussing details with the administrators and checking the areas where the set will be built. We have one area partly set, as I shared before, where the ‘market place‘ will be located. It is partly built. We need to cover part of it and it will look huge. We then have to fill it up with people and animals, mostly donkeys, sheep and a few dogs. … Lots of linen, herbs, gourds, things like that, including a couple of partly naked slaves for sale.