Prepare the way of the Film!

Larry and I are happily preparing for the launch of our beloved movie "Camilla Dickinson" on August 25th! There are, of course, the 67 million (give or take) "deliverables" due to your distributor when a movie you have worked on for so many years is about to be released. But what a wonderful set of tasks. It is such an incredible blessing to be where we are this summer with Camilla, and with "West of Redemption". No matter how tough things get...and they have been...daunting lately of course...I have a very thankful heart. We hope and pray to reach lots of current, and future, Madeleine fans with this film :) We had a wonderful SIFF, premiering "West of Redemption". I hope to get pictures of that evening soon for the blog here. Till then, here is the amazing and talented Tony Becerra and me at the fun Women in Film "Northwest Connections" party:)

Coming back to the Blog Again

For years I have not posted here on my blog, but have instead posted on my Mom's CaringBridge (www.caringbridge.org/visit/sylviaduryee). Since her death on December 20th, 2014, I have been buried, both in grief and in work on several movies at once, and I have not come back to write in my own blog here. (
) I wanted to announce, for any that still are on the list, that my new movie's World Premiere is Memorial Day, May 25th, at 7pm at the Harvard Exit in Seattle. Please come! You can get tickets at the following link for both that screening and the Wednesday one. I would love to see you there! (
) http://www.siff.net/festival-2015/west-of-redemption (
) And the latest article about me is here: (
) http://womeninfilmseattle.org/featured-member.htm (
) I hope to write in here more regularly, now that I finally have remembered the password! (
) Thanks for reading this again:)

And... that's a wrap...

(
) Day 19 was long, cold, and eventually windy, rainy, and very hard on the actors and crew, though it made for some amazing photography. Thank goodness the end of the day, and the shoot, was indoors. The last sequences were some interstitial shots of Billy and Mariana, with Billy clean-shaven; in the "past". The very last shot was of Billy walking past a vaguely cross-shaped key-holder on the wall. I cried for the last five setups. Folks let me. It is SO tough for the shoot to be over. When you put something together for years...not-doing it suddenly is pretty tough. (
) I stayed for awhile, drifting around base camp taking pictures, then went up to the flood-lit house to watch the guys load equipment. T.J. was pitching right in helping - that's my D.P. I tweaked my ankle in the dark, walking over the cattle guard to make sure wrap was going ok. It hurts today, among other things. (
) I cried a little as I forced myself to leave the farm, eventually, and drive to the dive bar where the wrap party was. Even though I had stayed late wrapping, Mary and I were the first ones there. But then the party got going, and eventually, after a hard cider, I stopped mourning and begin to celebrate what we had done, along with everyone else. T.J. toasted everyone who had helped him with "his first feature". So sweet. (
) Now we start post-production. Okay, well, after I lie around doing nothing for a couple of days, resting my ankle and back, then get myself to Seattle. I am taking it very slowly today and icing a lot. (
) Post-partum? oh yeah. But...we DID IT. Thank God for every single member of the team. I love them all to pieces. Thank God for this movie. This crew was utterly amazing, few as they were. (
) I want to curl up on the couch at my Mom's house and tell her all about it...wish I could tesser...think I will call her, and Terry.

So Day 18 was wonderful...we basically drove all around the wheat fields with Billy in a truck all morning, "crashed" a truck, then did interstitial Billy shots outdoors on the farm, then inside, sorting boxes. It wasn't Hamlet. But it was very good. And the sunset was stunning, and Billy walked through it toward camera as it magically set behind the hill. LArry and I watched it fade from the porch as they lit the interior of the house. And the stars were so beautiful that they made me cry, and I had to call my wonderful 88 year old Mom to talk about how beautiful the Big and Little Dippers were, and how lovely Draco was between them, just like the star decals were that she put over my bed at home to make me comforted at night. I told her how the farm smells reminded me of all good times with her and with horses, and the huge bowl of sky, and the singing coyotes, just led me to celebration. She told me I should go up Mount Spokane and get her pine branches:) Ever the Adventurer :) Then, after calling Terry too, I went back into the 1880s farmhouse to shoot the penultimate scene of the penultimate day of the film. Tomorrow we wrap. I can't believe it. I drove home in a tired and happy daze of disbelief that it is nearly over. I work for years to get to do this, and live so intensely during a shoot, that sometimes real life is hard to adjust to after. But for now, I am making a wonderful, moving movie, and savoring every second of it. Tomorrow we film a gun going off. God bless us, every one.

Day 16 Tomorrow

I have been remiss in writing all this last week, and now I have had two days off, in which I stayed mostly in bed resting. I did go to the chiropractor and got a strange not-good massage today, as my neck and back hurt so very much, but other than that... down time. Sure needed it. It was a very intense week, in which we said goodbye to Kevin on the last night; that fun, jokey, magical night in which we filmed Youngblood arriving at Keller's door in the rain (we created the rain rather magically, a big thank you to Mike Kjelso and Mike Astle; riggers thereof). Last week, among other things, we filmed the very intense final fight, which was a super tough day that took a lot out of everyone. We filmed lots of Youngblood driving in the beater truck for the final sequence, which made me very happy, including the very final shots with Rebecca and Keller. Also lots of lovely scenes with Rebecca and Keller, magic hour, bicycles, sweetness, and squabbling. And we sent Kevin back to the barn for some pick up shots we had been pushing for the first two weeks. "Just when you thought you were rid of the barn, dude..." Now he is off to the set of Arrow, after a brief fly-by of L.A., and after finally doing his EPK over French toast the morning he left at our house. Suddenly, this weekend, it was fall! Sarah and I had to turn on the heat in our house. What this bodes for tomorrow, Day 16, and the following last week of shooting, I am trying not to worry about. Home stretch. God bless us, every one. I am tired but very much looking forward to Day 16!!! Hoping the old bod and mind can get me there. It's worked so far...well, mostly lol...

Day 10 was the most intensely emotional day I have had on set yet. I cried, as privately as I could, many times, through the morning work's tough emotions, and was very worried, mid-work-day, as the rains hit us, rolling across the wide fields as they had been threatening all day. We held for about an hour, huddling under popup tents, with gear under tarps, then bravely went on to try to get the romantic second scene of the day, rain or shine. It rained only a little on the lightly-dressed-summer-clothed actors, and at the end of the day, miracle after miracle occurred...the scene was supposed to have been at sunset, but instead we had a grey sky. Which was all right, and we shot out all angles that way, in our typical "it is what it is" indie attitude. But then...right as we were nearly over with the day and the "Marsha" setup was up (third-to-last shot of the day), wonder broke over the crew as, low on the Western horizon, the sun busted through the cloud cover and we had...a sunset. Quickly we reset everything and everyone and went again. The actors walked lovingly up the hill again with the real sunset behind them and did the scene. And THEN it got BETTER. Pink streaked clouds exploded under the grey. Back they went again. I began to cry, this time for joy. Probably unprofessional of me, but I could not help it; I was so happy. And on that take, with the pink sky, as the dialogue ended, a flock of birds flew up right behind the actors. And THEN it got BETTER. I kid you not. A rainbow appeared. We swung the camera on it. And then we shot the scene again. And then...it got better. Coyotes started to sing. And Kevin, standing at the top of the hill, next to Mariana, improvised "Did you hear that? Coyotes singing." And Chris turned his mic on them. And the actors sat and did the scene a last time...as the color went out of the sky, and the sun set... I was the happiest director in the world. Most of the day, I was in a thankful, tender, raw prayer-state. I felt more alive than I had in a long time. When you get as emotionally open as we all got that day, I think the numinous feels closer, or at least more accessible. Some of the usual barriers are down when you are making art of that kind, I think.

W.o.R at War

Today was the War Day; an entire day dedicated to getting our footage of the war flashbacks. It was a very intense day in a big cow pasture, shooting the same short sequence over and over to get it from all angles. I absolutely loved the footage that we got, although the rain was scary and intense, mid-day. TJ and I had some tense weather-related moments for awhile. But, thank God, it let up enough to shoot, and the lovely cloudy sky made everything look amazingly beautiful.