1) Interview of a One-Year-Old Child. Video. Way funnier than it sounds.
2) Moebius did concept art for the movie WILLOW. Check out the art design that could have been.
3) Astonishing bike stunts in abandoned industrial facility. Video. Music’s nice, too.
5) Everything you need to know about the video game industry in one graphic.
6) The 10 Most Brutal Moments in ‘The Savage Sword of Conan’!
“Jerry may seem too sly and eccentric to be a metaphor, but since there is no such thing as a literal vampire, we have to assume that his presence in this landscape means something.” A.O. Scott, missing the whole point in his review of FRIGHT NIGHT
Some filmmaker friends are tearing into the quotes from a Disney exec in this article. Essentially, he’s saying that Disney is going to pull back and focus on big, expensive tent-pole movies. It’s the only kind of film that makes sense with the marketing budget they need to bring in really huge numbers of people. (Added later: this particular exec doesn’t actually greenlight films, so here’s a grain of salt.)
He’s also saying that, for this kind of movie, audiences don’t care that much about the story. They like the big budget spectacle, and if the story doesn’t hold together, well, that’s a secondary consideration.
Frankly, I find it hard to refute him. He points to ALICE IN WONDERLAND (which made a billion dollars?? Really?) and I point to TRANSFORMERS. The writer of the article brings up TRON: LEGACY, which had lots of spectacle, a crappy story, and which failed at the box office, but honestly, we can all point to the reasons any individual movies drew (or failed to draw) a big audience after the fact. Everyone thinks they can Monday morning quarterback surprise hits and flops, but no one can predict it reliably.
Personally, I’d love to know what’s driving the success of those movies, but I haven’t seen them. I watch some of them on DVD when they hit the library, but in the theater? Not so much.
However! There is an ongoing TV series that a lot of people really enjoy with plenty of spectacle (on a TV budget), a large and enthusiastic fanbase, and really awful stories. I mean, dumb stories that don’t make any sense at all, or that seem spackled together with bullshit and “Hurry past, don’t pay attention here”. And that’s DOCTOR WHO.
I quit the show when I realized that too often the “stories” were an arrangement of emotion-tugging moments with only the most spurious connection to each other. A really good story will evoke powerful emotions, but if that can’t be managed, the moments themselves can be strung together (“My friend is in danger!” “This is worse that I thought!” “You don’t scare me, Villain Of This Episode!” “Thank goodness you have been safely rescued, Friend!” “Oh, I stare stonily at the terrible cost of battling evil!”). Even without the context of a sensible, well-crafted story, those moments can force emotional responses from our well-trained brains.
Isn’t that what these big “tentpole” movies are doing? They mix spectacle with specific emotion-tugging moments (cue long-withheld hug from father), and if the story makes sense, well, that’s just a little extra gravy.
That’s how it seems to me, and as a person who creates (and tries to sell) stories, this is something I need to figure out.
As promised, here is the actual script I wrote for the trailer. You can see the similarities and the differences.
What’s that? You missed my post last night with the full trailer embedded? You hate Vimeo? Well, here’s your chance to watch it on YouTube:
Anyway, you can see there are quite a few differences, to put it mildly. The guys at Wyrd told me straight out to write whatever I wanted–to not hold back at all–and they would figure out what they could or couldn’t do.
Well, dangling from the hole in the world wasn’t going to happen, and neither was the Molotov cocktail. There were some other things that were shot but didn’t make the final cut, like Catherine’s only line.
And there was other stuff that the guys at Wyrd just grabbed and ran with, like the floating storm, the confrontation with the guy drawing the sigil, and the final shot, which the director rightly changed from a punch to the ghost knife. Not to mention, thank god they changed the way Annalise is introduced. ::slaps forehead::
A note about formatting: This isn’t “correct” script formatting, because Christ this is a blog post and it’s 10:50 at night and I don’t want to go nuts making a fake screenplay. Also, I cheated the format for my own purposes by using two columns–why not, right? I didn’t have to follow any formatting rules! It was my money!
Plus, for those reading this on my main blog, my nifty WordPress theme puts a gray bg on part of it. Just pretend that didn’t happen and we’ll both be happier.
For folks who haven’t read a script before, character names are ALL CAPS the first time they’re introduced. The INT or EXT mark a new location in the script, and making the first few words in a line ALL CAPS also designates a new location or shot, esp in a montage like this.
Here’s the script behind the cut. Continue reading
Previously, I’d posted a teaser trailer for my Twenty Palaces books, but we’re finally ready to share the whole thing. This version includes all the special effects, characters and short scenes from Circle of Enemies (not spoilery), Catherine Little, Charles Hammer, the ghost knife…
And of course, Annalise doing some damage.
Here you go:
Full Twenty Palaces Trailer from Harry Connolly on Vimeo.
Swear to god, the guys at Wyrd did a fantastic job on this. Above and beyond, really. If you follow that link to their site, you can find out more about their award-winning genre documentaries, including H.P. LOVECRAFT: FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN.
Hey, if you like the video, please do let other people know about it. Almost forgot: if I can work out the formatting, I’ll post the original trailer script tomorrow, so folks can see the differences and how things change.
1) The largest Hot Wheels track ever. Four years in the making and it’s already sold for millions.
2) The 50 most delicious foods in the world. Points off for “Texas Barbecue Pork.”
3) More on joke Amazon.com reviews.
5) The Wesley Crusher Pullover Collection.
There’s a new Conan movie coming out on August 19TH!
Yes, I know it will be terrible. Yes, I’m going to see it anyway. Yes, I will have a 20-sider in my pocket when I do this. Part of my Fathers’ Day present was that I could see this movie in the theaters without the family.
Made with Comic Life.
I don’t plan to be around much today. I have to brainstorm the New Thing and do some reading. Try not to be too interesting while I’m gone.
That looks crazy-awesome.
As promised, here’s a quick note about why I made the trailer, (Vimeo | YouTube) then I’ll let it lie for a bit. But first!
A big “thank you” to everyone who helped spread the word about the 99 cent promo price for Child of Fire. Yesterday was pretty great, and the book climbed to #159 on the Paid Kindle list, was #16 in Fantasy overall and made it to #3 in Contemporary Fantasy. In fact, it’s still #3 as I write this even as the main Kindle List sales ranking has slipped back. Now it’s up to word of mouth and momentum.
Anyway, I’m tremendously grateful, to the point that I’m a little befuddled by it all. It’s always difficult for me to ask favors, and now I find myself full of gratitude, and… that’s difficult. I don’t want to gush. I don’t want to be standoffish or brusque. Maybe if I’d been more in the habit of asking favors I’d have worked this out by now.
Trailer! Here’s the thing: Trailers are terrible for promoting books. Seriously, I have never bought a book because of a trailer, and I’ll bet you haven’t either. So why make one? Most importantly, why spend just shy of five grand on it?
Well, it’s not for the promotion, clearly.
But what if you knew someone who was an amazing painter, and you wanted to hang their work in your home? What if your friends were accomplished musicians and you wanted to commission a song? Wouldn’t it be cool to let them run with it?
Well, my friends are filmmakers–good ones, too. Everyone who’s seen LOVECRAFT, FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN knows that. So when I got a little unexpected money (French and German foreign sales) I thought Why buy a car? This will last longer and won’t make me fat(ter).
At first I considered asking them to make a short film–pick a scene from one of the books, dramatize it, the whole deal. But when I sat down to think about it, I was paralyzed with options. Which scene would be doable? How would we deal with stunts? How do we handle exposition?
I could have done the opening to Child of Fire, but there was some stuff there that wouldn’t translate well to film. So I decided to ask them for a book trailer.
And of course I’m treating it as though it’s a book promotion; that makes it tax deductible. Still, to me, it’s about hiring my friends to make something cool for me, about them showcasing what they can do (and maybe get some work out of it), about seeing Ray and Annalise onscreen, and sharing that with all of you guys.
Because you know what? A lot about this industry is changing, and people who think they know everything about it or think they can predict what is the right /wrong move to make are kidding themselves. It seems to me that the best thing to do is whatever seems cool. That’s what I take away from the way others have found success: they had their interests and obsessions, and they didn’t “promote” so much as create stuff they thought was cool.
Okay, I think I’m done talking about the teaser trailer for a while. Back to the usual natter later.
You know the old truism that, in film, a writer’s work always gets changed? Well, it’s true. Even in the teaser trailer I just released yesterday, the fact is that what ended up on the screen was not at all like what was on the page.
First, for those who missed it yesterday, the teaser trailer: It’s now on Youtube in High Def and in not High Def. (what’s the term for “not High Def”? Regular?)
Okay? Did you watch it (either yesterday or today)?
Right then, here’s how it breaks down: there was one shot in the script saying Ray cut through a padlock with the ghost knife, but for the rest of it, this is what the script said:
INT. OFFICE – DAY
A MAN kneels on the floor, weeping.
MAN
Oh God, I’m so sorry!Ray knocks him down, yanks his jacket over his head and puts the barrel of a gun against his skull.
That’s it. That’s all it said. From those words, the guys at Wyrd created that trailer.
Maybe some other writer would be upset about that, esp if they were writing the check[1], as it were. Not me; I knew the guys would have to change and adapt things to make this work, and I made sure they knew I was cool with that when we started. What I didn’t expect was that they’d take the ball and run with it as far as they have.
Tomorrow I want to clarify a bit why I did this. (It’s not for promotional purposes. Really.) Today I have to take my son to the gym and teach him swimming.
[1] In this context, “writing the check” is a laughable claim to authority, since the guys at Wyrd are putting in way WAY more work than I could have ever paid them for.
