April 11 - Some Answers to Some Queries

Yesterday, Chuck wrote a comment asking what ADR stood for....

I've heard ADR stand for a couple different things; Additional Dialogue Recording, Automated Dialogue Record.... I'm sure there are other variations too. Basically, it's the actors re-recording their voices AFTER the movie has been shot and usually to the edited picture. The dialogue recorded could be because of technical reasons, performance choices, or it could be lines that are freshly written... called add lines, cuz well, they were added after the movie was shot.

Also, yesterday, Duane asked what for my favourite scenes to shoot were from THE CHAIR and GINGER SNAPS UNLEASHED....

For GS 2, I must say, it's hard to pick a favourite.... of course anything with Eric Johnson was particularly difficult as we had to use special lenses so his piercing eyes wouldn't fog the film. After the week three, which was almost exclusively OUTSIDE, in Edmonton, in February, mostly ALL nights it was painfully cold....frigging freezing.... Just how cold WAS it ?

Deathly cold.... just look at the picture.....
Hence. it was a DREAM to go into studio for the last three weeks, a controlled, warm environment where that if you fell behind, you could always get it later as you were in that location for quite a while. It was just about being comfortable. I will also say, there were scenes where I wanted to cry and throw up my hands, get in the El Camino drive to Mexico and say, "well I tried". Other times, I has my 'director stick' in my hand, and 'sometimes in my mouth' and I would think, "This is the BEST F^#&ING job ever." It was just fantastic. The stress one day and the euphoria the next, mixed with total exhaustion, made all emotions heightened. FANTASTIC EXPERIENCE

As for the CHAIR, it is more fresh in my memory. Everyday was challenge. I would wake up, there would be people in my house making noise, I would go to bed, there were people in my house. I didn't sleep much during those 4+ weeks. The shoot in the woods, on Hallowe'en, although EXTREMELY challenging and stressful, felt very rewarding as I KNEW we were getting some great looking stuff. Better than a movie on our budget deserved to be getting. And shooting Lauren Roy trying to escape from the chair was a blast, as the 'gag' we had planned for her to use to aid her in the escape ACTUALLY worked in reality. Also there is a scene we shot in the kitchen, where there were about 10 people crammed into every possible off camera space to make the 'cutlery' gag work. It was painful after double digits retakes and resets. It was a highly choreographed scene in which many of the cast and crew had to do exact actions at precise times. Batter splattered cutlery was whipping unpredictably around the room, so amidst all these precisely timed actions, people were trying to protect themselves from flying utensils and the crew was covered in goo.
RIDICULOUS.

I actually got the scene on take 3, but was SOOOO enjoying the moment and the torture I was putting Alanna(she had to eat the pancake batter each take... that's her in the pix, licking the batter-y spoon) and the crew through, I just had to continue. SUCKAS.
The hardest was the one in which I had to spend WAY TOO much time underwater in a tub under Ms. Chisholm, but it too was fun in its own way.

Wow... long blog today.... that's what happens when people ask me questions.