more film opinions

This past week we were doing our final projects. All the groups had to do Preproduction work, casting, and script revision. I learned a lot these past few days. For one thing, fixing the script was pretty tough. The writer put in some stuff for us that were very difficult to shoot. How were we going to capture footage of an explosion and dead bodies? That didn’t quite work out… and it looked really poorly constructed today. Casting for real actors was something I got a lot out of. The acting career is really sad, IMO. People do it for free. Our TA went on NYCASTING.COM and put our project up for grabs. We had like 20 people sign up for auditions for each main role. We called up people who we thought would fit the role the best. I would call this process conning someone. You see, when the producer calls up the actor, they have to give them the details of the film and things like that. Ivan did a lot of small talks and he’s so sly about it. He told the actor that his role was going to be on screen for 70% of the time when in reality, their role is not that important and only on screen for maybe 30% of the time. The thing is, once you get them to agree to come and do it, they can’t back out of it. What are they going to say after they show up? “No I won’t do it?” It’s just good tactic to use. Another trick is to use reverse psychology on them. When an actor is uncertain on whether or not go play the role, the producer can say: “We chose you because we felt that you would be the best candidate for this role. If you don’t want to take the position, we have plenty of other talented people waiting on queue.” Saying something like that really nails them on the head and strikes their ego.

The acting career is a tough road for those who pursue it. Like Irving said, many talented actors never even get to make a living out of acting simply because it has so much to do with luck. A lot of the actors really have little opportunity to shine on camera. They do little skits and things like that, hoping to build a nice reputation/connection/resume. This career has such a heavy reliance on luck, it’s scary. It’s just a matter of being in the right place in the right time. For example, Pamela Anderson. She was in a football game when the camera pammed across her. The crowd went nuts and wanted the cameraman to go back to her. Instantly, she attracted attention and got a contract on the spot (in a football game for god sake). I kind of feel sorry for these people, like those who came to shoot today. The guy is around 40 and the woman is around 40. They still haven’t hit it big and they have already lived half their life away.