Lots of lovely free stuff

A big part of my weekend relaxing is getting the weekend papers and going somewhere nice to read it. I was delighted to see that this weekend The Guardian included a free suppliment called 'How to make Films' a welcome addition to my usual weekend reading.

Joy of Joy this was followed by a free DVD on in The Observer on Sunday with the first short films of Ken Russell, Ridley Scott, Stephen Frears, Shane Meadows and Gurinder Chadha. 


The Ken Russell short called Amelia and the Angel is probably the loveliest short film I've ever seen. Made in 1957 this black and white film follows Amelia (pictured below on the front cover) as she tries to find a new pair of angel wings after her brother ruins her first pair. I'm a sucker for a sweet story and this little film captures the endeavours of a very sweet little girl.

P.S Tonight I'm off to watch Eat Pray Love. The Book dominated my summer so I'm apprehensive for the film to live up to the Book's reputation. Review to Follow.

Let's start at the very beginning,

A very good place to start.


So here begins the topic of inspiration for this blog. Endeavouring to complete various tasks to make me:


1. More employable
2. More creative
3. Generally better.


My first endeavour is to learn how to edit. As an aspiring film maker it is an extremely useful skill to have. 


So far I've edited projects for Uni on Avid and messed around with IMovie on my beautiful Macbook. I plan to buy Final Cut and edit my dissertation film this year, which HAS TO be good. 


By endeavouring to do this publicly I am making myself accountable to YOU! I need your help any suggestions or tips you have are gratefully received. 


To give you an idea of the work I need to do, here is a short video of my lovely niece filmed on my pocket Canon Camera and edited on IMovie:

Treasure Trove

My second week of work experience proved more adventurous than the first.


I had a wonderful Little Mermaid moment. On wandering into Trevor Howsam prop house in West London to collect a 1950s style pocket watch, I was reminded of the poignant lyric:


'I've got gadgets and gizmos a plenty, I've got woozits and watsits galore, you want thingymabobs I've got twenty.'


and then questioning again in the words of Ariel 'How many wonders can one cavern hold?'

Answer: Lots and lots

This place has everything to transform a set into a different era, including tons of retro wallpaper and unusual trinkets. 

I am liking this.

This little youtube advert for Tipp-Ex is such a good idea and so much fun. You just fill in the blank with an action and the hunter and the bear will do your bidding. My personal favourites are dance, sing and shag. Have a go by clicking on the link below:


http://www.youtube.com/tippexperience?ref=nf

I am a huge Shane Meadows fan, I geekily wrote essay for my course on This is England earlier this year. So I am mega super excited for This is England 86, the TV series sequel to the film. First episode is Tuesday 10pm channel 4. Check out this sneak peak trailer here:


http://www.channel4.com/explore/this-is-england-86/?'-86#/video/trailers

Zombie Nation

After weeks of a dull summer job I am finishing off the summer with some work experience. For the next two weeks I am experiencing the world of television at an Independent Production Company. However so far the main thing I am experiencing is the world of zombies.

After hours of transcribing an interview with a prominent zombie specialist for an upcoming zombie documentary I thought I would share my findings with you.

When Zombie specialist was asked: Why do you think Zombie films have such a big following?

Zombie specialist replied: I think that zombies have their core group as I think all monsters have their core group for example if you’re a little tween girl and your absolutely terrified of penis’s you’ve got Twilight, now if your say, a teenage boy and you wanna be a hero and rescue a girl on your motorbike with your M16 that’s what a zombie plague is for. I think that when the world economy stabilises and and these wars end and we finally get terrorism under control, I think people will want less zombies. I think they’re gonna want to stop thinking about the apocalypse and start thinking about…sexy werewolves.

Work experience so far has taught me three important things however these things are not about the television industry.

1. Phallus phobic teenage girls are responsible for the Twilight phenomenon.
2. Boys with heroic aspirations love zombie films.
3. And finally when we finally achieve world peace we’ll all sit back and fantasize about sexy werewolves.

Urrgggg Arggggg!