Tuesday, December 11, 2018

Rushes.

The rushes, or film dailies, are the segments of film from a day's shooting, assembled to allow the director of a movie and others to view at the end of the day. Apparently the term "rushes" comes from the speed at which they were prepared in the past, so that they could be viewed soon after shooting was done for the day. That way, any necessary reshooting could be done the following day. It's still done, but with digital technology it's undoubtedly easier than when film had to be developed.

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I would like rushes of my days.

Seriously, I'd love to be able to sit down at the end of the day and review them. Then go back and reshoot what didn't work, or at least cut what went wrong. It might go something like this....

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"Okay, here's the scene where you start the day --"

"Ugh! Oh, no, that looks stupid. Checks the phone first thing? That makes the character look weak. We'll trim that out."

"All right... Here you're walking the dog..."

"Yeah, and that jackass blew his horn at us  -- wait, back that up. Shoot, that's the guy with the Dalmatian three blocks up. He was just saying hi? Okay, we'll have to cut the part where I give him the finger, and reshoot it as a wave."

"Nah, we can fix it with CGI. Okay, now to the desk."

"Jeez, who designed that set. What a mess."

"It's your desk."

"Yes, but I thought it would look smart-cluttered on film, or eccentric-cluttered. This just looks lazy-cluttered."

"Okay, maybe we reshoot tomorrow."

"Well... It's not like anything interesting happens in that scene."

"Let's have a look... There's a lot of typing and frowning at the laptop... Big lunge for the dictionary... Pretty dull."

"We have to keep that in, though, or I don't get paid."

"Looks like you're pounding out something."

"Yeesh, yeah, angry e-mail to an editor. Probably shouldn't have sent that. Adds drama but it'll hurt revenues, specifically mine. We'll cut that part."

"Like it didn't happen. Let's have a look here, at the scene with your wife. You were irritated at her."

"Yeah, but see? I look calm and collected here."

"Watch this. Where she asks you if you think the ChapStick that was in her coat from last year is still good?"

"Oh, yeah... To be fair, if I hadn't known we had a brand-new ChapStick in the medicine cabinet, I wouldn't have rubbed that one on my butt and tried to hand it back to her."

"Maybe if we punch up the dialogue? 'Feels good to me' is a little pedestrian."

"The whole scene is going to alienate the viewers."

"Let's leave it in and see how it tests."

"No, I want a rewrite. Way too much childish humor in this film. Tell the bullpen to get something to me tomorrow morning."

"Okay, don't sweat it. By the time we're done your wife won't be mad anymore and you will have had a good day. Wanna see the supermarket run? I know you had some concerns about wardrobe."

"Yeah, old Dad jeans versus new sweatpants. I mean, they're both bad, but which is worse? But aside from that I think the supermarket scene was fine."

"Even when you grabbed five cheese samples while the cheese sample lady was talking to someone?"

"Ooh, well, yeah... But look, her job is to make the samples disappear, and I helped."

"What will the audience think?"

"All right, all right, let's have a look at the whole scene and maybe we can cut the cheese."

[Screening room dissolves into laughter. This scene is a keeper.]

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