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A PRAYER FOR STRESS

Dear Almighty

Grant me the serenity to accept things I cannot change. The courage to change things I cannot accept, and the wisdom to hide the bodies of those people I had to kill today because they pissed me off.
And also, help to be careful of the toes I step on today, as they may be connected to the “BUTT” that I may have to kiss tomorrow.
Help me always give 100% at work, 12% on Monday, 23% on Tuesday, 40% on Wednesday, 20% on Thursday, 5% on Friday.
And help me to remember when I’m having a really bad day and it seems that people are trying to piss me off, that it takes 42 muscles to frown and only 4 to extend my arm and smack the Bastard in the mouth. - producer

timing

a standard hollywood production would take three years to complete. 1st year for development, the script needs to be convert into a shooting script. 2nd year would take you into pre production, thats where all the recee's, production design, casts selection, budgets...etc and principal photography. and final 3rd year is in to post production, getting the whole picture together with music scoring and of course promotion. in malaysia, we take half of that time, sometimes even less. our movie has gone into a 1 year of script development, even until today we could still be talking on how to improve the script. 3 months of pre production, 1 month of production and 3 months of post production.
so as you can see, we work extremely fast, not that we want to but we can't afford it like hollywood. i was asked by a producer from the u.s. of a. "how do you guys finish up a movie in less than a year and with that kind of budget?" our average film budget costs no more than 2 million ringgit per film, thats less than 1million usd.
so is it a good thing that we could finish up a movie with that miserable budget? most definately not. as a producer myself, there's endless days and nights that i count and count and recount with my faithful calculator, how am i going to squeeze all that into 2million ringgit? at the end, it's the sacrifice that i have to make, cutting down on so many items that is crucial for making a movie, the director wants this, i said "cannot, no money", the dop wants this and i said "cannot, no money". the 1st ad said we need to have 45 days of shoot, i said "cannot, no money, bring it down to 30 days". it's a crying shame that we have to go thru this, we're trying to bring our movie to the next level yet anything that goes beyond a 2million budget, the likeliness of recouping is hard.
we now face another set of problems, actors commitment on the shooting schedule. our time has been bouncing here and there and everywhere, morale of the team is low caused we can't get into the action. for those who wants to join the entertainment industry, think twice, it's not as glamorous as you think it is. we face situations that laymen could not understand or relate themselves to. and you have to have a deep well of patience with you. blowing your top won't help much in this arena, with a clear mind and sharp focus attention is what we need in this industry. and i'm loosing both of them. think it's time to consider optioning a second career path. - producer

HARDWARE

Guns Guns Guns, from Glocks to Barettas to MP5's not to mention the action sequences of fists n kicks n punches.
Looking at a genre that has eluded malaysian audiences for a long time. Something that has often inspired the looks of Quinten , Michael Bay Ridley Scott gory bloodbaths in the name of justice and personal vendettas.
We should all go back to sticks n stones - 1st AD

never never argue with a woman!

this posting has nothing and i mean absolutely nothing to do with our movie . a few days back, we the production team as usual, were talking on our movie production, again, thats our daily routine before we commence principal photography. somehow somewhere we diverted into talking about food, just to clear off our mind about budget problems, logistic, more budget problem...blah blah blah! we were talking about food and a particular peculiar item. roast pork sandwich. now i have eaten it, tasted it, touched it, saw it with my own eyes and yes, it does exist. some says it's a creation from ipoh, a food haven. and i have eaten it in ipoh itself for breakfast. my best friend wedding, we had it for breakfast again at his house before we got trash by chi muis (brides maids).
so it does exits. back to the present day, as we were talking about it, my line producer who hails from ipoh rejected the whole idea that roast pork sandwich came from ipoh, they don't have it there. she starts calling her mom, uncles, aunties, friends and if she could, she would call up ipoh town council to verify that roast pork sandwich does not hail from ipoh. and man! you should see her face, she was all fused up with the idea or concept that roast pork sandwich DOES NOT come from ipoh. i told her that, "i do not know whether it hails or created in ipoh or not, all i know i have eaten it there and it taste great. so to me, ipoh or not, it's good food". she was pissed! till today she is still trying to get a concrete answer from ipohreans whether roast pork sandwich hails from ipoh or not.! the morale of the story is, DO NOT ARGUE WITH A WOMAN! we'll never win. - producer (for those who has tasted roast prok sandwich aka siew yuk min pau. do write to my line producer and tell her where can she finds it in ipoh. the last i check, gunung rapat wet market, do verify it!

budget! show me the moolahs!

budget, budget, budget! thats the real "fark - up " part of a production. i have been going around the figures in and out for the past 2 months, nothing concrete. from a 40 days production down to 22 and up to 35 again. everyday extra means more moolahs. and i dun have that great amount of moolahs to be spend in the 1st place. for a fact that m'sia film could not be made for more than 2million. yes! you heard me right, no more than 2 miilion. even at that rate, the recoupment period is drag longer than expected. its a domino effect on what our nature of business. sigh! ever wonder how hollywood does it? "this movie is made at 300million usd, this is 150million usd...the numbers are mind blowing! back home, what? 3.5million to make? you mad ar?

ever wonder when you go watch a local flick and the night scenes always seems more blue in colour even there is a full moon out there? i'll tell you the reason, we don't have the budget to colour correct! film making is a painfull process and damn long one too. just my movie, it would take up a minimum 1 year to complete and of course there's the waiting period for it to be screen. "take a number and we'll call you when there's an opening in the cinemas" yup! thats the way it is. we have the expertise in movie making but not the equipments. most would have to get it from either thailand or hong kong or a little further australia. since we're in a good spot, logistically wise, we're at the centre, why can't we have the equipments to go further in film making? oversea production could come here to film and to post production since our ringgit to dollar is cheap for them.

well! thats the way it is! struggling film makers. lets hope things will smoothen out soon. - producer

it's the weather, definately the weather

"line producer sick", suggested my producer, after telling him I dunno what to write. I've have this page opened for about 15minutes now and not knowing what to write.

Took me about half an hour to look at how to join this blog. Still can't find it! so, we're all logging in thru the same user. uh, interesting, if I dun like anything written, I can just delete or modify it >:) hehehe..

But, it's true. We here in the office is getting sick, over again. I recovered to only get it back mid of last week. Last week, the producer had the longest migraine I've ever heard of in my entire life. Got in one day cheerie and all, only to be sick few days (or was it the next day) after. That was mid of last week, him coming in with a plastic bag filled with meds. Think maybe I should also get a pack myself soon! if i were to get well and party this weekend~! I've missed out a lot of my weekends becoz of this darn cough.

tataz~ *off to get meds* -line producer

a good weekend recee

the team had went for recee (scouting for locations) with the permission of the Polis DiRaja Malaysia PDRM, to view their latest facilities at Salak Tinggi. It was an absolute architectural eye opener. You might have never guess that PDRM would have a command centre this beautiful. Truly the "Malaysia Boleh" spirit has been put to the test here. You'll be able to see the place in the silver screen next year, once we have the master reel up to the cinemas.
We have also spoked to Supercharged magazine, our media partners thats gonna help us to get some really nice wheels for the production, we have car chase sequence in the movie, the version of "Terlalu Cepat, Terlalu Ganas". It's Monday now, we have lots of meetings and permission to apply and a whole lots of actors and actresses to get confirmation from us whether they get the job of not. Oh! My 2nd Assistant Director was absolutely early today, he came in before 10am, never happen before for the past 2 months. - producer.

2nd month into pre production

It has been a sea rough 2 months of pre production. making a movie is a tough deal. just by waiting for confirmation on dates and timing for actors and permission from designated bodies will make your head spin. from a 101 scene script has been change to about 90 in order for us to fit into a 100minute picture. 800 over frames of storyboard has been drafted, just scanning it took 2 whole week. right now we're waiting for more cofirmation from higher authority to approve our script before we commence principal photography which is expected in August 2007. audition has been done yet we have to change actors and actresses due to timing problem. we're trying to expend malaysia movie making horizon, trying to bring malaysia movie into asia pacific. at least for now. hopefully 1 day to the world where we could garner millions of movie goers to appreciate malaysia film. right now we just need to get this film done. - producer