Look to the Beard

A couple of days ago John, Scott, I were getting still pics taken for the movie’s poster/dvd with our photographer Chris Tait (christait.ca if interested) and something occurred to me. As we set up, it occurred to me that every decision that was made about the film’s schedule was based on my beard.



I always wondered where big movies start with scheduling. Obviously you would group scenes by location and film accordingly. And you would to do things somewhat sequentially to keep the prima donna actors (like me) happy. But where do you start?

Well luckily I didn’t have to think about that too hard. Because I had no choice but to start at a certain point in the story because of my beard.

Well my facial hair and hair length to be exact. How ridiculous is that!! All that other stuff, actor availability, location availability, convenience, that was all secondary to how my hair/facial hair needed to look in each scene.

It’s funny, having worn every proverbial hat on this project that I possibly could, I’ve realized that all the Neils don’t really like each other. For example: Neil the producer, the guy that needs to schedule out how to film a 91 page script within a reasonable amount of time, thinks that Neil the writer is an asshole for creating a veritable logistical nightmare by writing in that Neil the actor needs play 7 (that’s right 7?!?) different parts.

Neil the producer suspects that Neil the prima donna actor was in the writer’s ear the whole writing process going “give me more to do….No no screw that, I can play that part too, and that part too, oh and hey why not that one.” Haha, basically Neil the producer thinks that Neil in all other forms are dicks.

Before you get too worried that this is some weird one-man movie…well wait it is. No I’m just kidding, there are plenty of other good-looking people to look at.

But yeah, here’s how I scheduled the movie.

First we filmed 'early story Trent' who had grossly long, dirty facial hair and long hair to match which meant that we filmed the 18 scenes with bearded Trent first in the first two weeks. We also filmed 3 scenes with the dream character that I also play named Sharky (who was essentially Trent’s subconsciously ill-informed caricature-like interpretation of what a coke head would be like).

I grew that facial hair for about a month and a half. I even had this beauty movember worthy beard and mustache combination for my convocation. Haha, that’s commitment for you. Needless to say Nicole wasn’t thrilled about my grizzly adams face…haha, she wasn’t actually angry, she would just give me a much needed hard time every once and awhile ;)



Next up I shaved off the beard. A momentous day indeed. Within 10 minutes of shaving, I started filming one of four flashback scenes of early Trent.

From there I got a minor trim of my mop and started filming the second half of the real life story with Trent (and by real life, I mean: not dream sequence stuff). This amounted to 42 scenes. Which at the time I thought would mean we were almost done filming…HA HA was I ever wrong. This took us to about July 16th ish…give or take a week.



So we did this epic marathon over 3 weeks I think. Over this period I shaved daily for the first week and a half…then I stopped. Because this is as we’re approaching the climax of the movie where Trent’s falling apart, so I figured it would be good that I was no longer clean-shaven. Incidentally, my week and a half stubble is my sweet spot, where my facial hair looks kind of cool, without being creepy or dirty looking. See my convocation picture for the definition of creepy and dirty facial hair.

So once we finished filming the last of that segment. It was big haircut time. My f***ing bowl cut (which became the bane of my existence) was transformed into my best attempt at Tyler Durden hair.

From this point all but 5 members of the 14 person cast were done filming.

Real life sequence was done filming. It was onto the dream sequence.

The character Billy came first. Billy’s the cool one of the two main dream versions of Trent. Billy = how Trent wishes he could be mixed with his interpretation of what his brother was like. Glenn = Trent’s interpretation of how he sees himself and the possessor of all of Trent’s weaknesses and shortcomings in real life. In short Billy’s cool and Glenn’s a tool.

Billy had 23 scenes. This took a good two and a half, maybe three weeks.



You have to understand, playing a cool version of myself, was surprisingly difficult…haha. I had to work my ass off and do a lot of takes to come off cool. I’m pretty proud of how it has turned out so far. But it was a struggle. It was interesting to see some of my tells that I wasn’t feeling a hundred percent sure of myself. My voice wouldn’t come out as strongly, I would speak quicker and would trip over my words, and sometimes my eyes would almost flutter as I blinked when I was not feeling the Billyness.

After finishing Billy’s scenes. I had to do 8 of Glenn’s 20 scenes, because the second half of the movie, Glenn tries to look better so he has some facial hair, and slightly more stylin’ hair. So for 8 scenes, I would do Billy, then right away, change my outfit and hair and film Glenn. That was actually really helpful, because it made it easier to remember what it was I’m reacting off of.

Once I was done Billy and late Glenn. I got another haircut and started to do early Glenn.

Early Glenn is super awkward, and kind of toolish. This was surprisingly easy for me to play haha. Dammit. It was actually a tough balance to have Glenn be toolish, but not over the top bad acting toolish. Like when you see someone playing a nerd on tv and in movies and it’s so viciously over the top. That’s what I didn’t want. The result was an awkward kind of strange guy.
One of the most interesting things I realized so far from the people who have seen some of the movie is that girls love Glenn and guys despise Glenn.

I have a theory about this. Girls like Glenn because he’s cute and awkward and they feel sorry for Glenn because he’s kind of a nice guy, and he’s trying his best to be cool. But! But, girls love Glenn not at all in the way that that’s what they look for in a guy. Guys on the other hand can’t stand Glenn, because he’s so awkward and toolish. He’d be the guy who the guys would make fun of in the hockey dressing room. I think the reason that guys really can’t handle Glenn is because of the fact that guy’s see the worst of themselves in Glenn. All guys know that they have the potential to be, in some capacity, like Glenn. All guys (I’m generalizing here obviously, but most guys) fear being weak, unconfident, and just generally awkward and uncomfortable in their own skin. And that’s what Glenn represents.

So I get a haircut. And to get into Glenn, what I would do was shower, then put zero product in my hair, so it would just sit there not spiked but just kind of foofy (foofy??!!?) just very unstylish. Then I would wear my nerdy glasses. (I have two pairs…one for early Glenn, and a dark framed more stylish pair for later Glenn).

And bam! Just looking like this would make me feel very self conscious and painfully self-aware. This combination of lack of style and crippling self doubt equaled the perfect Glenntastic cocktail. And to cap it off, when I’m not paying attention, sometimes I smile and my bottom lip covers some of my top teeth, and I just strongly resemble a tool...this is Glenn.



I know that all these things I’m writing make me sound really vain but when you watch 20 odd takes of 20 odd scenes where you're playing cooler and toolier versions of yourself, you start to notice trends.

So for the next 2 or three weeks, we filmed Glenn’s half of the remaining 12 scenes.

After finishing these scenes I was still not finished. Believe it or not. Haha. There are actually 3 more scenes where there are not only 2 versions of me (Billy and Glenn) but a third guy. To date I’ve only finished one of those…and unfortunately (or fortunately if you’re sick of seeing Neil) I think this’ll be the first to be cut. Not because it’s a bad scene, just because it kind of crushes some positive/comedic flow of the segment in which it resides.

So to date we have filmed 96 of the 99 scenes. 2 of the last three that need to be filmed are waiting on…you guessed it…my hair and facial hair. And the last one, we just haven’t got to yet. It’s tough to schedule people in the fall, they’re always doing their own thing…selfish bastards. Just kidding.

So there it is. That’s how you schedule a movie. Look to the beard. It will reveal the answers to all your scheduling problems.

Running Out of Running Time

I wonder about things like this: if you like you're job, you don't ever want to leave it. Then it's always on your mind. But if you hate your job, you leave it at the end of the day, and you don't think about it. Except the odd lingering feeling that you hate your job of course. Which of these two situations is better for all the other parts of life that aren't your job. Circumstances have lead me to be in this state of mind today, which makes editing a struggle.

Although another reason editing's a struggle is that it tends to be a pain in the ass to see Lady's Speed Stick on a shelf in the background of my scene. I can't use that shot. And yes, is the answer, I do wear Lady's Speed Stick (kidding...maybe).

An hour and 19 minutes done, and I'm still a ways from the climax. The last movie I saw was Trainspotting. Running time 94 minutes. I am worried. But other of my favs include Fight Club 139 minutes, Pulp Fiction 154 minutes. So clearly, unlike some people I don't discriminate based on length...(haha). It takes balls to try to make a movie longer than two hours. Cuz long movies that don't quite hit the mark are painful. Short movies that have even an ounce of filler, feel unfulfilling. It's a tightrope Spud...a fuckin tightrope.




Railed Up and Wrecked has two stories that it's following. Trent's story. And Dream Story which is Trent's way of subconsciously dealing with everything through two main characters Billy and Glenn. Billy is Trent's dream interpretation of his brother as well as how he'd like to be; and Glenn is Trent's interpretation of himself. Trainspotting only follows Renton's story. Pulp Fiction follows three stories (Vincent's, Butch's and Jules'). So based on this very precise mathematical system of 1 story = 90 min (Trainspotting) and 3 stories = 150 mins (Pulp Fiction) that should put Railed Up at exactly 120 minutes with 2 stories. Right?? Haha, I hope so.



Running time is always on my mind lately. It's always that 'but' in my mind. Like "Damn that's a sick line, I can't cut that.....but"

1 hour 19 minutes. That's the mark I hit early this afternoon. Things are slow. I am sad. But that's a from a combination of things. This project is all consuming. When I'm not editing, or working on it in some way or another I feel like I should be. Is this bad? I don't know. Probably not. I don't yet have enough perspective yet still being in the thick of it.. I'm probably just having a rough day.

hmmm...

I think that's it for now..





Here's a couple for pics from the movie...This is from a beauty scene where John's character beats the shit out of the blond lookin fella Mitch, while 3 guys hold him back, Scott (the shaved head guy), Matt (Black Shirt Guy), and Bruce (looks super worried guy)

Snorting Flour

It’s 11:15am, I just had a mini panic attack. I’d just hit the 70 minute mark of edited material on Railed Up and Wrecked when the power goes out. My external hard-drives don’t have any juice, so final cut pro (my editing software) starts looking for files that are no longer there. Everything goes red. In Final Cut, red means bad.

11:23am power comes back on. I open up final cut. It takes literally a minute because of the size of the movie. A minute’s a long time to have look at a window telling you the progress of opening a file, that if lost, would cause me to go into a homicidal rage . I’m pretty sure it’ll be all good, but I still worry, because that’s what I do. I worry about stuff, it feels like I’m doing something. After the long minute, it opens, the red is gone, everything’s all good.

Still, not a great feeling to have after finishing up editing a real cool scene with a great performance by one of my actors, Brendan Hunter. This guy’s a beauty. He gives off a Peter Saarsgard type of vibe because of his voice. Except Brendan has this intensity that makes it seem like he might just snap at any moment and, maybe kick your teeth in, if he feels so inclined.

I wish I had more scenes with the guy. When we were filming, I never really knew what he was going to do. After the 15th take, (each take was different incidentally), he started to get right up in my face at the end of the scene. This was a perfect character choice, as the guy he’s playing is named DB (I couldn’t think of a name for this character while writing so I called him DB, which was my short hand for DoucheBag). The first time Brendan got up in my face, I was so taken aback that I literally could not handle the tension, so I would laugh and fuck up the take. Neil the editor is now angry at Neil the actor for being a bitch and not being able to stay in character because Brendan was dishing out gold.





DB is one of 4 characters that Trent (my character) and Mike (Scott Reid’s character) go to deal drugs to. Each of the four guys only has one scene each. All these guys did truly bang up jobs with these parts. These were some of the most fun scenes to film. Maybe because all the guys playing them were very unpredictable. Case in point: Dusty McDougall pictured below began snorting the flour I had brought as prop cocaine at the end of each take!! Even when he wasn’t on camera…Haha Beauty. Each scene had it’s own little tangential story that helped them be fleshed out characters. But not so tangential that they take away from the main story.



I read this book about screenwriting by Syd Field, it was a decent book, less a few big lies, such as with a screenplay: a page of script = a minute film. Syd you dirty liar. I have a 90-page script that’s going to be a 135-minute first cut. I don’t actually blame Syd, because I’d say 90% of the stuff in his book helped me.

This book is still covered in post it notes marking all the important info. That’s something I was into for a while, what with studying and all. So all the books I read for like two years were all fat cuz they were overflowing with post it notes. Quick side note: All my third year engg notebooks are covered in post it notes containing the millions of invented fractured English words that my teachers would use. Example: Mow-teep-why = Multiply. In-vin-a-mint = Environment. Per-mee-tee = Permeability. Trripell Hump Backattack =??? Something involving some chemical reaction ???. Haha good times.



Anyways Syd Field’s book talked about how a scene has to be doing one of two things, or else it doesn’t belong in the movie. A scene either has to move the plot forward, or else it has to reveal something about the characters. The plot ones are important otherwise you a have stagnant movie, that’s not really headed anywhere. But if have nothing but these scenes, you have a boring movie that takes a straight-line path from A to B. And the second type, this is where I found a lot of freedom in the script writing. I tried to come up with the most interesting, funny, entertaining ways of revealing certain things about characters. Did I go overboard sometimes? Absolutely. But that’s what editing’s for, poor Sharky’s 7 minute speech will probably be cut down to 2 or 3 minutes ☹ Not cuz it’s bad just cuz the point can be gotten across with 2 or 3 minutes.

One thing that really helped me as far as screenwriting was the structure that the screenplay needs to follow according to good old Syd Field. Now again the structure part is like the plot moving scenes I mentioned. There’s certain points you need to hit, like the point about 15 to 20 pages in that sends the main character out of old world and into the new world where they will go through stuff that will change them yada yada yada: essentially sending them into the action of the story. Then another point 90 pages in (this is based on Syd’s erroneous 120 page recommendation, essentially 3 quarters of the way through) where something sends the character towards the climax.

So if you know the beginning, the end, and these two points, you’re good to go. Now it’s within this structure that a good writer (whether or not I am or not remains to be seen, but we’ll go on the assumption that at least I know what good is….maybe) can find freedom. You can take a bunch of different paths to get between these four points. So with Railed Up I tried to not do the run of the mill straight line between the four points, but I also tried not to have the line veer so far of the straight line path that it gets lost in tangential BS that slows it down too much.

So with the four guys DB (Intense manic Peter Saarsgard), Ozzy (played by my buddy Izzy haha), Chase (played by flour snorting Dustin MacDougall), and Anton (a very late find, this guy needed to be the epitome of douchebaggery, as well as kind of tough, played very nicely by Todd Moon (who is not as big of a doucher as the one he’s playing)) I was able to come up with interesting and entertaining ways to reveal certain things about certain key characters, none of which I will reveal right now.



Movies are surprisingly not that long incidentally. I’ll explain. Once I realized Mi Heramano: my 140 page “masterpieceofshit” needed to be rewritten. I did it differently. Over the summer and beginning of fall, before 4th year structural got out of control with homework, I would carry around my notebook, writing down ideas, scenes, orders of scenes, beginning, end, other structural points, funny pieces of dialogue, the points I wanted to get across with each scene etc etc etc. I would bring this everywhere, to class, to watch my gf (Nicole ;)) and my sister Ali ( who’s in the movie as….my cousin…big stretch I know, I’m so creative haha) play hockey with the Dinos. You never know where or when ideas'll hit you.

Then by October 2008, school got too busy, so I left everything to fully concentrate on school. Then in December 2008, I picked back up the notebook, and for a couple days really finished fleshing out ideas, structure and what I wanted the movie to say.

Then I busted out my trustee macbook pro, and started writing this bitch out. Now screenplay formatting is a pain in the ass and seriously gets in the way of creative flow. So over the course of two weeks (but mainly 3 or 4 five-hour writing sessions) I wrote a 25 page jumble that was the whole screenplay. This was something only I could understand, because there’d be dialogue without noting who said it. But this was enough for me to be able to put it away again by January, concentrate on my final semester, and be able to pick it up again in May and just transcribe my Neil code jumble into a formatted screenplay.

But that’s what I’m saying, my 25 page jumble = 91 page screenplay = 135 min first cut. Ridiculous! That just shows you how long books are and how movies are just a completely different medium. Without getting into too many differences, you can get a lot more into a 400 page book as far as ideas, insight, intricate stories etc. But with film, you have the advantage of significantly higher sensory impact on your audience. That means, that with film, you better know what you want to say, and the ideas you want to get across, because you only have 25 pages to do it.

Just to bring things back around, if I was writing Railed Up the book DB, Chase, Ozzy, and Anton would probably have fully developed tangential stories of their own within the main story. But because I don’t have time to veer too far off the main path of the movie, we only get a glimpse into these characters. But hopefully it’s enough to like what we’re shown.

Anger Leads To Nothing But Good Things

I woke up this morning feeling brutal once again. Probably from the swine flu shot I got 6 days ago…I’m hoping that’s what it’s from, otherwise I’m just another out of shape slug that tends to feel like shit after 8 hours of sleep.

I don’t edit right away, like I should (I’m done 67 minutes so far, see a screen capture below). Instead I do my best to ignore my catholic guilt, as I drink coffee and watch extra features on a British horror movie I watched a couple nights ago. This is what makes me feel better, movie related shit…and stimulants. Two years ago, before discovering coffee, I probably would have tried to go about my day, whilst being really angry because I feel like shit.





However it should be noted that if it was two years ago, I might have also been angry because I would’ve been sitting in an engineering class listening to some douche with a PhD as he butchers the English language while trying to teach whatever incomprehensible nonsense which happened to be on the docket that day.

See you can tell, I get that irritability creeping back every time I start thinking about my days as an engineer. But I have my coffee, and my movie shit……so it’s all good. Anyways, so I’m watching behind the scenes on this Brit flick “The Children” which was pretty awesome, in spite of the fact it was tough to understand these brits. This wasn’t quite Trainspotting incomprehensible (which funny enough becomes comprehensible after you watch it 20 odd times). They assume people watching this movie speak British.





Dammit! I can’t get to my point, it’s the inner screenwriter in me feeling the need to explain a lot of shit, so no one gets lost…Here’s the point: watching behind the scenes, I get this nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach. This is because I see this movie set, that looks like complete chaos, with a shit ton of people hanging around, nothing ever seems to get done, set ups take so long, and the responsibility of this whole mess all seems to, in one way or another, fall onto the shoulders of the director....And this is what I aspire to? Haha, yeah I guess so.

Would this be an easy job for Neil to do…Hell no! Let’s check out the cliff notes on Neil (Yep third person, I’m an egomaniac, don’t worry about it)

And for those of you who find the story of my life, told by me, a little heavy. My apologies, but in order to understand why a seemingly well-to-do civil engineering graduate would ever attempt to make a feature length film, I felt a little back-story was necessary.

Here it goes:

1986 Neil is born

Neil, as a kid, is shy. (Not a good start as far as being a director)

But Neil is good at stuff (thanks to mom and dad for some good genes).

Neil being good at stuff gets Neil friends.

Neil goes through elementary school and junior high playing sports, being good and thus having friends.

(Again this sounds egotistical, I got it, but I’ll break it down for you: people initially don’t flock to Neil cuz Neil is shy. People see Neil play sports. He is above average. People want to be friends with the above average people…bam! Neil has friends)

Neil goes to high school, doesn’t play high school sports. No one sees Neil be good at stuff…bam! Neil has no friends. This is because Neil never had to develop social skills to get friends up to this point, just be better than them at sports.

Neil doesn’t like high school too much. But it’s not hard, so Neil gets good grades.

End of high school – Neil has a few friends, but Neil is lazy, he didn’t work too hard at getting friends/girlfriends. Neil was lazy because everything else Neil had: came easy - athletics, school: these things Neil was a natural at.

Got good grades, Neil goes to university cuz Neil wanted to be an actor, parents (thankfully) said go to school while acting.

Fine. Neil goes to school, Dad-engineer, brother-engineer do we see a trend here-Neil-engineer

Bad news, Neil sucks at engineering…not really sucks, just below average.

What do below average people have to do to get through, work hard.

Shit. Neil is lazy…working hard is hard.

Neil has few friends, Neil has to work hard at school, Neil doesn’t like engineering

Neil is angry!

Neil’s anger builds for three years. More hard work! More teachers that suck and can’t speak English! Neil is super pissed.

Neil still has minimal social skills. Cuz if he’s working hard at school…Fuck working hard at something else too.

Neil has few friends, no girlfriends, he is angry depressed. Neil is getting very few acting gigs.

Oh right…after first year, Neil gets big audition: part of Robert Ford in Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford. Neil obviously doesn’t get that…because in spite of a solid audition…Neil has 0 experience, Neil is not famous; Neil is probably not good enough. Neil is not Casey Affleck.

Neil is not acting with Brad Pitt. Neil is at school. Neil is girlfriendless. Neil is angry/depressed.

Anyone reading this must be thinking…good old Neil is approaching serial killerdom haha. Don’t worry I’m not.





While avoiding school in 3rd year school, Neil rents El Mariachi. Neil is introduced to who Robert Rodriguez is. Neil listens to commentary. Neil gets Rodriguez’s book. Neil says fuck waiting for acting parts. He’ll write and make his own…Rodriguez style.

Neil needs to finish school first. John (brother) finishes engineering; Neil goes to Europe with John.

Neil goes to Europe. Europe makes Neil angry. Surprise. It wasn’t Europe’s fault Neil was just angry. (Need proof compare John and Neil’s Europe blogs…believe it or not they were on the same trip.)

In Germany John and Neil film short film on a digital camera called ‘Mi Hermano’ (Rodriguez connection anybody? Haha)





In Spain Neil decides Mi Hermano should be full-length movie…this will be Neil’s El Mariachi.

Problem: Neil has good ideas, but ultimately Neil’s screenplay sucked! Dialogue is horrible, totally not believable because (connection point here) Neil spent the last 6 years friendless (pretty much), girlfriendless (more or less) and thus with no idea how people speak.

Neil still thinks Mi Hermano is the shit! And that he’s Rodriguez. So Neil writes and re-writes Mi Hermano for months until it is a 140-page heap of average writing. We’ll get back to Neil the screenwriter in a minute.

Neil starts internship job (working as engg) to fund Mi Hermano.





Note: In Europe Neil had no choice but to develop a bit socially…just a bit though haha.

Neil meets girl: Nicole.

Neil manages to get Nicole to like him. Neil’s friendless girlfriendless life over.

Neil’s flung into this world of being social. Neil is out of Neil’s safe little world of watching movies and writing movies that have no basis in reality.

Neil experiences all the shit that should have been experienced 6 years ago, when Neil should’ve developed the social skills instead of retreating to the cave that eventually lead to anger, depression, and bad scripts.

This fact of wasted (not really, but kind of) time and life angers Neil. There are many surprises in this new world. This world is not as shiny and nice and Neil imagined it to be.

Neil is angry (not nearly as angry as before, but still a little angry) at the realization that the world wasn’t the way he thought is was going to be

Neil breaks out of angry funk and decides “Holy shit! This is it…I can’t keep waiting for the world to be shiny and perfect…that place doesn’t exist, so I must love this unshiny imperfect world”

Neil tries to be less angry, Neil works at social skills.

What Neil didn’t realize, is while Neil had left the safe little world, Neil was becoming a more well-rounded human being that had some actual life experience.

Neil’s screenwriting skills improve.

Neil realizes Mi Hermano, the 140-page heap of stinking poubelle, is actually a cool 40-page script.

Neil combines Mi Hermano elements into another, new story, based much more in real world. Blamo: Railed Up and Wrecked is born.

Neil does 4th year of engineering. Neil hates life less, has friends, school is hard but he makes it through.

Let’s not undercut this any, 4th year was fuckin hard. And to add to it, Neil took Structural minor=very useful minor=very fucking hard minor.

But Neil has learned to work hard; he knows what it takes to "get ‘er done," as it were. Neil passes all class and graduates with 3.43 GPA.

Neil is pumped.

And that, folks, is how Neil arrived at (May 2009) the beginning of the ridiculous process of trying to make a movie…