On behalf of everyone involved in the production of MINUS 1, I'd like to thank everyone who attended the premiere screening at the National Film Board of Canada, and those who tried to make it to the screening but were hampered by the apocalyptically bad weather we had that day.
The screening at the NFB went very well, and I can confirm that I am currently in talks with the Royal Film Commission of Jordan (http://www.film.jo) to screen both MINUS 1 and BLACK COFFEE at a special screening ceremony in Amman this summer. I will be conducting my discussions with the RFC immediately upon my arrival in Jordan on the 10th of September and will hopefully be able to attract enough attention to help me finance my debut feature film, to be shot in Jordan in Arabic.
Thank you all for your continuing support, and keep watching for more updates in terms of releases of the film or other screenings.
Yours,
Zaid
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Hello everyone,
I'm gonna make this a quick update because it's 2.40am and I'm exhausted. The shoot last week went great aside from a few bumps along the way with the settings (nothing too bad, no worries). The shoot started off at the Church, moved on to the internal scenes at the house, and the next day went off to Sterling Road in Toronto to do more of the outdoor shots that we finished the movie with. Everyone's contribution was fantastic and I'd like to personally thank everyone who was there to help out on the film.
There will be professional photos soon, courtesy of our photographer Darren Kennedy. Until then, keep your eyes peeled for more updates on how postproduction works out. We've got some B-roll footage to shoot at some point in time (when it gets cloudier, weather permitting) and then Eric Wiegand will be ready to work his magic in the edit suite.
Keep watching! See you later!
I'm gonna make this a quick update because it's 2.40am and I'm exhausted. The shoot last week went great aside from a few bumps along the way with the settings (nothing too bad, no worries). The shoot started off at the Church, moved on to the internal scenes at the house, and the next day went off to Sterling Road in Toronto to do more of the outdoor shots that we finished the movie with. Everyone's contribution was fantastic and I'd like to personally thank everyone who was there to help out on the film.
There will be professional photos soon, courtesy of our photographer Darren Kennedy. Until then, keep your eyes peeled for more updates on how postproduction works out. We've got some B-roll footage to shoot at some point in time (when it gets cloudier, weather permitting) and then Eric Wiegand will be ready to work his magic in the edit suite.
Keep watching! See you later!
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Shooting Today
Wow....has it been a hectic week of running around or what. Still, I love doing this no matter how stressful it is.
Yesterday, 1st AD Jason McLeod, Grip Kiran Singh and I went out to several production service places around Toronto, driving a giant HINO van to pick up all the lighting, location support equipment and the big prop of the fancy coffin. It was a fun ride that ended up with all three of us being extremely starving in the sun (which thankfully came out again just in time for the shoot!). We topped off the day with a nice little meal courtesy of Popeye's on Yonge. What a meal that was! :-P
At 6pm we had a small dress rehearsal for Michael and Claire at Carina's place. Art Director Sonia Hong was on call to help me determine what is needed for hte wardrobe. With that out of the way 2 hours later all that was needed was to keep a clear head and a smile on your face and you're ready to start shooting.
They tell you it's easy? Boy do they not know what goes on in one's head 12 hours before a shoot!
So here I am, it's 10.36am in Toronto by my watch. We're due to meet up for our first location shoot, the Metropolitan United Church, in an hour and a half. I'm excited, nervous, and impatient. I really hope this works out both for my sake and for that of all the people who've had faith in me over the past few months to make this work.
See you on the other side :-)
Yesterday, 1st AD Jason McLeod, Grip Kiran Singh and I went out to several production service places around Toronto, driving a giant HINO van to pick up all the lighting, location support equipment and the big prop of the fancy coffin. It was a fun ride that ended up with all three of us being extremely starving in the sun (which thankfully came out again just in time for the shoot!). We topped off the day with a nice little meal courtesy of Popeye's on Yonge. What a meal that was! :-P
At 6pm we had a small dress rehearsal for Michael and Claire at Carina's place. Art Director Sonia Hong was on call to help me determine what is needed for hte wardrobe. With that out of the way 2 hours later all that was needed was to keep a clear head and a smile on your face and you're ready to start shooting.
They tell you it's easy? Boy do they not know what goes on in one's head 12 hours before a shoot!
So here I am, it's 10.36am in Toronto by my watch. We're due to meet up for our first location shoot, the Metropolitan United Church, in an hour and a half. I'm excited, nervous, and impatient. I really hope this works out both for my sake and for that of all the people who've had faith in me over the past few months to make this work.
See you on the other side :-)
Monday, May 5, 2008
Things have been picking up rather well on the Minus 1 front as we prepare to start shooting at the end of the week. As a matter of fact the time now is 13.08 on Monday afternoon and at 4pm Eric, Michael and I have a meeting with the top production team which in the past few days has evolved from just being Kar Wai Ng to art director Sonia Hong, production manager MyLy Pham, as well as 1st AD Jason McLeod.
MyLy's been fantastic at organising the shoot schedules and call sheets and her contacts with the related parties, and it's definitely made my faith in the production stronger still. Apart from contacting The Metropolitan United Church and the Regent Park Council for us, MyLy's been great at getting our priorities set with the permits from the City of Toronto so as to keep the work running smoothly.
Sonia came in a few days later by reccommendation from Michael and I liked the fact that she was in tune with the production's visual aspects from the start. Sonia is now attempting to buy more props and additions for set decoration based on our limited budget from flea markets and discount shops. I find that rather a fun concept actually since it's just a reflection of how dedicated people are to finding the few bits and bobs the production needs to secure the authenticity of its look and how bare-bones the production is. Hehehe...
We had a bit of a kerfuffle with the Regent Park Council a few days ago when they refused to let us shoot on their grounds without paying an exorbitant sum of money per day for the production (for the sake of not embarrassing both them and us, no numbers will be given here). However I believe Eric and Michael have come up with a solution that would probably satisfy everyone and keep us on the go for the time being until it is necessary to find a contingency plan and shoot elsewhere in the City, which I hope won't be necessary at all.
Apart from that everything is hunky-dory. I'm hoping that Humber College excuse me if I become a bit pre-occupied with the film over the next fortnight or so as classes commence again and I find myself trying to balance between the two facets of my life. Once everything clears up I'm hoping we can start to send out letters to film festivals worldwide in hopes of attracting enough attention to the film and possibly get our names out there as writers and directors and established filmmakers. This should be a good opportunity for all.
And now I have to take the family car out for an oil change. I'll see you all at the next update! :-)
MyLy's been fantastic at organising the shoot schedules and call sheets and her contacts with the related parties, and it's definitely made my faith in the production stronger still. Apart from contacting The Metropolitan United Church and the Regent Park Council for us, MyLy's been great at getting our priorities set with the permits from the City of Toronto so as to keep the work running smoothly.
Sonia came in a few days later by reccommendation from Michael and I liked the fact that she was in tune with the production's visual aspects from the start. Sonia is now attempting to buy more props and additions for set decoration based on our limited budget from flea markets and discount shops. I find that rather a fun concept actually since it's just a reflection of how dedicated people are to finding the few bits and bobs the production needs to secure the authenticity of its look and how bare-bones the production is. Hehehe...
We had a bit of a kerfuffle with the Regent Park Council a few days ago when they refused to let us shoot on their grounds without paying an exorbitant sum of money per day for the production (for the sake of not embarrassing both them and us, no numbers will be given here). However I believe Eric and Michael have come up with a solution that would probably satisfy everyone and keep us on the go for the time being until it is necessary to find a contingency plan and shoot elsewhere in the City, which I hope won't be necessary at all.
Apart from that everything is hunky-dory. I'm hoping that Humber College excuse me if I become a bit pre-occupied with the film over the next fortnight or so as classes commence again and I find myself trying to balance between the two facets of my life. Once everything clears up I'm hoping we can start to send out letters to film festivals worldwide in hopes of attracting enough attention to the film and possibly get our names out there as writers and directors and established filmmakers. This should be a good opportunity for all.
And now I have to take the family car out for an oil change. I'll see you all at the next update! :-)
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
A rough poster for the film.
This is obviously not Claire, but hopefully we'll get a photoshoot going for her soon.
Stay tuned!
Monday, April 28, 2008
Another week of no updates is justified when you consider how busy it's been on fronts other than just the film one. Since I'm doing my post-grad diploma at Humber College, this past week was the finals week for the second term and I need to bone up on the work. Nevertheless, through all the hub-bub of getting the studying out of the way, we managed to find ourselves our lead actress to play the role of Vicky, our troubled protagonist.
Ladies & Gentlemen, boys and girls, please welcome the lovely Ms. Claire Duncan
Claire comes to us from Newton Landry management and from the two actresses that we managed to narrow down our entries to, she was the most convincing, most prepared and most connected to the role of Vicky. In her second reading in cooperation with Anne and Michael, I really saw how the three of them would work together to form the great on-screen team for the film.
We're going to be working on an EPK to send out to festivals later in the year and hope that it works out for us. We already have an idea of how we want our promo poster would look like and are hoping to schedule a photoshoot with Claire at some point in time so we can work on it.
Keep watching the blog for more news on how it goes, and hopefully very soon we'll have an EPK ready for you all to download.
Adios! :-)
Ladies & Gentlemen, boys and girls, please welcome the lovely Ms. Claire Duncan
Claire comes to us from Newton Landry management and from the two actresses that we managed to narrow down our entries to, she was the most convincing, most prepared and most connected to the role of Vicky. In her second reading in cooperation with Anne and Michael, I really saw how the three of them would work together to form the great on-screen team for the film.
We're going to be working on an EPK to send out to festivals later in the year and hope that it works out for us. We already have an idea of how we want our promo poster would look like and are hoping to schedule a photoshoot with Claire at some point in time so we can work on it.
Keep watching the blog for more news on how it goes, and hopefully very soon we'll have an EPK ready for you all to download.
Adios! :-)
Monday, April 21, 2008
A Much-Needed Update
I haven't updated in a week. Bad, bad Zaid! I should have done that a very long time ago.
Thing is, I couldn't help it! It's been such an exciting week in terms of casting and location scouting that one gets caught up in the excitement of the whole thing to the point of being overwhelmed! Hehehehe
Well, first of all! Casting on Monday was fantastic! We had close to 30 actors and actresses coming in for these three parts. Some carried themselves with a great deal of talent and others, well...you could tell they were new to the acting thing! Nevertheless we are happy to confirm that we have succeeded in casting the roles of Vicky's Mom and The Dealer.
Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Anne Shepherd and Michael Woodley:
So now all that's left is having a second reading for the two actresses that we've narrowed our choices down to for the role of Vicky: Saffron Cassaday and Claire Duncan. They'll both be reading on Wednesday April 21st with Michael and Anne and a decision will be made then. It's gonna be tough, but it's also gonna be great.
Also in the fantastic zone of news! HAH! You're gonna like this, we've been negotiating with the Metropolitan United Church of Toronto for the use of their sanctuary area for the filming of the final scene of the movie. Kar Wai, Eric, Michael and I went for a location scout the past Wednesday to all three locations in the film (Regent Park, the house, and the Church) and we've got some fantastic prospects on the table.
We've also got a new CGI expert working on another draft of the work for the film, Mark Alberts comes to us recommended by producer Eric Weigand and has some great ideas for the CGI effects used in the film.
We're also happy to welcome veteran sound engineer Valentin Pricop (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0697233/) to the team as on-location sound mixer.
It's rather fantastic to know that someone who's worked on $10m movies and productions before can spare some time to work on a small little thing like this that's about 1% of the budget of his other work.
The support I've been getting for the project from friends and acquaintances is great. There's no doubt that friends are an important factor in spreading word of mouth about the film, but it's rather overwhelming to see the support go in such directions as attempting to help with entities such as the Dubai International Film Festival or the elusive Royal Film Commission of Jordan. My thanks and appreciation goes out to all of you who help out constantly.
It may interest some of you to know that I am also currently extending a short screenplay that I have into feature length in anticipation of sending it to the RFC in Jordan to see the potential for finding investors for it there. It'll be an interesting story, I'll promise you that. So if you're interested, keep watching the blog ;-)
See you all later, god bless!
Thing is, I couldn't help it! It's been such an exciting week in terms of casting and location scouting that one gets caught up in the excitement of the whole thing to the point of being overwhelmed! Hehehehe
Well, first of all! Casting on Monday was fantastic! We had close to 30 actors and actresses coming in for these three parts. Some carried themselves with a great deal of talent and others, well...you could tell they were new to the acting thing! Nevertheless we are happy to confirm that we have succeeded in casting the roles of Vicky's Mom and The Dealer.
Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Anne Shepherd and Michael Woodley:
So now all that's left is having a second reading for the two actresses that we've narrowed our choices down to for the role of Vicky: Saffron Cassaday and Claire Duncan. They'll both be reading on Wednesday April 21st with Michael and Anne and a decision will be made then. It's gonna be tough, but it's also gonna be great.
Also in the fantastic zone of news! HAH! You're gonna like this, we've been negotiating with the Metropolitan United Church of Toronto for the use of their sanctuary area for the filming of the final scene of the movie. Kar Wai, Eric, Michael and I went for a location scout the past Wednesday to all three locations in the film (Regent Park, the house, and the Church) and we've got some fantastic prospects on the table.
We've also got a new CGI expert working on another draft of the work for the film, Mark Alberts comes to us recommended by producer Eric Weigand and has some great ideas for the CGI effects used in the film.
We're also happy to welcome veteran sound engineer Valentin Pricop (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0697233/) to the team as on-location sound mixer.
It's rather fantastic to know that someone who's worked on $10m movies and productions before can spare some time to work on a small little thing like this that's about 1% of the budget of his other work.
The support I've been getting for the project from friends and acquaintances is great. There's no doubt that friends are an important factor in spreading word of mouth about the film, but it's rather overwhelming to see the support go in such directions as attempting to help with entities such as the Dubai International Film Festival or the elusive Royal Film Commission of Jordan. My thanks and appreciation goes out to all of you who help out constantly.
It may interest some of you to know that I am also currently extending a short screenplay that I have into feature length in anticipation of sending it to the RFC in Jordan to see the potential for finding investors for it there. It'll be an interesting story, I'll promise you that. So if you're interested, keep watching the blog ;-)
See you all later, god bless!
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