Ohna Falby

Yesterday we celebrated the premiere of Long Distance Information at Sundance 2012. The screening went amazingly well, a packed out cinema and receptive audience who laughed emphatically at all the right places and applauded loudly when it was over. Doug was so nervous he had to stand outside by the doors listening in. I think next time he will feel braver. He is also keen to see the feature film we are accompanying which is called TEDDY BEAR, directed by Danish director Mads Matthieson as beth and I watched it yesterday and it is an absolute gem. Many will know Mad's short film DENNIS which I believe also screened at Sundance a couple of years ago. TEDDY BEAR is the longer story of the same body-builder character, whose strange relationship with his oppressive mother has made him confused emotionally and unable to find a life partner to love (or even just to have sex with!). Beth and I just had to pose with him as he was beaming from ear to ear, so proud and happy to be here!

The first film I saw here was a documentary called ETHEL, an HBO documentary by Rory Kennedy - the youngest (11th!!) daughter of Bobby & Ethel Kennedy about her mother. What a brilliant film, and I was stirred by the audience reaction which was so emotional it caught me by surprise. I guess the Kennedy's have a very special place in the American collective spirit anyway, but I think this portrait showed such a very special woman and how she forged a most amazingly loving and close-knit family, and the most enviable marital relationship you can imagine (especially when you consider all the circumstances) that the audience were blown away and gave the director a standing ovation at the end. The Q&A session at the end was peppered with emotional questioners who made clear the respect they had for the filmmaker and her film's subjects. Also super instructive as I realised I hardly knew about any of this! Not to be missed once it's in the UK!

Since we've been here, we've been pretty darn busy & it's been really great. We've made quite a few teams of the films that are in competition here from around the world. We will be seeing L tonight. More news later!

I've been so busy it's hard to keep the news up to date, especially as far as LDI goes. People are calling out for it from all over the world now. We have had the immense pleasure of being invited to screen at Sundance and now immediately following on from that at Clermont Ferrand. There will be a special screening of LDI at Glasgow Film Festival, where the film is probably most at home - being home to both director (Douglas Hart) and lead actor (Peter Mullan) and I believe the rest of the cast too (Caroline Paterson & Alan Tripney). They will have a special retrospective screening of Doug's pop promos over the years as well as the film itself.

For the Christmas launch of his sold out vinyl Christmas single Atheist Christmas, written for LDI, Gruff Rhys will be doing a special gig at Rough Trade shops in London on the 19th of December. Don't miss it!

At some point I'll have to update the festival circuit list as it is quickly growing with many more about to come... But first off in the new year will be The London Short Film Festival and Doug is schedule to participate in a Q&A on the 13th of January. More details to follow.

This has been a busy year so much so it's quite frightening seeing that Christmas and the next year are only around the corner! Summer feels like it was only a couple of weeks ago (the weather does have something to answer for on that one) and instead of lazing about the pool I was prepping a little Cadburys commercial. Then came the Tottenham riots revisted and we were watching London up in flames on our little Lacanau TV set. We had to move the shoot when it became dangerous scouting the city at night and one of our location finders was mugged by 8 youths with baseball bats! Thankfully he wasn't hurt. Anyway fast forward to Friday and we were finally delivering the finished job. Anyway here's a link. And actually here it is in the context of the keepteamgbpumped.com campaign

The commercial was shot through Independent and the directors were called Jonnie and Trevor. What a lovely pair of directors to work with! Trevor had to rush home to be with his pregnant wife who in fact gave birth to a little baby boy on the 27th of September - so we were all glad he didn't stick around!

They came to London at the beginning of August and were surprised by our eclectic weather. It very soon became a matter of urgency to get them to the shops to stock up on appropriate London weather gear after which everything ran smoothly.

You have to watch Jonnie's humping movie for MTV called "My Humps". Not sure if it was on the back of that he was approached to do a Cadburys commercial. Maybe this lovely film of Trevor's helped too?

All night prep and night shooting again, which does of course solve problems like traffic and parking, but doesn't half make loos an unwelcome preoccupation.

So that's it! Last night was the London Calling screening in NFT1 and the last as part of the London Film Festival. Both short film programmes were really good and last night I particularly enjoyed Walk Tall by animator Kate Sullivan. It was a really fresh little film with beautiful illustrations and a most charismatic ex Olympic OAP, a really lovely film. Our film was also really well received and it was great to be immersed in the positive crowd reactions.

The School Of Life screenings were equally enjoyable and Douglas got to meet Terry Gilliam who also had a short in the programme. There was also a beautiful little film in the group called Bird by Jane Shearer & Steve Ayson of New Zealand. I hope it does well on the festival circuit & I look forward to catching all the shorts I missed at LFF at Encounters next month.

What is it with all these night shoots? Hmm glamourous? I hope I don't become an expert in them because they are ever so exhausting - not so much the shooting but especially the prep. Having to scout through the night and do all the prep (casting etc) throughout the day. When I came back from Argentina, I slept for 3 days. And here also is an article I found in Televisual.

I realise I never posted the Philips ad which went on air in July I think. This version with Director music - much nicer than aired version.

It looks like I haven't posted any pictures from the shoot either, so here are a couple. Director Philippe André in Buenos Aires at night (just before the downpour!) and the dream team Jan (Production Designer), Franz (DOP), Philippe (Director) & Steve (1st AD) on a bright sunny start to the last shoot day (again ending in a downpour!).

Yesterday we finished all picture post work on Long Distance Information. It is looking amazing (see the trailer) and I can't wait to start sending it off to festivals. The tracklay is done and now all we need to do is the final mix.

Mike's back at Tate Modern in the Turbine Hall for a short 4 or 5 days as of Wednesday next week - this coming week. We went to see him last night & it was a fantastic unmissable show, so I can only imagine that by Wednesday it will be even more so. He has new David Bowie footage, new costumes from Stevie, new tracks, new moves & apparantly there will also be screening of John Maybury & Ceryth's films - but I'm not sure if that's separate. I'll have to read up what it says. It's a really exciting space to see them dance in. Anyone who cares anything about dance & in fact everyone should go see it if you can get a ticket! Book here!

Mike was looking great, the only trace of his scary lung thing was that his operation scar
was visible beneath his costume...

It was all marvellous and i can't wait to see it again next week!