What if the shark worked?

First off Happy belated 4th of July.

I'm celebrating my freedom by working on my movie.

I am looking over the footage we have for the final battle in REDD. Part of the final battle is when Smith (Chris Plouffe) faces off against Chapel (Richard Gaither). Chapel gets bit by a Werewolf and ends up turning into one. We've only shot about 5 minutes of this scene, and now the problem is that Richard is in Maine and may not be back in time for us to get the rest of his shots. So some creative problem solving is in order. But hey, that's pretty much all moviemaking is isn't it? Creative problem solving.

I've come to expect and almost love when we run into problems like this.  It's the blocks, the delays, the unexpected problems that are always great opportunities to come up with creative solutions and usually bring you to a solution that ends up being better than what you originally intended. This has happened to me quite a bit. Now I just get excited about what we can come up with. Not to say I don't get frustrated when things go wrong, you almost have to. It's just gotten easier to recognize the opportunity to turn negatives in to positives.

I always look to Jaws as an example.

If you're a fan of the movie Jaws as I am, you're familiar with the stories about how the mechanical shark never worked.  You've probably heard all the nightmare stories about shooting the movie, and what a pain in the ass it was to not have the shark functioning a good portion of the time. But it was their creative solutions that made the movie what it was.

Eventually they did get the shark to work, enough to get some key scenes, but I always figured if the shark did work the way it was supposed to, then perhaps Jaws wouldn't have turned out as great as it did. Many of my favorite scenes were minus the shark.

Some exciting news for REDD. Popular Author John M. Davis has agreed to work on the novelization of the screenplay for REDD. The novel will detail the entire story of the movie and give you more background and insight into the characters and the world of REDD. The novel will be available when the movie is released. You'll be able to get it as an E-Book as well as on paperback.  Check out the books of John M. Davis and his very popular Gunship stories.

You may notice on some of his book covers and art the image of our very own Amanda Elizabeth. She's done some modeling for a few of his book covers. Ain't she talented? Check out her site here.

I'm still making some casting decisions for REDD. Hopefully we can clear all that up and get to shooting in the next few weeks.

Now, if there was just some creative solution for beating this heat so we can shoot exteriors.