Big in Japan

[At the Indie Fest Awards with Sotu a.k.a. the CannibAlien, whose short "CannibAlien" also won]

I promised on the STM Facebook page that the next posting would be about the photo on this link:

http://ameblo.jp/cannibalien/image-10344096510-10255080138.html

I can't seem to copy & paste the pic, which sucks because I really love this pic! It is even better than the one above. Everything on the page is in Japanese, though, so I can't tell if there is a way to do it that I can't figure out.

Well, ALMOST everything is in Japanese. The caption of this photo reads "CannibAlien Can't Eat Rat". I was quite taken aback by this. I thought maybe Sotu thought it was a page I would never see and he was outright insulting me! This hurt my feelings, because he was very nice at the film festival and I talked to him several times. But finally I found that using one of the buttons that are in Japanese, I could scroll through other pictures of him with the mask at the awards night, and in all of them, he was pretending to eat some screaming person, and under each, the caption was, "CannibAlien Can't Eat Rat." Maybe it is a generalization about Americans, or maybe this is a ridiculously funny joke in Japan that just doesn't translate. Couldn't tell you.

Without rehashing everything I have already told you about Indie Fest and how weird it was to be in freakin' Disney Land by one's self, I do want to tell you a little about Sotu (as I only know a little about him). I believe he is the writer/director on CannibAlien, but I am not sure because his English was limited (though 100% better than my Japanese), and that is not the name on the credits.

I think Sotu was the only other filmmaker at the fest who was traveling by himself. The first day, he asked me where the sign-in table was and I pointed it out to him. The second night, I was standing in front of the theater waiting for the nightly Disney fireworks to start. He was nearby and kept looking at me. I knew he wanted to talk to me, but since for the first day and a half no one was really socializing, I was sliding dangerously deep into solitary mode. All these things were going through my stupid head,

Jeanie, for pete's sake, just talk to the poor guy, he obviously wants to talk to you, and I don't think it is in a hitting-on-me way at all, I am not getting that vibe, he's just alone, like you, in this weird place, which is even weirder for him because it is a foreign country, just give him the green light to say hello, you are probably looking like a stuck-up bitch right now, just SAY SOMETHING,

He kept lurking about and finally started talking to me, and I think we were both relieved. After that, it was all good and when we would run into each other at the fest we would smile and chat for a minute, and I was very happy for him when his short won because it was honestly REALLY good and he seemed to relax and have a lot of fun that night.

I just flipped back through the posts I wrote from Indie Fest, and I can't believe I didn't mention Bob Keiper. He is an actor who had a short in the fest. I met him at the Opening Night Party, while we were in line waiting to go into the ballroom at the Disney Hotel. He is an older gentleman, and asked if he could cut in line with me, his family was already inside. We exchanged vital movie-related stats while we shuffled slowly to the door, and once inside, he invited me to sit at the table with him and his wife and the director and producer of his movie, "A Dance of Two". Bob lives in Northern Virginia and we had a lot to chat about, and I spent a good bit of time talking to his very sweet wife, also. They both talked about how Bob was not usually very outgoing in a crowd of people that he doesn't know, so it is hard for him to force himself to network. Of course I said, me, too! Later, Bob and I walked around a little bit and did exactly that. It was easier to do it with someone who felt the same way. I've taken that walk sometimes with people who are VERY good at schmoozing and I can sometimes become a shrinking violet in that situation. But here was Bob, who has not only got a few years on me but is also SAG, and he is just as shy as I can be when I am out of my element! To have a compatriot in that situation made it a lot easier and a lot more enjoyable.

When I first got my feet wet in the biz, I thought I was the only one who felt that way, but in talking to a lot of filmmakers, I have found out that it is really the norm. We're all in the same boat. We are in an unfamiliar city, sometimes even in an unfamiliar country, putting ourselves on display via our films, waiting to be judged, hoping for the best and almost constantly just wishing someone would talk to us.

At the Heart of England Festival, my first, it was cool because everything was so contained, and none of the other filmmakers had brought a traveling companion, and most of them were American, so we just automatically hung out together. In Philly, I was a bit overwhelmed, it was much larger, much more spread out, social gatherings every night, and everyone was rabidly marketing themselves. Mikey was there with me, and in retrospect, I will admit I used him as a crutch and was not nearly as social as I should have been, though I did meet several people there with whom I am still in touch.

But Indie Fest really sealed the deal for me in a way, and it is frustrating to me now to not have another festival lined up because now I think I've got it. I met some people there who made some GREAT movies, and some of them had rather large groups with them, but they seemed really happy when I would make the rally call, "Let's go have a drink at the House of Blues!" Winning Best Director gave me more confidence in my abilities in that capacity, but attending these festivals has given me immeasurably more confidence in my self, and I am finding myself to be comfortable more and more often in situations that not that long ago would have completely stressed me out.

Some filmmakers put WAY too many expectations on the festival circuit, and others think it is a load of crap and there is little to be gained from it. The people who keep their respective faiths at those opposing extremes are missing much of the point and most of the fun, in my opinion. I went into this with no delusions of grandeur, and personally, I think they were worth every penny.

300!!!

is the number of fans we now have on our "Smalltimore, the Movie" Facebook page! I love milestones.

Blog My Mango!

To answer your first question, the title of this post means nothing. Just unrelated thoughts mashing together in my head. And it sounds like some random thing that Kyle Holtgren (pictured above, as David in "Smalltimore") would shout, unprovoked and loudly, after several cocktails at Dionysus just to make anyone with him laugh.

I just got back from having lunch with my good friend Christie Thorndill, who is in town for a visit. She used to live here but moved to Florida last summer, and so of course part of our lunch was spent covering the pros and cons of Baltimore and why people miss it when they leave. I was driving, and when we left, I asked Christie where she wanted me to drop her off. "Baltimore is your oyster!" I said. She replied, "I thought oysters were toxic." "No," I said, "they're an aphrodisiac!" And that sort of sums Baltimore up, in a weird way. One woman's toxin is another woman's aphrodisiac. Christie thought about this for a moment. "Actually, I'd prefer a mango."

I am boycotting Facebook today, because as you probably already know, the new version of Facebook sucks and everyone hates it. So I vowed not to log on at all today, and I am sticking by that, although I accidentally logged on at 12:49am because my computer was tied up burning DVDs to send to festivals for about two hours and I wanted to check it one last time before signing off. So, I won't get back on Facebook until at least 12:49am tonight.

Right before I went out to lunch, I received a text message on my phone from Kyle, tempting me to log on to FB. Yesterday I posted on the Smalltimore the Movie FB page that it would make me very happy if we could reach 100 fans of the page that day. Since announcing the "Feed a Starving Actor" competition (scroll down a few postings for details), our number of fans jumped from 50 to (as of signing off last night) 87, newcomers being mostly fans of Kyle or Phil Calvert, whose horns are now locked in a battle to the death over a juicy slab of meat. I was a bit disappointed in that we should have easily seen it hit 100. I have about 120 friends of my own on Facebook, and hardly any have become a fan of the movie page, which I don't really get, since every one of them know how much blood, sweat, tears, time, energy, love, and money I have sunk into this project! But never fear, Kyle, upon seeing my plea, posted, "I'm on it!" So he texted me today when we hit 98... then 99... then finally, Oh Joy!, 100!!!

You have to enjoy these little victories along the way, they help to keep you going, as the road to the big brass ring is long, rough, and uphill all the way. I am including links to this blog and the FB page on the DVDs I am sending to festivals now. It is the way people find out about things, it is the way people market interactively, and the great thing is, it works, AND it's free! When I send the DVD off to the Atlanta Underground Festival, you better believe that I will be mentioning how many Atlanta folk have become fans (via Phil Calvert) on our FB page. I think they need to come up with a cool name for themselves, as do Kyle's peeps, so think on that.

Definite props to the Phil Calvert contingent for being such loyal friends to their guy, but I gotta tell ya, though you are beating up on everyone else, Kyle is mopping the floor with all y'all. I have about 5 actor profiles left to do, and I know Kyle is anxiously awaiting what I have to say about him on the set of Smalltimore, but he is going to have to wait a little longer for that. Today is just my specific shout out to him for getting the word out like crazy, and always being so supportive and enthusiastic. It makes me smile, it sometimes just cracks me up, it makes the whole thing more fun for me and it really does keep me going. There are days when I really need that.

So, kudos to the Man of the Hour, Kyle Holtgren! Next cosmo's on me!