So this was my first short film and it was shot on 16mm over 2 days. It was adapted from a short comic story published by Vertigo written by the brilliant Brian Azzarello and illustrated by Tim Brad-Street. (God I hope I got that right.) I reset it in a British context and it was a practise run for us (so please don’t sue us DC we haven’t sold it or presented it to a paying audience…and Tim and Brian I shot this as a homage to your work I meant no disrespect.)
I wanted to do something very cheap and so I thought I could slash the budget by removing the editing process. So its a film with no cuts and is one take. We found a house in the middle of nowhere and set up the lights one day! DOP Sarah Bartles-Smith did such an incredible job lighting an entire house and we had the biggest flag in the World. We rehearsed again and again then the next day we shot it. We got picture perfect on take 7 but had no sound! So all the sound is ADRed.
Very few people have seen this. And its my first short so I can see its flaws but is interesting to watch for the mistakes and the influences. The man with breasts? Watchmen. The music. Alien. (Ouch.) This was in the days when I didn’t have confidence in what I wanted to say. Was trying to find my voice and style. The film is about something but crucially not about something that particularly chimed with something within me…if that makes sense. My next film did though.
It cost 3 grand which felt like a huge amount. John Hembrough did the steadicam and was so consistent on every take.
