Carli and Jake

I'm going through what I've already written on "...Owen Taylor" and working up a character list as I summarize each chapter. It's a busy little story; good thing Jake's there to keep everything in order.

Thing is, Carli's not giving up. She's still pushing aspects of her story at me. And she finally convinced me to watch "Kill Bill", both parts. I put it on my Netflix roster. She also reminded me of a Truffaut film I saw years ago -- "The Bride Wore Black", starring Jeanne Moreau. That was about a woman whose husband is shot as they're exiting the church after their wedding, and she takes revenge on the men who did it.

Thing is, it was an drunken accident. A stupid one worthy of intentional manslaughter charges, but was not a deliberate murder. Yet she destroys each man's life, even setting herself up to be arrested and put in jail so she can get to one of them. It's really pretty chilling.

I hear Tarantino swears he's never seen the film, but I find that unlikely. He used to work in a video store in Santa Monica that was famous for its selection of DVDs and videos, and he always said, "I didn't go to film school, I went to films." So...I guess I'll find out if he was influenced by it with "Kill Bill".

But Jake's strong enough to keep Carli back till he's done. And what I've gone through, so far, is pretty solid. I even named a pro-gay organization -- Gays And Lesbians Against Injustice And Targeting of Homosexuals, AKA: GALIATH -- and even a possible bank -- Gay and Lesbian Federal Union of Credit, Universal. Work that one out for yourself.

But Carli added a gay aspect to CK, out of nowhere, that adds to the meaning of the story. The bitch. I got a feeling this is going to be an ongoing battle. Pissed off gay man against pissed off straight woman.

What fun.

I been life lesson'd...

When I was in LA, I went to Loma Linda to talk with a guy who liked my writing and projects and wanted to look into making something. It turned out to be another bit of hot air; I guess I've lost my ability to suss that out, since I left the West Coast. But I did take the chance to go to Palm Springs (above) for "The Vanishing of Owen Taylor", because it's set there and I needed the visual to make sure I had things right. I then went to Riverside and checked out the courthouse area, since Jake has to go there. I found some things had to be changed while others worked okay.

Then I put it aside because I got my inner buzz going on writing some low-budget scripts and selling them to places like Troma and Asylum for whatever piddly amounts they offer. It'd be a way to bring in cash and get some things made, even if they were straight to video. Pulled together a dozen ideas, including reworking a few I'd already written.

I started out with "Carli Kills" because I could set that in four locations in an unnamed part of the desert that covers so much of the Southwest. Had it all planned out. She's out for revenge. Meets a guy who helps her. Things go too far. But she triumphs in the end...albeit with damage and the possibility of a franchise. A sort of anti-heroine out to rid the world of pond scum that's taken the shape of men and women.

This is where the life lesson comes in. Once I started working on it, and Carli got to talking to me...and Zeke joined in...within a week all dreams of simplicity and any idea of just dashing the story off vanished. Completely. Moments began showing up that you just cannot put on film. Moments that reminded me more of torture porn, though at least mine was about something more than just finding scary ways to hurt people before you kill them...in my mind, anyway.

You see, we're not talking "Hostel" or "Saw", here (which, to be honest, were sort of my templates, with a good dash of Wes Craven). We're talking Dante's "Inferno" and Milton's works of heaven and hell and the "eye for an eye" kind of tragedy that drives people to madness. And I couldn't keep it out. Carli developed into a near archangel gunning for Armageddon, when the innocent and the guilty are ripped to shreds. And Zeke became her only contact with humanity. Which threw my whole story off.

Nobody would have bought this script. Not even if I got the probable budget down to $150K. I finally got it through my thick skull that I'd just be writing another screenplay meant to go nowhere. I've got too many of those, already.

So...today after work, I dug back into VoOT. It's got a viciousness underlying it, but one that works within the parameters of the story. And which I'm leavening with some humor, dammit. Jake's got a wicked sense of fun in this one; mixing that with his "no bullshit" attitude should be interesting, at least. I'm going to give him full rein on it.

But the plans I had when I returned from LA were of the nonsense variety...again. Story of my life lessons.

Is that light at the end of the tunnel?

Or just a train headed for me? I've spent the last couple of days lost in a headache that's just now beginning to go away, so haven't been able to do much of anything as regards writing or thinking clearly or even watching a movie or reading. Man...I'm feeling my age, right now.

But the headache's slowly drifting off and the fog is beginning to disburse. And right now the only person who seems to be talking to me is Jake, from "...Owen Taylor". David started to, from "David Martin", but his story is being read by a nine year-old girl so I'm waiting for her verdict to see if this is clear enough and ready to continue with.

Jake, however, is doing his nudging. "Check out what you've done so far, buddy. See if you can get it finished and out there. I'm ready for the fight." I think I'll oblige him. The story's 60% done, if I remember right.

CK, however, has become darkness, incarnate. I don't know if I can do what the story wants done in a script. I may have to shift it to book form. You can get away with in a lot more in a novel than you can in a film.

I think the classic example is Stephen King's "Misery". It was made into a movie with Kathy Bates (who won the Oscar) and James Caan, adapted by William Goldman. The story is about a woman so obsessed with a character in a novel, when the author kills that character off, she goes nuts, kidnaps him and forces him to write her back in.

In the book, Kathy's character chops off James Caan's character's feet so he can't try to escape from her, again. Goldman loved that scene, but Rob Reiner, the director, changed it to her breaking his ankles. Goldman hated the idea...until he saw the film and realized Reiner was right -- showing her maiming the man would have been far too violent for the movie audience and would have killed any sympathy for her character.

That didn't make sense to me until now. Carli wants to do some things that will, quite simply, be wrong. And I'm talking about a lot worse than cutting the tattoos off a living man, but by causing the death of someone innocent of any wrongdoing. And doing it deliberately so she could get at the men she's after.

It reminds me of stories that came out of Russia, after Chechen rebels had taken over a school and were threatening to kill the teachers and kids. The army went in and killed the rebels...even though it meant killing a number of the kids. They saved most of them, but they accepted the others' death as necessary to keep the rebels from achieving their goals. The same thing happened when Chechens took over a theater audience; over a hundred hostages died when the army took the theater back (using gas and bullets), but several hundred more were saved. Same thing with a hospital. Since then, the Chechens haven't tried that kind of stuff...so maybe it was worth it; maybe it wasn't. I don't know.

That's the kind of thing Carli's aiming for. I halfway think I should change her name to Cali, after the Hindu goddess associated with death and destruction. The name Kali means "black", but has also come to mean "force of time". Today, she's seen as the goddess of time and change, which can be dark and violent, and can also mean annihilation.

In other words -- one spooky-assed bitch. And that's my Carli.

Sometimes I scare me.

Something is wrong...

I don't know what it is, yet, but I couldn't sleep, last night, and I've had one of my near-headaches all day, today, that's now migrating into my back. That usually means somewhere in the jumble of my brain an issue is having trouble resolving itself and is demanding attention. But like a friggin' cat, it won't tell me what it is. I've got to sort through the strum-und-drang for myself to figure it out.

I took this photo by accident as I was coming out of India Grill, last month, and it gives the perfect illustration of my thoughts, right now. Ostensibly, there's not a very interesting image there, but being warped and hidden behind the glare of the world gives it an undue emotion and sensibility. And makes my eyes hurt.

I think I'll just go sit under a hot shower for the next six years. Maybe that'll help release the snake coiled around my neck.

Zeke's spiritual home...

Trolltunga, Hardangerfjord, Norway

Trolltunga is one of the most spectactular scenic cliffs in Norway...situated about 1100 meters above sea level, hovering 700 metres above lake Ringedalsvatnet in Skjeggedal. The view is breathtaking. The hike goes through high mountains, takes 8-10 hours in total (to Trolltunga and return) and the ascent is about 900 meters.The hike is usually possible to do from mid June, depending on when the snow melts in the mountains. Normally one can hike to Trolltunga until mid September.

It's located on the splotch of tan to the left of the Ø in Sørfjord. There's a small town at the very tip of the Sørfjord -- Odda -- which would be spectacular to see unto itself.

I had a great aunt Irene who went to Norway to research the family tree -- I'm 1/4 Norwegian on my mother's side -- and she'd talk of the beauty of this world, but I never really appreciated how gorgeous it could be till I saw this image.

This is what fires Zeke. He's got the blood of Vikings in him, and it keeps him going. On top of it, as I was looking into this, I heard a single on KCRW -- "Soulless" by The Service. It fits the whole feel of "Carli Kills"...the direction it seems to be going. Deeper and deeper into film noir.

I think the perfect movie from that genre was "Out of the Past" (1947) with Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas, and Jane Greer. But that one's gonna be patty-cake compared to CK, if this keeps going the way I think it is. (NOTE: Don't watch the TOQATM review if you haven't seen the movie; its surprises are amazing and he gives some of them away.)

BTW, my aunt built up a family tree back to 1655. I have a copy. I should get it mounted and framed.

Gotta spew...

Still in avoidance as regards CK. Went looking for a good model to use as David for DM and came up zeroes in Shutterstock and Fast Foto. Nothing but the same crap poses over and over and over.

So I'm blowing off the weekend and just spewing my (very) liberal politics mixed with some artwork I'm going to do, in acrylic.

I found this image a while ago on a website, and it fits perfectly with the feeling I get when I read the comments sections in the news...and in reaction to my own comments. One massive drawback to the internet is, it lets the scum take over because they like to scream and get a reaction from people. So they say vile things -- like execute 17 year olds who've caused the death of someone, and desecrate the grave of a man who's accused of being a terrorist, and all Muslims are evil and hate us and crap. They despise abortion and Islam, but don't mind guns slaughtering hundreds of children every year. It's sickening.

On top of it all is the upswing in anti-gay attacks all over the country, including 2 in NYC within the last week, and how more "christian" leaders are using gays to scare their flocks into opposing any rights for us, let along the right to marry. Brian Fischer of the American Family Association (or something like that) even blamed the financial collapse on gays. That's on a par with Pat Robertson blaming 9/11 on us...12 years ago. No surprise we're still considered legitimate targets for anger.

I lay a lot of the blame on the GOP, with Democrats sharing some of it for not really pushing back against Republican insanity. And I mean insanity. Darrell Issa, a congressman from California who's been linked to auto fraud and who bankrolled a quasi-legal coup against a democratically elected governor, has spent 4 1/2 years trying to find something to impeach Obama over, and has come up zeroes. But he's still at it with Benghazi and now the IRS stuff.

Texas elected a certifiable nutcase to the senate -- Ted Cruz, who cannot make a coherent argument to save his life but sure as hell gets paid attention to, even when condescending to Diane Feinstein over gun violence...who was a lot nicer to him in her response than I would have been. He's being considered as a candidate for President, for god's sake.

I cannot tell you how many gay people I know who tell me they don't support all of the GOP platform (esp. as regards gays) but they're better at managing the debt and keeping taxes down. Maybe once upon a time they were, but this chart clearly shows that since Reagan, they've been blowing taxpayer money left and right, which will eventually lead to massive tax increases.

Even under Clinton, the ratio of debt to GDP was going down, but did the GOP care? No, they impeached him for lying about cheating on his wife. Under Bush, it shot back up, but did the GOP care? No, they handed the keys to the treasury over to the likes of the Koch brothers and Haliburton...until Bush 2 collapsed the economy. Then everything became the Democrats' problem and the liberals' fault.

I'm not crazy about how Obama backstabbed liberals and put us down as "the professional left", but it's not his fault tax revenues go down when an economy is in recession, and unemployment claims and need for food stamps and other means to keep people alive go up. It's economics 101. But you wouldn't know that from the GOP. It's all Democrats tax and spend" and idiots listen to them.

If you really you think for 2 seconds that Republicans have the best interests of Americans at heart, look at the list below. That's today's GOP. Anything to make Obama and the Democrats look bad; nothing to help the people who seriously need it. And this is just in Washington. You go to the state level, it gets even worse.

If al Qaeda really wanted to destroy America, they'd put all their resources into electing more Republicans to office. The US would be toast in less than a decade.

Rant over. Now I'm gonna go paint.

It's war...

Wow...what a fun day. Carli's out to take the story over and run with it. She's revealed she was a non-com in the Army and has been to Afghanistan, so she knows how to fight. Use a gun. Use a knife. Plot strategy. And detach herself, emotionally, from her enemy and his well-being. She's got a goal, and she's gonna get there, even if it means using Zeke.

At the same time, Zeke is pushing back. Not so much fighting as being insanely Zen. He's been in prison. He knows what hate and anger can do. He's done it. He's become a rock against Carli's hard place (and I may use that phrase with ALL its sexual innuendo in the story). He's become the antagonist, but for good, because he knows Carli's quest will destroy her...and he will do anything to prevent that.

Suddenly I have no idea how to dramatize this. How to write it. Not as a script. I might be able to as a book...but that's not what I set out to do. I wanted to write something fast and cheesy I could sell to Troma or some other straight-to-video company, who could then do what they wanted with it...so long as they paid me in cash. That idea is now in the toilet.

I spent all day trying to sort it out in my brain, and did all sorts of crap to keep from getting freaky over it. Made potato pancakes for brunch (using a recipe I heard on NPR, once) then cooked a tuna casserole. I defrosted and cleaned my fridge. Tried to watch "How Green Was My Valley" but just couldn't handle the sweetness and decency of it. Wrote down notes Carli shoved in my mind. Posted reviews of three of my books on their FaceBook pages. Anything but seriously focus on the script...because I'm lost with it.

Should I start a different horror script? Something with a cheesier premise? I've got one dealing with ancient Aztecs on an island off the coast of Mexico using college kids on Spring Break as sacrifices to the gods. I saw a story about a ghost town in Argentina that used to be underwater but now that the lake's level has dropped is available to see, again. Couple of ghosts and some sightseers and there's another one.

Only now I'm spooked (pun not intended). If I get into those scripts, will the same thing happen? I've got so many other stories I want to focus on; I don't need more. Jeez.

I dunno...maybe I'm just not disciplined enough to make it go the way I want. Big surprise there.

Recent trip to Seattle...

I'm on a ferry headed back to town after trying to find a steak house I'd heard of in Bremerton, but nobody knew anything about. Instead I had a decent pulled pork sandwich at a restaurant near the ferry and damn near missed the boat because my server was so friggin' slow.

Hasn't changed much since the first time I went, 4 years ago...no, wait...I went nearly 8 years back, the first time. In November 2005, to accept an award for "Bugzters", my family film script. I came in 2nd, and got a check for $300, which paid for half the trip from LA. I also got a certificate, and it hangs on the wall by my desk.

That was the script I tried to make into an animation film and nearly lost a couple of friends over it. It was good as it was, for live action, but I thought I could do what was necessary to make it work in a different format...and found I couldn't. I liked my characters as they were, and the demands for changes were at the point of being ludicrous.

That was also when I started realizing, no matter how good your script is, most people in the film business will want to change it because "it's not good enough." It's never good enough. I finally got to where I understood the only way something of mine would get made is if I connected with someone who a.) would not take no for an answer and b.) believed in my writing enough to tell a producer, "I don't care what you think; it's perfect as is and we're making it as is, and we'll make a killing by doing that." Meaning someone who was passionate about the project. I was passionate about my writing, but I have never had the ability to instill confidence in people about my abilities. I'm still far too open to thinking other people's opinions have more validity than mine, and that is deadly in any business like Hollywood.

I took this as the ferry exited the inlet and headed back across Puget Sound. I like the composition and the feeling of it. Like the ferry's trail curving across and around. Like the calmness of it...and hint of isolation and danger.

Seattle's got a lot going for it, and I'm at home with the whole atmosphere of the place...but I still couldn't live there. It's so tight and hard to get around. And would really be no different from Buffalo, right now. 

Outlined...

I have 5 more pages worked up between Zeke and Carli...leading up to Zeke getting the hell beat out of him by the sheriff. It's pretty rough and entails Zeke finally opening up to Carli...and I halfway wonder if she's doing what I almost think she's doing -- setting him up. I'm loathe to go that direction, but she is a terror in this script.

I think of "Buffy..." and how she was strong and conflicted but good at heart and in soul. A spoiled Valley Girl who became a heroine and role model...for a while. She did what she had to do, including send Angel to hell. And she lived with it. I think that's what's so great about that show -- because there's nothing else like it on TV. I tried watching that Cajun vampire thing, "True Blood", but it was more interested in showing asses and tits than in decent storytelling. And I stopped "Twilight" halfway in because I could not handle how stupid it was, not to mention Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattison(?) grating on me like nails on a chalk board.

But Carli's not turning out like either of them. In fact, she's not at all in-between. She's more like another female lead I wrote, in screenplay form -- Claire in "Brand of Justice", who gets so focused on protecting her family, she damn near gets herself killed and destroys the life she's carefully built up. She even drives away the man she loves.

Which reminds me of Antony...and Alec...and Curt...and Niko, in my revenge script, "Kazn". Even Eric, in "Bobby Carapisi". All of whom learn that revenge feeds on whomever it wants, be they innocent or guilty. But at the end, they all have an idea they've stepped over boundaries and become too close to animals. I don't think Claire will do that, if it goes that far...and that makes me uncomfortable.

Of course, rewatching "The Virgin Spring", I get an idea of where the idea about vengeance comes from. The father even attacks the young brother of the men who raped and murdered his daughter, a kid who was there but did not even try to participate in what happened...and is wracked with guilt over it. But the father is more beast than human by that point.

I guess that's my theme for my work in general -- vengeance is a wild beast that doesn't care who it feeds upon; innocent, guilty, they're all food for its anger and hate.

Cut clean and create chaos...

Trimmed a bit out of CARLI KILLS...and a new possible title is rearing its head -- THE FOURTH MAN. Which I'm fighting because it's too oblique and murder-mystery-ish. But Carli and Zeke haven't weighed in on it, yet, so we'll see what happens then.

Anyway, part of my process is to overwrite and then trim down and mix bits of dialog together and find ways to hint to the actor what they're supposed to be feeling. I used to say it, flat out. I got to where I pulled back from that but never got rid of it, completely. I still have some in this script...but it's mainly to tell the story to whoever's reading it.

I'm not going the Shakespeare route where I write nothing but dialog and you don't find out that someone's got a knife until he pulls it in act 2. I want people to see that he's got one in the first act, which adds to the tension.

I think I've indicated pretty well, so far, that Carli's got the hots for Zeke...and he's more than interested in her. And they want to let things play out. No matter what.

I get scared when that last sentence rears its head in one of my stories. But you have to let the reality of the story make itself known, no matter how painful. It took me almost a year to accept that Bobby was going to kill himself in BC. I knew how and when and the image I wanted to end on...but first I had to grieve for him. And that took some time. And added to my sense of psychosis.

In CK, my ending is aiming for a horror-style...and I've got a feeling it's going to be hard to put over. Like the lynching in KILLING MOON. That was honest. Was required by the story. And everyone who's read it wants that taken out because of the political implications of it. And I won't.

It's like the title of HTRASG -- it's the right title for the book, and I wouldn't change it. And it's gotten me into some trouble. Hell, it's gotten friends of mine into trouble. But any other title would be...just...wrong.

I guess I just needed to remind myself that I can still be stubborn about my work when I need to be. It is what it is, even when people berate me for it. It hurts to get a negative reaction...but the fact that my work affected someone to that extent is good. It means I'm not being a wuss.

I hope.