For some odd reason, the late summer of 1986 has been on my mind of late. It was mid-August of that year that my family moved to Sacramento. My father had moved a couple weeks before the rest of us to start work and find us a home. While we were waiting for our rental house to become vacant, we lived in a small one bedroom apartment in the Arden area of town for a week or two. 

I've been trying to figure out why those 10 or so days have been so vivid in my memory. I can remember sitting in the miniscule dining area, eating sandwich cookies in the heat of a Sacramento summer. I remember standing before our front door, staring at the Jewish Senior Center across the street, wondering what happened there. I remember going on walks with my mom. I remember shopping for new shoes and G.I. Joe toys at the nearby Gemco. And I remember my Dad listening to Little River Band's Greatest Hits repeatedly. And, in hindsight, I remember looking out on my new home town, taking in my surroundings with fresh, innocent eyes. 

I'm sure many of these memories and emotions came back because I got my Dad LRB's Greatest Hits on CD for Christmas, and when I traveled north for a friend's bachelor party, I again listened to that album on loop. Here's the song that's probably stuck with me the most:

I'm not sure if this really ties into Chupacabra at all. I'm sure it'll find it's way in there somehow. 

Almost there

Here's what I could find of the "Chupacabra" playlist. Naturally, they don't have some of the more adventurous selections, and I couldn't find any of the Hecker tracks I really wanted. I did include one from him nonetheless. I'll keep digging.

It's been far, far too long

Hey there everybody. Firstly, I want to apologize for the extremely long delay. Once I started working again, my previous life ceased to exist, which meant no spare time to blog, or write, or well, do much of anything. So, yeah, sorry guys.

My girlfriend and I attended the opening night performance of Das Rheingold at the LA Opera last weekend, and it reignited the fire within me to get back to work. Just hearing the prelude is enough to stir all sorts of emotions, and this time, it really gave me a kick in the ass. The opera's themes also started to connect with me and with the story I had been working on: myth, exerting control over one's life, etc. It was a rejuvinating experience that will hopefully lead to more writing, and more blog posts.

Shortly after the opera, I sat and made a playlist that sort of laid out the emotional soundtrack that I had in mind for "Chupacabra." Here it is:

Burial- "Arcangel"
Tim Hecker- "Dungeoneering"
The Twilight Singers-"Hyperballad"
Gyorgy Ligeti- "Lux Aeterna"
Fleet Foxes- "Ragged Wood"
Animal Collective- "In The Flowers"
Aidan Baker and Time Hecker- "Dream of the Nightmare"
Roy Orbison- "Crying"
Arvo Part-"Festina lente for String Orchestra"
Sigur Ros-"Untitled 1"
Krzysztof Penderekci- "The Dream of Jacob"
Time Hecker- "Blood Rainbow"
Radiohead- "Arpeggi"
Richard Wagner-"The Entrance of the Gods into Valhalla" from Das Rheingold

I'll see if there's a way I can gather all this goodness onto one playlist. If not, go to Amazon/iTunes/illicit download site of your choice to check out these jams.

Undulations

Sorry for the lack of posts in recent days. I've been in a pretty serious writing groove this past week, so I've been riding the wave while it lasted. 

I can already tell that today is going to be completely unproductive. I had to pick up my girlfriend at the airport last night/this morning, and I didn't hit the sack til 4:30 or so this morning. I'm not exactly firing on all cylinders right now. 

Even yesterday, though, I was starting to get the sense that my current hot streak was starting to cool. I'm not the type of writer who can sit in front of his computer and just write. I wish I were. I remember reading/hearing an interview with Paul Thomas Anderson following Magnolia were he said he pretty much wrote that script in two weeks. And now having tried to write several screenplays, I can appreciate what a remarkable feat that was. 

I consider it a productive day when I get a scene done. I'm just painfully slow when it comes to writing, and often I find it terribly frustrating. I just want to get the writing done so I can move on to the fun shit: working with actors, shooting and editing. 

Even when the writing is going well, I don't enjoy it. In fact, I know when I write something of quality when I start getting nervous while I'm writing it. For instance, I wrote a scene the other day that I was really happy with but by the time I was done with it, I was almost shaking due to anxiety. I don't understand why it touched a nerve. Anyone got any ideas?

So today, I'm taking a load off and listening to the song below on loop. 

Moving On...

Now that I've provided an extended introduction to this project, I thought I'd finally deliver some of the goods. Please take a look at the first scene that I came up with and leave a comment or two. I'm interested to hear what people think. 

How did you go bad?

I've developed a bit of a terrible habit when it comes to working on scripts. I'll come up with an idea, get really excited about it, and come up with the basic story almost immediately. Then I'll sit on it for a while, letting it languish. Shortly thereafter, I'll come up with something else that gets me more excited and completely neglect the previous idea. I have a hard drive full have half finished outlines and scripts, and lord knows if I'll ever get back to them. 

Fortunately, my previous idea kind of dovetails with the new one. Much of last year, I was doing research into cults and cult leaders for an idea I had for an artsy exploitation film. I kind of figured out that I would need more resources than I could probably get to make it as a first feature, so I moved onto something else. But the research I put into it has proved to be invaluable for "Chupacabra."

For a time, I read every book and watched ever TV program I could on cult leaders. Of the sources I found, Len Oakes' Prophetic Charisma: The Psychology of Revolutionary Religious Personalities proved to be the biggest influence. Len lived with a cult for 11 years, during which he dedicated himself to the research of the charismatic leader. The common denominator he found amongst all cult leaders was their intense narcissism. They all possessed an unerring sense that they held a special and unique place in the world. In extreme cases, charismatic leaders would develop delusions regarding their powers, developing messianic complexes. 

This was all great stuff...if I had decided to write a movie about a cult. But I did have all this stuff floating in my mind when I was coming up with the idea of "Chupacabra." Probably the question on the forefront on my brain was, "How do these cult leaders develop such a strong sense of narcissism? How do they become delusional?" Oakes does spend a chapter in his book trying to explain this phenomenon. But it's nearly impossible to explain the intricacies of human behavior in one cover all theory. There has to be more to it than just having an overbearing mother and distant father. There's got to me much, much more to it. I hope I can figure it out. 

With that said, on we go...