Fisherman's friend, Ida's better half.

Time for another update, I think.. So it's Friday evening. Another week has gone by. A particularly exhausting one, I have to say. But fun.

So on Monday we got our cameras and stuff, a not-so-brief-but-at-the-same-time-not-so-thorough-either walk-through by one of the staff, clearly not a teacher, and clearly not a film-maker either, I mean, who says, when asked something along the lines of, "What if I want to do this shot where the character does this and then that and I want to do this and that, how to I do that with the camera without fucking the exposure and white balance and blah"... "Oh, yeah, Uhm, you don't have to worry about that, this is a simple exercise, just cut inbetween the two different shots..." is creative? Is that in any way a problem solving attitude? I don't think so.

Tuesday, I woke up feeling dead, except worse. I can't really pin-point where in my body the problem lay because EVERYTHING hurt, my head, my throat, my eyes, my lower back, my chest. I was dizzy and nauseous. I was convinced I had the swine flu. And most definitely running a fever. And this is they day we get divided into small groups and get our first filming assignment. Teacher, Maria, gives us a little piece of paper with a statement, and we make it into a scene or a three minute short, so morning is spent brain-storming and script-writing, then after lunch we should be ready to start shooting, and by three o'clock we need to be ready. This is also the day I'm supposed to direct. Not a very successful shoot, as I'm sure you can imagine, in my pitiful state...

Wednesday, a lot more successful, I was feeling a bit better physically, and I was acting instead of trying to direct, didn't learn anything, but I got my confidence up again.

Wait... I'm missing a day... today's Friday, what the Hell...

Well, then I don't remember Monday.

Today, I was acting again. We had a really good time. According to the two behind the camera, the end result wasn't as good as yesterday, we didn't get all the shots we needed, we weren't as organized as we were yesterday, but that's not too surprising, because yesterday we did a simple head on sitting on a couch scene. Today, all four of us, five when the teacher came to sit in and observe, cramped into a little bathroom, with tricky through the mirror shots, and Anja and I who were acting, didn't really make it easier for Ragnar who was directing today, cause we got so into our characters and the scene that we kept going, and improvising all over the place, and barely paid any attention to him or Mireya and her frame, so it was a bit chaotic. Plus the air went rather quickly, so we were all suffering from the lack of oxygen and getting pretty dizzy as well... Oh, Ces, in the scene I wore my seahorse necklace that you got me in Chile!

Al in all a good week. My throat is really sore, but I feel more energized. I'm going to devote my weekend to getting some more writing done and possibly getting in touch with an old friend of mine who live in Stockholm.

Over and out.

Magpie Mentality

I got in, first of all. Those of you who actually somewhat follow this blog probably knows this already, but I thought I'd document this happy occasion anyway. So the 17th of August I'll be a student of the Dramatic Institute and argue about cinematic symbolism and word choices in dialogue with like-minded yet again. I can't wait!

So I move on the 1st of July. I haven't even started packing yet and I get nightmares just thinking about it. All my stuff and my clothes and I'm supposed to take as little with me as possible, and of course that is an actual impossibility in the world of Ida. I have the hunter-gatherer mentality of a magpie, doesn't matter if I should end up on the street with the living area of 1m2 inside a cardboard box, I'd still fill it up with garbage within hours. I can't help it. I need to keep things. Collect things. The first thing I see to when I move to a new place to start over is the location of the nearest library and securing a library card... and yet, I need to own the books I like, I need to have them, all the time, and not have to ever give them back, even if I never end up reading them again, I need them to be mine -- I'm Gollum with books! -- And movies! Speaking of which.. There was a big sale on this swedish movie site and I got these DVDs for barely anything and one of them was Suicide Kings, which is a classic, with both Christopher Walken, Denis Leary and my new obsession Jeremy Sisto, not to mention a whole lot of homoerotic subtext which is always fun. I also that Daniel Craig movie that caused a bit of an uproar in the UK, The Mother, where he falls in love with his girlfriend's mum or something, I haven't seen it yet, but I bet it's going to be great and I got it for 10 SEK (that's like less than a dollar!)

Anyways.. I'm supposed to re-write this script, right. The one for the feature I'm probably doing, and I've been putting it off for over a week now, and I really need to get to it, but I just don't want to!

Girl in desperate need of some advice

Okay, here's the deal...

I got into Emily Carr University, the course starts in September, I already have a ticket booked for late August, I have somewhere to stay when I get there, the program allows you to apply for a work permit on top of your study permit (apparantly) and finding a job is much easier over there than it is here, i.e. it's not completely fucking impossible... I'd be in a creative enviroment, I'd be close to my best friends, I'd be able to work on my own projects with my friends, maybe get the production company started, plus I already have an agent who really wants me to come back... Basically, what I'm saying, is that I have a life, for sure, in Vancouver just waiting for me to come back to it...

So, why am I doubting, why am I even considering other options? I was so certain that this was the right thing for me, that it was in my path, my destiny thingy, or whatever... but now I'm not so sure anymore... It could be due to some subtle brainwashing I've suffered from my mother and that I've been soaking up the overall negativity that is polluting this town... but it just doesn't feel right anymore...

I missed all the deadlines for applying to swedish acting schools... but there is one course. It's the Dramatic Institute in Stockholm. It's a year long Basic Film scourse where you get to try everything, directiing, script writing, photography, producing and all of it... It's free. No tuition. Plus you get a grant from the gouvernment to cover your living expenses. Plus student accommodation is available. And this is what I really feel like doing.

Except I wouldn't be in Vancouver. I would be on my own and by myself and I'd be risking everything. That's what it feels like. I'd be risking everything I kind of almost have.

Mike just told me via MSN that since I have a life already established in Vancouver I can always come back to it and take my time... but Emily Carr is for this september, and who knows how long my agent is willing to wait for me, and all my friends (all one of them, okay that's an exaggeration maybe...) will all have moved on by the time I get my arse over there probably, I mean not literally whereby they've forgotten about me or anything, but they'll have started their projects and careers and everything, so I'd be on the side, I'd be that swedish friend that can come and visit their lives and go for coffee or a drink with them and it'd be good to see me again and everything, but it wouldn't be the same, because I wouldn't have walked the miles with them, I wouldn't have done the time... that's what relationships are, and love, essentially, it's not fireworks and highlights, it's suffering through the seasons together, taking a stand side by side as life throws you one obstacle after another and being there for each other through all of it and then looking back at the whole spectable and say "Huh... well, look at that. We survived that. Together." and that's the thing. You have that. And that'll forever link you together. You did the time, your relationship passed the test, you didn't fall apart.

I kind of stole half of that theory from Alan Rickman's character in "Dark harbour"...

That's a great movie, you should see it. I've seen it 17 times. I maintain that it's a thriller, but Ana and Cesar (who both agreed to watch it with me since it was my last night in Vancouver!) say it's a very slow drama. Whatever. It's good. You need to watch it at least twice.

Any advice anyone have to give me, would be nice. Mike, I got yours already but if you have something to add, feel free...