July movie playlist

- The Outlaw Josey Wales
- Where The Wild Things Are
- Paranormal Activity
- Amelie
- The Crow (PCC)
- Teeth
- Torso
- Frozen
- Transamerica
- Deliverance
- Inception
- Shogun Assassin
- Kill Bill 2
- Beautiful Losers
- Delicatessen
- Frogs
- Thumbsucker
- Rebel Without A Cause
- Color Me Blood Red
- Sid & Nancy
- The Prestige
- Pale Rider
- Morvern Callar
- Toy Story 3
- Crank
- Paprika
- Eaten Alive (Umberto Lenzi)
- Undertow
- Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus
- The Empire Strikes Back
- Bitch Slap
- Return Of The Jedi
- Pulp Fiction
- City Of The Living Dead
- Dead Man
- El Mariachi
- Kill Bill 1 & half of Enter The Dragon (Somerset House Summer Screen series. We got a bit chilly at 12:30am and left before the movie ended)

favourite celluloid moments

Shogun Assassin. SO RAD.

adventures in production running

Currently doing four days production running for a TV show in its preproduction stages. We rotate positions daily, and today I was in the camera room, assisting the Shooting Director, logging tapes, and holding the boom when we were recording interviews.

The room we were in is on the 8th floor of an office block in central London, with pretty great views. It was quite late in the day, I was holding the boom while we were recording, just zoning out as I'd heard the questions quite a few times before, staring blankly at the high rise hotel a block away. A movement in the top floor window caught my eye.

I wish it hadn't.

A fat naked man was parading back and forth in front of the massive penthouse picture windows. The first time it happened I was like "oh gosh", and tried to look away. And then he just kept on walking back and forth, not realising obviously that though he was high up and thought he was away from prying eyes, there were inhabited high rises around too. After about the fifth time of him walking past the window, pale flabby belly jiggling up and down, I had a bad case of the giggles - but with camera and sound rolling, and the SD interviewing some poor applicant, I couldn't do anything about it. I was biting my tongue so hard, trying not to shake so the sound wouldn't be distorted, forced myself to look away until I could calm down.

Eventually he drew the curtains and I got myself back under control. But talk about unfortunate circumstances. As I walked the applicant out I apologised and told him what I'd seen, in case he thought my suppressed giggles were anything to do with him, but luckily he didn't even seem to have noticed as I was facing away from him.

My fellow runner based in the room opposite eagerly asked if he had a "hot bod" when I told her. Alas, if only. Might have made the 14 hour day with one ten minute break slightly more interesting. Ahh, production running...

one of those the-internet-makes-the-world-a-small-place moments

So way back at the beginning of this project, at our first meeting (as detailed in the first blog post), a guy sitting next to us in Chiswick Brasserie overheard parts of our conversation:

"The table next to us starts to pack up to leave; one of the men turns to us and tells us there really is some good stuff at the LIFF we should check out. Turns out he's a film reviewer at viewlondon, overheard our conversation. Starts talking to us about filmmaking, picking up on Cici's lack of experience over my (admittedly limited) knowledge. He wishes us luck though; Cici hollers "you'll be reviewing our films in a year or two's time!" after him as he leaves. Probably serves us right for having this meeting at an offshoot of Soho house."

And that's the end of that, I thought. We wrote and planned and auditioned and filmed and edited and that very first meeting was half forgotten in the haze of everything else we were up to.

Then maybe a month ago, I noticed one of my twitter pals mentioning he was going for brunch at Chiswick Brasserie. Intrigued in that way you are when random internet friends you've never met go to the same places you do, I checked out his profile and saw he was a film reviewer. For Viewlondon. Too much coincidence.

I direct message him, asking if, by any chance, and if he remembers, he might be the person I referred to in the first blog post.

FilmFan1971

Yes! Of course I remember. God, I love Twitter. Did you see much LFF stuff in the end?

Hilarious. We were each following each other this whole time without even realising it. I think I'd followed him for purely filmic reasons (not sure about his reasons). What a strange small world. (Oh, and the answer is no, I didn't see anything at the London Film Festival in the end).

We struck up an email correspondence (mostly about film) (we are nerds), and he offered me his +1 for a press screening of Adam Green's Frozen this evening - which, I am glad to say, totally ruled.

Love the internet sometimes.