okay, so starting simply, inspirations: well it's a 3 part film, was always seen as 3 parts and was always imagined as 3 parts, if you want to know what those parts are look back to an earlier post, that explains it better than i will now in this state, any-who...
act 1, make it melancholic, so I based it on the animation aku no hana, a slow brooding drama from Japan, that despite being filmed around and outdoors, has a sense of pace and atmosphere that is as brooding and melancholic as it gets:
So challenge 1, make that....indoors, so more close-ups, more claustrophobia, and a different theme, in this case the blue flash of a pc, now I will admit that when filming with some lights and a shit-tonne of blue filters on the lights things were arguably a bit too low key for some, and part of the significance of the imagery is personal, and to some that is a problem, the whole use of coke cans everywhere is about binging during depression, and to some people this may not come across, and that is one thing I must first address:
The piece was always personal and sentimental, and I tend to feel that going into something with personal wants and feelings is frowned upon somewhat, y'know what, i get why, personal reasons and wants is no excuse for poor film-making and confusing plot, an inability to communicate a message is just poor conveyance and personal, selfish, indulgent films are of such a thing. the reason i say this is because it stops me from having to use the personal reasons excuse, if someone does not understand something in the film that is my fault as a film-maker, and not validated by the "i was being personal" card, so basically call me out on hypocrisy if you will, so that i may actually have some argument that i am unable to bullshit my way out of.
anyway part 2 and 3 is where we introduced the digital aspect, in terms of the effect my main source of inspiration came from a japanese (naturally) indie tv drama, Mirai Nikki Another World which follows similar themes of digitalism, although in a more literal sense than the metaphorical one employed in this work, however if you happen to see, for example....cubes floating around, it's fair to say that it may or may not be a slight homage to a show i adore:
Editing and pacing however was where the most debates were had, it's fair to say that the order of a lot of things switched around during post-production as we made it a priority to secure our effects first so that the film could be easily reordered to suit the needs of the group, that and because on certain parts the idea was to break the scenes to create a sense of catharsis. A personal inspiration in which we based certain scenes on (specifically a scene involving a loop of myself running towards a shadow) was the american trailer by funimation for mnemosyne, a rather insane horror show and while we definitely held back compared to the trailer, the original DNA of the midway editing has its roots in that trailer:
So the question really is "did I achieve my ambitions for the film?"; honestly, no, because it became more than my own original ideas the moment I had a team, the fact is that interpretation is an important part of any art, and to present these inspirations to the group shows different influences and details than i could find on my own, the ambitions and ideas evolved over time and I can only be proud of that. on set it's true that lighting and contrasts occasionally suffered due to a shortsighted focus to the compositions and the timings and an initially rigid shoot schedule; the film was arguably planned too much at points creating a rigidity in the shooting schedule and an occasional attitude of "it might be salvageable in the edit". An attitude that we initially wanted to avoid but with the clock ticking became an inevitability. However I can at least say I saw people come out there shell during this film and, any experimental side to the film became an interesting hurdle for all of us but one that allowed us a sense of odd vision. The reason i cited Child of Eden and End of Evangelion as influences was because they gave me a vision of a digital paradise gone wrong and a feeling of odd dread and tension through seeming randomness together. I wanted to emulate some of that spark they created within me the first time I saw them and, in the course of making this, I'd like to think I found some of that spark again.
Also if you're reading this I'm sure you have a lot to get through today, so here's a lovely song from end of evangelion to keep you going (and yes it's my favourite film):
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