Sunday, June 11, 2017

When Life Gives You Mud, Make Movie Magic

WE PERCHED over the White Rock pier railing like seagulls, enchanted by the strange sights at the muddy beach floor. Along the boardwalk and below, thickly curled cables and other equipment were being expertly shuffled about by people playing a sometimes tedious but significant role in making a movie.

The box had to be positioned just right for the shoeless cameraman who set his sights on actors waiting to perform by a blue umbrella.

I learned the scene was a pilot project for a comedy television series called Better Things. Have you watched the very long list of credits scrolling down at the end of most film endeavors? I long ago realized that it takes a village to make a good show, hard work and perseverance and a desire to play and build imagination "sandcastles" in whatever awkward spaces needed for the plot.

Like life, a good movie makes us laugh, cry, feel awestruck and inspired. Getting bogged down in the small details that make the story "reel" can be less than exciting. But once all the technical, mundane and creative challenges are met, the big picture often seems surprisingly meaningful and grand.

Creative tools have become so portable now that anyone can get in the act of making a movie of their own lives from start to finish. After all is said and done, or not done, as Jim Henson of Muppet fame once wrote: "Life's like a movie, write your own ending. Keep believing, keep pretending."

Emblazoned on a red painted rock by White Rock City Hall during the 2010 Winter Olympics, I dusted believe from my archives because this is the pinch of magic that adds clarity to life's muddy brew to help get things started.

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Copyright by Penelope Puddlisms

8 comments:

  1. It must have been very interesting to see all this going on, but you're right about it taking a lot of people behind the scenes who bring a movie to life. Not just the actors, it's those unheard of hard workers at the end of the credits who deserve a lot of the recognition.

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  2. interesting post. great scene to witness.

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  3. What fun to see a movie being made!

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  4. Fascinating post and photos and wonderfully inspiring message ~
    ^_^

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  5. The first image is superb, Penelope, with the orange nail of a girl looking down at the shooting scenes below. A very good reminder of how so many people,things, and perseverance are involved to make even a short commercial movie. If our life is compared to a movie, any tiny part of the reels of film is not cut out to the very end. When we act in our own life movie, I believe that our late loved-ones watch over us. The title is so encouraging.

    Yoko

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  6. Love this sequence of shots and commentary. Excellent!

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  7. For n to watch "the making of". We watched a movie being filmed when we spent a few months in Imperial Beach Calif. They were filming surfing scenes for weeks. When we later watched the movie the scenes we watched being filmed We're on the screen for about five minutes!

    Your beach definitely looks movie-worthy!

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