24k Film In-The-Making

by ana agabin

Here I am, resolved to never again make another indie film in my life.

As I mull over the events of the recent shoot, I get a text asking me to call Robbie Tan, head of the Cinemalaya monitoring committee.

“Robbie, I’m not done with shooting. I scheduled eight shooting days. I shot for ten days, I still didn’t finish it.”

Robbie assures me that it’s perfectly normal and encourages me to keep it up. I explain that I didn’t want the quality to suffer just because I’m pressed for time or money. He says that that’s the way it should be.

They expect a rough edit soon. I reply that I’d get to it.

By golly, I’ll get to it… and remember the pains we went through to shoot it?

I step over to the editing suite and I see the rushes from Ilocos, and I think, wow, how beautiful our scenes have turned out.

Then I open the behind-the scenes photo files that our photographer took…

Then I remember it wasn’t all that bad after all.

We had mostly 12-hour workdays in beautiful locations, and we had breaks every two or three days to keep us from getting too drained.

Our accommodations weren’t first class, but we had the place — videoke and all — to ourselves.

We had good catering, mostly buffet-style meals, special food for those with special diets, and halo-halo breaks on days in intense heat.

There were days when I would completely blow up. Like that day when we all pulled out at 430 in the morning and got to location at 530 am eager to shoot sunrise scenery, only to find out that the camera got left behind at the lodge.

But hey, 30 minutes after breaking the serenity of the mountainside, Pao and I were laughing hysterically at how ridiculously unthinkable the situation was.

it's as if the camera never got left behind...

Looking back, I realize I shouldn’t let a few bumps ruin the journey.

Sometimes the difficulty of the situation in doing low-budget indie films subjects relationships to an acid test. It’s very different from high-budget commissioned work wherein the people are well-compensated, and a number of them behave superficially and kiss ass.

It hurt when a few of the people who gave their commitment to 24k dropped out suddenly for various reasons, when I knew very well they never would if I were giving them their regular rate.

I had to face it, commitment, for some, is money-deep. And really, I try my best to understand.

I was fortunate that in spite of our limitations, I was able to work with great people who were not only talented but also very supportive. That goes for most of the cast…

Wasdi, a Bago tribe elder, studying his lines

as well as the crew…

script supervisor Timmy Torres

sound recordist Mark Villena

1st assistant camera Apollo Anao

production assistant Recci Bacolor

camera tech Randy Roldan (center)

pao and apollo down under

pao and ana discussing a shot

Well, this shoot’s not over yet.

I’m donning my producer’s hat in the meantime and ironing out some temporary kinks in the financial side of the production.

To those who worked so hard for 24k, and are sticking it out with me, thank you.

I won’t let you down.

Tags: 24k, ana agabin, apollo anao, cinemalaya, mark villena, pao orendain, randy roldan, recci bacolor, robbie tan, timmy torres, wasdi

This entry was posted on Friday, April 3rd, 2009 at 11:09 am and is filed under on location. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.