It was enlightening to discuss TOBY, which was a collaboration with my girlfriend (and really ultimately a collaboration with Mick Krizaj and Magali Gillon because they graciously gave so much of themselves throughout the process). Jonny asked me what my biggest lesson was in hindsight. My answer—centred on story, which is the indisputable foundation of a film—was and is:
I had an aha moment last year when I was reading the great book A Writer's Journey as it relates to Toby and other stories I've written/am working on. Here is what it said:
There is only so much focus available in a given work, and it seems the more elements you take out of the composition, the more focus is poured into those that remain. Cutting lines, pauses, entires scenes sharpened the focus on the elements that were left, as if a large number of diffuse spotlights had been concentrated into a few bright beams aimed at select important points.Brilliant nugget and it heartily applies to the lessons learned in doing my first short film. We tried to do too much in 10 minutes. What started out as simply a story about a neurotic dog who thinks his family is trying to kill him, and his pursuit to escape, turned into a pugish-dominatrix-ciggie-smoking-secret-hiding-missing-panties explosion! As a novelist, I am used to layering on story after story—because you have a whole book to tell and resolve each storyline.
That simply isn't true in a 10 minute short. The scriptwriting mentor tried to warn me in development, but we ran out of time before I really got it and instead of pulling focus on the pug solely, which we should have done, the spotlights hit too many points and the entire film lost its focus. I'm so grateful for this lesson and am glad it happened with my first short and NOT my first feature.
After we wrapped HPS, I just had enough time to make it to hockey! From heels to blades in under an hour... Only in Canada!
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