What is better than randomness from me?

Randomness from someone else! And tonight that someone else is my best friend and a huge influence on my life, Thomas Midena. Thomas is a film maker, and a very good one, but be warned, he is almost as random as me…

How long have you been making films?
Probably since about 2004/05. That’d make it a decade now! Feels shorter. I guess early on I wasn’t really aware that I was making films, I was just having fun.

Were these early films scripted?
No, they began very improvisational. One of the earliest ones I remember making simply shows me walking up to a plastic toy frog and looking scared. Another time I decided I wanted to make a zombie film, so I jumped in a car with friends and pointed the camera at them as they improvised the whole thing. There was no planning at all back then.

Back then there was a website to feature all these films. It was called LCM Film. The website is gone, but the videos still exist. Here is ‘The Zombie’, which stars someone you might know……

What was your favourite LCM Film?
Oh tough question! I’m super fond of stuff like ‘Toy Killer’ and ‘Darkness Blazer’ (no idea how and why I came up with that bizarre title). But one I’ll never forget is ‘Heerlo’, which had a sequel but the original was always best. It has so many weird and ridiculous ideas in it that I have no idea how we came up with back then. It’s the ultimate zero-budget short fantasy action film made by kids in an hour.

Here’s ‘Toy Killer’, a favourite of mine……

Why all the short vlogs?
I’ve found it’s a fairly easy and enjoyable way of quickly making and sharing some smaller ideas I have, when I don’t feel like fleshing them out into something larger like a short film. It’s also a format that requires literally only myself and a camera – so it’s easy to experiment and just try to make something I’m unsure about. Over the past couple of years there have been maybe half a dozen vlog-type videos I’ve made and haven’t shared because they didn’t turn out how I’d imagined.

Here’s one of my favourite vlogs. It’s called ‘A Saddle’ and it inspired my post ‘Does this scare you?’

You’ve done quite a few films with Nat Kelly, how did that start?
Well I had already known of him for a while. Nat gets around, I think he’s pretty much as close to a celebrity as Darwin can get. I’d enjoyed his videos on YouTube. When I started putting together plans for ‘Intelligence’ I knew I’d need some keen assistance in producing it, so I got in contact with Nat. I expected him to be tentative or freaked out or in some way uninterested. Flatteringly though, he turned out to be as much a fan of my videos as I was of his, and he was incredibly keen to get involved. Since then I’ve relied on his assistance in almost all of my filming projects – recently crediting him as Director and Co-Director in a couple.

Here’s ‘Old Man Charles’, by Nat Kelly and staring Thomas……

What are you currently doing at Swinbourne? What does that involve?
I’ve just finished my first year of a three year Bachelor of Film and Television. It’s a pretty broad filmmaking course which has a bit of everything – critical research, creative writing, practical camerawork and everything in between. This makes it pretty ideal for someone like me who hasn’t decided on a specific area of filmmaking, and instead wants to try a bit of everything. So far I’ve found it quickly becomes clear the things I do NOT want to do. Documentaries are not my area and I loathe pitching.

What do you prefer doing: acting, writing, directing, producing or editing?
Impossible to choose a favourite at the moment, but I can definitely divide them into categories. Enjoy: acting, writing, directing, editing. Dislike: producing. Very much. Seriously. The thought of filling in production documents makes me need to breathe into a bag.

Thomas recently made ‘Intelligence’, a short web series that I helped with. Here is the first of three episodes, Thomas gives us his thoughts….
Remembering ‘Intelligence’ is like remembering that you climbed Mount Everest with one hand. Not that I can relate to remembering such a thing. But ‘Intelligence’ was a big, difficult, 60-minute long three-part webseries that I only attempted because of ignorance. We created it over only a couple of months, including some crazy shoots. For student films if you shoot about 30 seconds worth of a film in an hour you’re doing well. On ‘Intelligence’ there were times when we must’ve shot close to 10 minutes worth of scenes in one hour. We charged through. But anyway, it’s done now, and it’s a nice and very strange little series about terrible secret agents protecting Darwin against some riffraff.

Another recent film, ‘One Of Us Like To Eat People, So What’, Thomas gives us his thoughts…..
One Of Us is definitely one of, if not my favourite film that I’ve made. It’s got one of the most intricate scripts, with a diverse cast of characters who are all connected in some way. It’s dense enough that even I still discover new things when I watch it. It was also done entirely by myself (excluding some explosion effects by Nat Kelly). This meant pointing the camera at myself and a lot of difficult costume changes as I try to get two characters in the same shot before the light changes. I’m also pretty pleased with how my unorthodox approaches to heavy issues like cancer, cannibalism and the end of the world ended up being depicted. It’s a film about the end of everything but also about a guy who sits on a chair every day.

Fist Full of Films (FFoF) is a short film competition for Territory filmmakers held each year. Last year Thomas won ‘Best Actor’ for his entries.

How many films do you have in FFoF this year?
I had quite a few short films recently completed and ready to go in time for FFoF entry this year. I’m very excited to have a total of 4 accepted and screening on the final awards night.

What are they about?
There’s a short fantasy animation about a village of people who are trying to get to the moon. Then there’s ‘Serendipity’, which is already online actually, about an almost-romantic encounter. ‘Case: Fluff’ is a pretty big murder mystery which could be thought of as a spiritual successor to ‘Intelligence’. Finally there’s ‘Marco’, a horror film about a blind monster.

Here’s the teaser for ‘Case: Fluff’…..

And a teaser for ‘Marco’…..

Do you think you’ll win?
I decline to answer on the grounds that I may jinx myself.

Last week it was ‘Halloween.’ So here is a short story I wrote, my tribute to the spooky season…

Ever since I was younger I’ve known one thing: I have always been intrigued by the old haunted house on top of the hill.

My teachers always told me to stay away. My dad said no one has ever come out alive. My mum said my sister walked into the house when I was a year old, there are still pictures of her and me on the wall. She hasn’t been seen again.

Despite what everyone has told me, I have still been intrigued by the old haunted house. My best friend has known of my fascination with the old haunted house. He’s very brave, he’ll stand up to anyone, even if they’re twice his size. When we were young he and I agreed that when we were both twenty we would go into the old haunted house. He died last year.

The funeral was on the hill, in the cemetery next to the old haunted house. After the service a wrinkled old lady with frizzy white hair came up to me. In a raspy voice she told me, “There’s a bear in there. And a chair as well. And people with games. And stories to tell. Open wide, come inside.” As she walked away she had a sly smile on her face and a glint in her eye.

Ever since that day I have waited for the day I turned twenty. Today is that day, and I stand at the gate of the old haunted house. It beckons me closer. As I open the gate I hear a ferocious roar that makes the hair on my neck stand up. “There’s a bear in there.” The almighty roar echoes in my head as I inch toward the old haunted house.

I hear a long wooden moan that sounds like something being dragged along the floor. “And a chair as well.” I stop. For a chair to be dragged along the floor, someone must be moving it. As I ponder this I hear the gentle giggle of a young girl. “And people with games.” My hopes lift as I think my sister may be inside. I begin to creep toward the house again.

My heart skips a beat as I hear the same girl shriek. I am nearly at the steps that lead to the door. I can hear some gentle talking from upstairs. “And stories to tell.” 

Every wooden floorboard creaks as I slowly approach. I stand outside the old haunted house, mesmerized by this door in front of me. The door loudly creaks as it opens all by its self. “Open wide.” There is a hush. The gentle chatter from upstairs has stopped. The bear isn’t roaring and the chair makes no sound. I stand still, but the house beckons me in…… “Come inside.”

What’s the point of ears?

Well, clearly ears are for drinking soup that is too hot to taste… Or so I’ve heard. Actually I think I misheard that, maybe. I might’ve been too busy drinking soup at the time.

Anyway, I did mishear something on the weekend. What I heard was that a friend of mine works near the murder registry. We had a good laugh about that. But it gave me an idea for a film. Allow me to share it with you…

It is the year 2056, in an effort to curb the Earths over-population, the Government have legalised murder. They have created ‘Murder Registries’. You have to go in and wait to be served, like in a bank. At the counter you tell the server who you will murder, how you will murder them and why you want to murder them. The person serving you will then calculate the importance of the person you’re about to murder to determine how much it will cost. For example, the President of the USA may cost one billion dollars to murder, while a local housewife may only cost two thousand dollars to murder. This way the government will still get money. Once you have paid, you will be handed a ‘Murder Card’ that tells the police that this murder is okay. They will also tell you that you have 24 hours to commit the murder. Once you have killed the person you leave the ‘Murder Card’ on the body for the police to find. In order to prevent unregistered murder the death penalty is reintroduced…..

There is a setting and a scenario for all of you other screenwriters out there. Come up with a few characters (name one after me), a plot and a genre. Don’t forget to include my name in the credits. And another thing, the ‘Murder Card’ comes with a free will kit to give to your victim.

Last thing… he actually said motor registry.

What do I write about!?!

That question has been on my mind for at least four years of my life! Ok, maybe not four, but at least two. That figure is calculated from every occasion on which I have wondered what to write about. That includes school and uni assignments, essays, creative writing pieces and now this blog.

I’ve already considered writing about the coffee cup to my right, complete with brown murky liquid. I could list various uses for that brown murky liquid, including pouring it over my human chop for extra flavour!

But I can’t write that. It’ll make everyone that reads this, and considering that this is now free for anyone and everyone to view, think that I’m a cannibal. It might also put me on an FBI watch-list. I’m not a cannibal. But what if everyone thought I was? I’d never have anyone brave enough to come over for dinner…

With me, your rule number one is never take anything I say seriously. But that human chop sure was nice, especially with the coffee sauce.