Dispatch from Les #5 - "You Wanna See Helicopters?"

Yes, we are still here. Life and the 40-hour work week go on in the real world. The editing continues in the movie world. (On weekends, that is.) The mind numbing attention to detail and constant search for that best combination of scenes that is editing. Most scenes shot at a 3 to 1 shooting ratio, if we were lucky. Viewing the same scenes over and over for three years is like water torture. It's like eating chocolate cake until you puke. Whew! But we are so close! We're at the finish line! Still planning on that March 2009 premiere for Having My Baby, fingers crossed! The media blitz will start soon. Look for us on the telly, as our British friend would say, as we countdown our fifteen minutes of fame.

What kind of movie takes 3 1/2 years to complete? What were you doing on Labor Day? Editing. What were you doing on Thanksgiving? Editing. What were you doing on Christmas Eve? Editing. (Eraserhead supposedly took David Lynch five years to shoot. The torture that man must have gone through. Five years of anticipation to see a completed project. Some people call Eraserhead unwatchable... some call it genius... an audience is a fickle thing. I fall in the latter camp and call it wholly original.)

"You wanna see helicopters?" I got the helicopter shots just hanging around Addison Airport for a couple of Saturdays. Inserted those shots where needed, and voila! Used the helicopter sounds to sell other lean scenes in the woods... indie movies at bargain basement prices! Life is good. Guerrilla filmmaking is a blast! And it looks good! And sounds good! Gotta love the Canon XL-1. It's a workhorse. Probably almost obsolete by now, but hey, it works. The medium is not the message in cinema, the story is. All you pretentious filmmaker wannabes and poseurs clucking from the sidelines like matrons in some sewing circle can't see the forest for the trees. Show me your movies. Oh, you've not made any.... Our little movie is looking good, Holmes. Dilligaf has mucho cajones. (Translated: Big drawers.)

Long story short, we're not giving up. We have survived scenarios in movie making that would make Oliver Stone blush. (Incidentally, we love Oliver Stone at Dilligaf Productions, so back off, Phil.) We don't give up at Dilligaf. You can knock us down and we get back up. We keep pushing. We're like wounded soldiers moving through the bush, pushing to make it to the chopper so we can some day see our loved ones again. Keep pushing... keep pushing... keep pushing....

Walking my three miles every other day... doing my chin-ups every morning... meditating during the week when I can... eating my veggies... drinking my green tea and red wine... haven't had a cigarette in three months... pushing fifty... a vain, cranky old man who wants a cigarette... pushing past that donut aisle... pushing, pushing pushing! March 2009: be there.