Palin: The Rise of Evil

I might be young, but I'm not too young to understand that some people are out there trying to destroy the world; in the name of god.

And then I'm not talking about Bin Laden, but about an even bigger threat to this world: Sarah Palin. 

If that **** becomes VP of the United States, she'll destroy the world's economy with her Dominion Theology (which scared the hell outta me when I read about it). If I would compare her to someone, I'd say she's much like Mrs. Carmody from Stephen King's The Mist. 

People with that "overly-religious thingy" always seem to scare shit out of me. Just like Becky Fischer in Jesus Camp, and now: Sarah Palin. 

If she gets power: we'll see what happens... But I tell ya: it ain't good at all!

TRANSFORMERS: THE SCORE review

It's been ten months now since the release of the TRANSFORMERS: THE SCORE album, containing composer Steve Jablonsky's (the Island, Steamboy) music. Though it was highly demanded by fans from all over the world, Warner released some stupid "music from" album instead of releasing "the real deal". My source at Warner confirmed that the "execs wanted to market this baby", but as we all know, fans and other potential buyers turned their backs to the "music from" album, and requested; sorry, demanded Jablonsky's score. 

One man in particulair was very determined in this demamd. So determined, that he even set up a petition to get the score released. This man is Chris Knight, a co-writer/filmmaker/photographer from the United States. He always got good and new information on how the release was progressing, even contacted Mr. Jablonsky himself, and finally can held responsible for the "push forward" the release got.

(But the confirmation that Sony BMG wasn't releasing the score came from me :-) 

On October 9, 2007 we finally were able to get our greedy hands on a copy of the TRANSFORMERS: THE SCORE album. (actually it was late night October 8 here) and it was fantastic... the feeling I had then only occurs to me when I reach some sort of weirdish state of mind: Zero Stimulus, as Freud would say. I have only had that feeling four times in my life, all in the recent years, when my very own beloved "ZERO HOUR" was released, when I decided to produce "F=NV2", when I bought my waaaaaaay too expensive Sony HVR-V1E camera, and when the TRANSFORMERS: THE SCORE album was released.

Now, let's take a look at the album itself. 

The cover, I think, is a little bit funny. When looking at it, it somehow reminded me of those wacky romantic comedy album/DVD covers, where the characters stand in weirdish poses smiling at the camera with a white background and huge, mostly red, letters on the top displaying the title. If you'd paint the background of this cover white, I'd believe it was a romantic comedy.  

But nevertheless, this is one of the rare albums which lists the WHOLE, ENTIRE orchestra (including the percussion section) in its cover. Think that's a very good thing - now the people who really "do" the score, are given credit. 

Now: The score itself.

It's a pretty typical MediaVentures/Zimmer album, who has been Jablonsky's "master" in his training years. So, this means that a four to six note violin "ta da ta da ta da ta" motif is being heard as a backdrop to... well, pretty much the entire score, (just as heard in Batman Begins, and more recently in "The Dark Knight") with some heavy brass, more "ta da ta da ta da" strings, ethnic percussion, deep drones, more "ta da ta da ta da" and some George Doering guitar arrangements. 

There are two big main theme motifs (different than the "ta da ta da ta da"), which can be defined as "Autobots" and "Decepticons". The first, also introduced in the first track of the albu, being a heroic brass arangement, with it's accompanying "ta da ta da ta da" on the backdrop, a heavenly choir, and some percussive accents, which never get too loud and overblow the brass/ta da ta da ta da (which one could start to regret after ten months listening) 

What isn't much heard on a Zimmer Score is the "Metro Voices" (recorded at the famous Abbey Road Studios) Jablonsky uses for the Decepticon theme. Though the MediaVentures backbone of the score is found in this theme (ta da ta da ta da in some eerie, echoing way), that makes it sound like a total Zimmeresque piece, and though the choir to me sounded as a really gorgeous theme, one of the best I've heard this year, it *still* remains very MediaVentures - because it's actually a redenition of the motif we all love - now with latin words taken from Mozart's "Dies Irae". It's first introduced for four minutes in the 2nd album track "Decepticons", and is heard in different choral and orchestral forms woven into the rest of the score, to return in a glorious form in "Sam on the Roof", where both main themes (and our beloved motif, yay!) meet. 

A new theme is introduced in the third track; 'The All Spark". When listening to it, you'll get an overdose of the motif (yay!) and a Martin Tillman cello performance of the theme, later joined by female choir and strings, quick to turn into al full orchestal performance of the motif, with explosive trumpet stabs and cellos ragging through some wild staccatos. The brass remains low at all times, providing a good job for the subwoofer - till 3:04, where they  play a supportive role in bolding the All Spark theme. 

"Deciphering the Signal" is an eerie investigative track overblown sometimes by the synths which "ta da ta" alongside the strings, and the percussion. But it actually is just "the motif". It's a good listen for when I'm writing something investigative, but it doesn't work that well as a stand alone listen, for me. 

"Frenzy" is a new variation on the motif we haven't heard before: it's the motif used as a new theme. With eerie female choir in the background, string stabs, Doering-guitars and some explosive brass and trumpets climax this track and then fall down again to a fade out. I somehow can't recall this theme from the movie, nor the bootleg score that was released. Guess this was a mockup theme from cues they had left when they recorded. 

"Soccent Attack", for me, sounded too much like Zimmer's "King Arthur" - the motif, the brass... but when one would think: 'Nah, I'll listen to King Arthur when I want to hear this', Jablonsky somehow quickly notices it and throws in his choir, giving the listener something "new" to listen to. He then returns to the King Arthurish theme, builds and at the climax, the track ends... 

A more American Beauty flavor can be heard in "Sam At The Lake". It can be heard that Jablonsky threw in his experience from writing the score for "Desperate Housewives" in this track, but somehow wanted to do it "different" than he does in Housewives. Thing is, that because of this change, he made it sound like American Beauty (the low pusling bass motif) quirky xylophone(?) Marimba, & percussive elements. Good track, though. 

But when talking of the most original track Jablonsky delivers with this soundtrack, I'd say it's "Scorponok". He developed a stacatto motif instead of borrowing it from Zimmer, added loads of ethnic flavors and a full blown taiko section, perfectly balanced on the recording by Alan Meyerson, whose expertises behind the mixing table I have never doubted. 

That's the beginning of the track. At 2:31 the "main Scorponok theme" is introduced, bolstered by low male choir chords, military-style percussion (love it!), Brass stabs, chords, even more percussion, and Cello stabs. When it reaches its climax, it falls, but is quickly picked up in a thrid movement, slower, with low pulsing drums, male choral chant, more percussion and a string and brass section bolstering this masterpiece. It is brought to its final string notes underscored by Mell Wesson's beautiful drone. 

"Arrival To Earth" is the one track which people have been going crazy about. Jablonsky introduces a new theme for the strings, again underscored by a three note variation of the motif. When the track builds, you can hear the percussion players had the difficult task of drumming "soft". Which means you have to "pet" the drums. Me as a drummer can tell that's difficult, and I can hear that on the recording. But they deliver a job well done though. The theme you hear in this one won't be heard elsewhere in the score - which is, for a large Hollywood score - weird. Because this type of film mostly circles around one or two main themes; especially MediaVentures scores do so (Pirates of the Caribbean; anyone?). But Jablonsky decided to do what I call a "sub-main-sequential theme". 

The rest of the album is what we've all heard before: action, ta da ta da ta, more action, some choral bursts, even more action and some ta da ta da ta. 

What you can't expect from this album is bold Goldsmith-ish string arrangements, just MediaVentures "bold" arrangements. 

It's nothing new - more a collection of Zimmer scores craftly arranged by Jablonsky's gifted hands, whom we'll hear more from in the near future with TRANSFORMERS 2 coming up in 2009.

I am really curious about how he'll craft his first sequel :-) 

Practicing for the "Normalsville" score.

Yesterday all the mayhem began: I returned from my well deserved vacation in Luxemburg, and in the evening I was at my new school: The Veenlanden College Locatie Mijdrecht (since the VLC vinkeveen does not provide HAVO grade 4 & 5 I had to move - difficult story) to attend the first practice with the choir for Normalsville.
The boys choir.

Seriously - a 72 piece boy choir (which I shall refer as the "Studio Voices") assembled after a sort of a "in school" casting call for boys who'd like to sing.

I thought we'd end up with seven or nine boys, since most of 'em are very shy...
But look: we got 72 boys!

So, one would ask why these boys are crazy enough to come to school during their vacation, to record some a capella vocal pieces?

I honestly don't know it either... They're just nice boys... Just nice boys...

Yesterday evening we rehearsed most of the 20 (!) cues we have to record with them, 20 cues which is equivalent to 50 mins of a capella music, approx. 120 GB's of hard disk space, and a *lot* of score sheets... 

Today, we continued the rehearsal with the last 5 cues, and next week we'll spend five days recording the boys, split up in two sections of 36, the full 72 piece choir, and overlay those pieces to give a 144 piece feel! 

Sounds easy, but it isn't. That's why it takes us approx. 7 days to record everything. If we split the 20 "complete" cues up in the parts recorded loose, we have 237 cues to record, most of them 20 to 30 seconds, rises & "ooooo's". And finally, we'll ad the 72 piece choir for the lyrics. 

Aren't they cute? :-) 

Now yer curious about *what* exactly will be recorded.

I can't say everything about it, but I *can* say that we'll have lots of OOOOO'S and AAAA'S, some lyric-songs, and also some backing vocals for the horror-pieces, which run throughout the series. 

Of Course, all compositions are Ralf Wienrich & Tobias Marberger, 

Gotta go now, the crew and I are off having a dinner with 'em :-)

More soon!

in Luxembourg

on the terrace of the Hilton, with the free wifi "HOTCITY" network, enjoying my vacation.

More soon!

I'm ill.

Yes folks. I am. 

No lies. I'm ill. 

It's the worst thing that could happen to a creative person. It's the worst thing that could happen to a creative person in possession of a macbook running final draft & Pages during summer break. 

It's a writers block. A mild one. 

I feel this... terrible need to write, but once I've opened a blank page in pages or final draft, no thing in the world (not even Jasper) gets my creative juices flowing... 

So, that's why I decided to take a little time off from fiction writing. 

Since I have some of the greatest friends a man can wish, they took this very serious (I'm not me when I'm not writing - their words) so they decided to take me on a small trip to "our" Island, where we would have a "comfortable stay" at our luxurious, three person tent. Ofcourse, one could imagine that four friends in a three-person capable tent could be a problem.

We can't

Of course, one could imagine that four friends in a three person capable tent with only two beds to sleep on, could be a problem.

We can't.

So, there we went with the boat out to the "great open", the Vinkeveense Plassen. After a short 40-minute trip, we arrived and set up our campsite. 

It already started to get pretty late, so we decided to take some sleep. 

But then the problem came up: two beds, four people. And one couple.

So, Andy & Nina (the couple) shared a bed, and I, the lonesome dude with the writer's block was forced to share the sheets with... 

The desperate homosexual; Maikel. 

He's a great dude, and one of my best friends since kindergarten, but, for me, not the ideal person (and gender) to share a bed with. 

I was kinda lying pressed against the wall under the waaaaaaaaay to small pink blanket we even had to SHARE (just like the pillow) and tried to get some sleep. 

Then Andy decided to play pokemon on the GameBoy with the sound turned on and waked me up at like 2 AM because of the stupid musical underscore of the game... And I didn't get pretty much sleep, at all.

And so I was distracted from writing issues a little bit. And it helped. 

A bit.

At least I can say that I've had a taste of Campinglife and my writer's block is getting less worde and worse....

I'll keep you guys updated. 

Happy Birthday, Zero Hour!

Today, it's one year ago that I finished something that'll be with me my entire life: Zero Hour. Two years in the making, and much criticized because of its "Micael-Bay-ish" style of scripting and tempo, Zero Hour has been praised and acclaimed for its "breathtaking visual effects for a student movie" and by my friend & fellow blogger/filmmaker/writer/Transformers-the-score fanatic Chris Knight, for being "defined by its own cinematography" and its "number of great special effects." because of its epic trailer, it won the price for the most original act on the 2007 VLC Talenthunt, and received many good feedback from fellow students & friends. 

Now, it's one year after the mayhem of making this movie ended. And today, it feels so funny to think that I was working aroun

d the clock trying to finish Zero Hour last year... (and that I'm doing that 

now to get F=NV2 in production) until this day. 

And it has been a friggin long journey for me. From its origin in 2005, till

 the day we filmed with 30 degrees Celcius on the roof, till the last shooting day I've spent with Ralph in the airduct (which was shot on July 7, 2007 - the original release date).  

And I can't honor Zero Hour without looking back at the scene in the vent on July 7. 

I've never been so desperate to find 

a location to shoot, seriously. We first wanted to build it up in the gym, but that hall was unavailable a the time so we went on searching, finally ending up in the Science classroom, where Mrs. Cohen offered Ralph and me a bag of crisps while we were laying in (let's name it) uncomfortable positions in the foam-built airduct. We shot the scene, wapped principal photography and went back into the edit suite, where I spent 6 days to fine tune, edit and complete Zero Hour. 

Earlier that year, in June (don't know the exact date anymore) we were honored to be granted the opportunity to shoot on the roof of the school. And 

that will go down as the coolest location I've ever shot on. Stan

ding there, two stories high on the roof of my school... Damn, not much kids get that opportunity in their life. 

But I'll never do something like Zero Hour again, no. I felt like making an action movie when I was in my freshman year, and continued w

ith it in my 2nd year. Now, with F=NV2 (with thanks to Stefan van Vliet I know now that it means Fosfor=Nitrogen+ divanadium) I've found my turn. My favorite genres and styles: Thriller, Drama & comedy. Though Zero Hour had some dark humor in the part of the vent, not much funny and lauughable parts came by on screen. I can tell you, in my original *final* draft, (written two days before 7 July - the day principal photography wrapped) that was totally different. But seen the nature of the movie (action) I didn't wanted to turn it into some sort of weirdish Mr. Bean movie and decided to cut it all out. Which I now consider the best thing I did on the edit table.  But, one thing that MUST be noted: without the help of the many fantastic young actors, this project would've been nothing. They're the ones who did it. They're the ones you should be praising.

 And I don't know any better way to end this tribute with the following line and clip:

"Congrats, ZH, I've had a wonderful time making & watching you"

House MD: "Games"

It was a pretty good episode. It didn't air here in the Netherlands yet, but with many thanks to a friend in the States I got to see it, anyway. 

In this episode, House is forced by Cuddy to decide which two doctors will form his new diagnostic medicine team. Ofcourse, House plans a lot more "games" to decide who'll be the lucky bastard. Wilson misdiagnoses a patient, and by telling him the right diagnosis, screws up his life. 

The game House plays exists of a drug-addicted rockstar, who's body can only have one test at the time, therefore, the trophy which allows you to run a test is: a fake eyeball (which gets demolished by Kutner later on). The Bitch gets fired and has a brief section of developement with the patient. The most emotional piece of this episode. 

All with all: the writers over at Fox have done a good job on this one. The tension build of both the main storylines "game" & "the patient" goes up steadily, and the humoristic line of Wilson misdiagnosing a patient gives it the thing what made me *Love* House MD in the first place: the humor. 

Not so much character development happens, though Cuddy and House have their same old arguments, and the Bitch tries to pull all kinds of nasty and bitchy tricks (and gets fired because of that, DUHH) 

And as usual, the cinematography and the original score were just fine. 

I'd give it a solid 4 and a half out of 5.

The MPAA Mayhem continues

As I reported earlier; my project, F=NV2 is being classified by the MPAA standards as if it is a NC-17 project. 

Why can't it be R?

(I got response from the nice MPAA lady)

"Dear Marco, if your project would be officially MPAA rated, your Project wouldn't be eligible for an R rating, since, as I stated in my previous email (and in your responses confirmed by you) it includes Child abuse, violence, and pervasively strong language - Okay, hold.

On what do they base that? The pervasively strong language part - IT'S DUTCH! so how come they tell me that there is pervasively strong language if it's in dutch? (okay, I've sent the lady the pilot episode screenplay translated in English), but still, we just say "fuck" twice! And it's not like we are cursing each other throughout the entire series... (CONT'D) and therefore can't apply for the R rating. If, however you decide to remove two or more of these points featured in the project, R can be applied.

Yours Truly,

MPAA Lady"

And then, to show off how nice they are - she gave me a present. 

I still think that was just too nice. It wasn't even my birthday!

Why I love the MPAA & NC-17

Look at the picture: what do you see at the right bottom?

Okay, so my "project" (to which I shall refer as "F=NV2" until the official title is released later on at this blog) hasn't even gone public yet and already received some harsh ratings from the MPAA, but the kijkwijzer here over in the Netherlands was nice: they rated it 13. 

So, why NC-17?  BECAUSE WE KILL A KID. 

No. Seriously. The MPAA lady (who will remain anonymous to prevent civil punishment) told me that "a movie would be rated NC-17 if a minor is abused/tortured/or killed by a character portraying an adult." (her words). Okay. Fine. So there is this one 15 second sequence in "the Project", in which a minor falls down a stairwell and breaks his neck very nasty (believe me - it's disgusting to see), and after that his head gets bashed in by the outrageous kiddie-killer. 

15 SECONDS MAKE IT NC-17!!!!

I cite the MPAA:

"The rating simply signals that the content is appropriate only for an adult audience. An NC-17 rating can be based on violence, sex, aberrational behavior, drug abuse or any other element that most parents would consider too strong and therefore off-limits for viewing by their children."

Ideocracy. This rating is too strict. I mean, c'mon! I don't film the f*cking kid totally NUDE! You just see him faking how he breaks his neck and how his blood sprays out of his head against the walls of the house like if he starred in darn Saw III. 

But that's not the problem; "NC-17 NO ONE 17 OR UNDER ALLOWED" looks pretty neat on a poster... 

The real problem is: how can the minor, who is 12 years of age, SEE THE PROJECT WHEN IT'S RATED NC-17??? Or, how can I, the creator - 15 years of age - WATCH MY OWN PROJECT? 

Or, how will people react to this rating? Will they think; "It's NC-17: PORN PORN PORN! NOT MY KIDS!" Or: "Hey, a kid on the poster and NC-17? Hmm.... we could try it, though!". Unfortunately, I think (and know) that the first sentence will be the one most parents choose and shout out. People in these days only seem to use ratings as a goddamn law or something. Because if the MPAA tells you NC-17, MY CHILD WON'T SEE IT! But, if the rest of the film is f*cking Bambi and there's only ONCE sequence in which you see a kid DIE ON A BRUTALLY HARSH way, why wouldn't you go and watch it?

DECIDE FOR YOURSELF PEOPLE - DON'T LET THE MPAA OR ANY OTHER ORGANISATION DECIDE WHAT TO WATCH OR NOT! (use it as a guide - not a law)

The system is OLD. Too OLD! It, to me, actually states that I, a 15 year old filmmaker can't kill any of my friends in MY OWN movies - since the MPAA tells child murder is NC-17... 

I'm gonna watch Bambi now... need to cool down. 

Lost in the flood

Okay. for the past few weeks I've been studying for my exams, writing a novel, a 3rd & 4th season for a television series (Codenamed F=NV²) and I've cleaned up my room. 

So. Something's off. 

'cuz I normally don't study for tests or exams at all, my first novel has been published just four weeks ago (will post about that issue later), I haven't even written the 2nd season, and I normally never clean my room...

It all started last week. With the flood. 

We have an attic above the studio, which, due to a condition it posesses, I can only define as "ladder-impairdness". It's a place that I never really frequent. Lots of air-ducting, a creaky, homemade wooden floor, and lots of spiders. 

Last week, a leak developed in one of the hot water pipes up there. I've seen the leak and it really is small. It's a leak you wanna beat the crap out in high school. But that would've made the damage only bigger.

But nevertheless, it started to spray water all over the creaky wooden floor, spiders and airducts, until the wooden floor gave up and started to pass on the water to the studio ceiling, my office wall, a built in bookchase, and a wall next to the stariwell. First we thought the shower leaked again (that happened two year ago - it destroyed one whole wall in the house). So, in the time that the paint started bubbling off the wall, we were taking apart the shower and discovered no leaks. 

A day went by.

The next day the situation got even worse, because small drops of amber-colored water started landing in my Kellogs breakfast. And there are two things you MUST ONLY do if you really are in a mood to piss me of, and one of them is touching my breakfast. (The other is touching my MacBook, but that one seems obvious to me). Then I decided I wanted to record something in the studio and discovered a large amber-colored stain in the wall of the control room. 

Damn. I had to get up that attic.

It's scary, you know! The ladder which leads up there is small as hell and I (weight 45 kilos) can't even fit through the opening! So, after trying it sideways I *finally* got in and discovered the leak. 

Now, my house looks like the Dutch version of  Amish barn-raising scene in Witness except you take out Harrison Ford and Kelly McGillis and replace them with the handyman Peter and four other dudes who go sunbathing on our garage roof every time we're away.

Plastic hangs all over the doorways and large sheets of paper are rolled out over the floor with such enthousiasm that I'm starting to feel like I'm back two years ago when the "major transformation" of our house took place. Only thing is that there was dust instead of water.

The staircase wall was dried out and plastered over, and five hours later that wall had turned an ugly shade of brown-- suggesting that it wasn't dried out in the first place or I'm living in fucking Amityville.

However,

As a devoted brother, son and nephew it is my DUTY to find out what dark materials have found their way into my life and family.

Let's eliminate:

A) the old testament and related religious explanations

B) Nature

C) Coincidence

D) Or I'm a Freudian who suffers from a neuropsychosis combined with some super-ego evolution through time. 

Then we end up with one explanation:

Mrs. Cohen was upset with me getting an F for last weeks Math test and somehow cursed my house, family and pets with a strange, unsolvable mathematical formula!

I knew it... I saw her lookin' at me last lesson. And afterwards I saw Mrs. Ottenvanger give her some packages which I assumed were her donuts and some wine, but I strongly believe now that it were animal sacrifices.

So please, Mrs. Cohen, take back the mathematical formula. I know it might be kinda big to stall at your place, but maybe you can donate it?

Just a thought.