Limos, Brazilians and F/X: The InFilm Experience (Part 1)

Early last month, I was asked by one of my Facebook friends—AllMovie.com writer Josh Ralske—if I'd like to cover the inaugural program by the International Film Institute ("InFilm"), which bills itself as "a once in a lifetime, 5 day experience in the movie capital of the world." Ralske himself isn't affiliated with InFilm, but had been asked by Brazilian film journalist Pablo Villaça for some names of American critics who might be interested in attending, including myself and Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeffrey Wells.

Essentially, the multicultural staff of InFilm provides a guided L.A. tour for people who are passionate about film but don't have any insider access. The first week, which focused on special effects, had a steep ticket price of $2900, which included lodging in a swanky, four-star West Hollywood hotel, six days' worth of breakfast vouchers, a fancy farewell lunch, limousine transportation, traveling wi-fi access (which allowed me to post my Ulrich Seidl interview from one of our ever-changing modes of transport, a party bus with a sadly underutilized stripper pole), admission to each activity, but not airfare; it's definitely an event for well-off tourists. From my personal point of view, it's difficult to gauge whether that's ultimately a good value, as (a) I'm merely a journalist and don't have an extra three grand lying around, and (b) I already have greater access than most film-loving hobbyists. Was it fun? Did I enjoy the company of my 15 or so, mostly Portuguese-speaking companions? Did I learn a ton about CGI, practical and optical effects, with exclusive access and opportunities to ask industry veterans as many questions as possible? Yes, yes, and hell yes.

On Day One, we began with a primer on special effects at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences' Margaret Herrick Library, which was established in 1928, and housed since 1991 in a former Beverly Hills water treatment facility. Boasting over 10 million photographs, 32,000 books, and 80,000 screenplays (on a whim, I checked out the Brewster McCloud shooting script, simply because I could), this Mecca of Hollywood history would eat up a lot of my time if I lived in Los Angeles. It's a researcher's paradise, as long as you lock up everything but your laptop and a pencil, as almost nothing else is allowed inside. One of the librarians, whose name I sadly can't recall, set aside for our group some old Popular Science clippings on early F/X and original production art from sci-fi classics like 1979's Star Trek: The Motion Picture—beautiful, time-intensive sketches that may be forgotten by the next generation (no pun intended), more impressed by the CGI lens flares of J.J. Abrams' recent reboot. I also touched my first Oscar, the neglectfully unpolished 1950 "Best Black and White Costume Design" trophy shared by Edith Head and Charles LeMaire for All About Eve. Wearing a t-shirt and jeans at the time felt secretly embarrassing.

After lunch, we were given a tour of visual effects powerhouse Digital Domain, one of the "Big 5" effects companies, as a few industry types called it. (The list also includes Rhythm & Hues—where'd we end up later in the week, Sony Pictures ImageWorks, ILM and Weta Digital.) For such a whale of a company, so much so that their Frank Gehry-designed conference room is called "The Whale" (pictured at right), Digital Domain didn't electrify me, perhaps because it was the one disappointing stop during our entire excursion—admittedly because they refused to give us a taste of Their Next Big Project. We knew they worked on Titanic (James Cameron was a founder, after all), Transformers 2 (Michael Bay is a partner, after all) and won an Oscar for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, but we didn't get to see any early stages of 2012, and our walkthrough mostly consisted of reception areas, empty editing suites, and poster-filled hallways. Even the massive screening room yielded only the same show reel that their corporate clients see before whipping out their checkbooks. Do I really need to see Speed Racer clips again? The one saving grace was that our liaison was able to answer our near-tireless questions about animatics, technological limitations (there are none, he said confidently), sharing work with other companies on the same film, and how much creative control they get during conceptual stages (not as much as you might think, as I interpreted).

Back at the hotel, we met with makeup-F/X artist Paul Salamoff, author of "On the Set" and "The Complete DVD Book" (with Chris Gore), whose most exciting claim to fame to our group was that he created the prop pup in There's Something About Mary. Having worked on big-scale productions (Land of the Lost) and cheapies (Full Moon Entertainment, Lloyd Kaufman, two of the Critters movies), Salamoff was an appropriate speaker for a quick-and-dirty lecture on the history of effects, which the group seemed to like, though I was a bit bored having learned the basics years ago. If only he had gone into more war stories (until we saw his portfolio later, there was no way to know how much he had done in his 20+ years in cinematic trenches), I wouldn't have felt the need to escape for a cup of coffee. Salamoff was an affable guy, though, and very receptive to left-field questions.

The tour picked up steam in Day Two, including a talk between John Lasseter and Hayao Miyazaki, a trip to a physical effects studio, and much more. CONTINUED HERE...

Posted by ahillis at August 4, 2009 2:39 PM