Christmas with the Kids

Always in the background of our experience at Vancouver Film School is the fact that my kids are a thousand miles away.  Seems like just yesterday we were all saying goodbye, Christmas feeling like an eternity into the future. Then, boom: four and a half months have passed, we're on a plane back to Calgary, and I'm wondering where the time went! It hasn't exactly been a pleasure cruise for any of us, being apart this way.  There...

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VFS Progress Report #2: The First Three Months

Four days shy of month three. In some ways, the time seems to have passed by like a Japanese bullet train at rush hour, just like some said it would.  In other ways, it feels like the days and weeks have followed one another at a pace that my sage grandmother, when discussing the passage of time in her own life at 87, called "just right". If time is, at least in part, a measuring stick of what we have and haven't accomplished...

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Tatchell & Jennewein Inspire Screenwriters

Guest post originally published on Vancouver Film School's Blog (Friday, November 4, 2011) During the recent Writing for Film & Television Two-Weekend Intensive, VFS played host to two special guest speakers: alumna/Oscar nominee Terri Tatchell and Advisory Board member Jim Jennewein.   The Two-Weekend Intensive was a chance for aspiring screenwriters to experience a barrage of screenwriting tools, techniques,...

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Winner - 8th Place, Writer's Digest 80th Annual Writing Competition (TV & Movie Scripts)

Click here for list of winners. I just got word that I came in 8th place in the Writer`s Digest 80th Annual Writing Competition (TV & movie script category), for my original script, "Spare Change".   It was my first crack at writing a script and, because I only learned about the contest four days before the deadline, I had to work fast.  (These days, that just sounds like a typical week at VFS!)  So this is very cool,...

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Life @ VFS: What I've Learned So Far (Episode 1)

Every day at VFS is an epiphany.  I'm not even kidding.  It's kind of ridiculous. Just when I think I've jotted down that last great tip, morsel of wisdom or industry insight from one of my teachers - boom! - they fire off another one, just to prove they can.  I don`t think the big blue binder can take much more. Don`t get me wrong, I love every minute of it.  I`ve dreamed of this for years and I pinch myself a couple of times...

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My Worst Poem

Because screenplays and poems are close cousins (in terms of both format and economy of language), my first-term style teacher, Adam Warren, asked us to write a god-awful poem en route to coming up with a good one.  For what it's worth: I Flung Myself At Her by Paul Donnett I flung myself at her like a dog in heat, Like some sweet luncheon meat, Like a field full of wheat. And she opened her arms like a bright sunny day, and the horses did bray And the children did play And the farmers made hay And the real men turned gay. And we rolled...

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Remembering 9/11 at the Movies

It`s ten years ago today. And yes, it still deserves - will always deserve - the attention it gets.  Especially a few years from now, when we talk to our kids (and grandkids) about 9/11 the way our grandparents talked to us about Pearl Harbor, hoping that a profound historical moment our children never actually experienced will nonetheless resonate and influence the way they design and shape the world's future after we're gone.   Like...

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VFS Progress Report #1: The First 10 Days

A bit tired.  Five A.M., can't sleep, so figured it was a good time to write. Bob`s outside going through the garbage again.  (At least I think it's Bob.  It probably isn't.  I'll just use Bob from here on as an umbrella pseudonym for whoever's out there at any given time.) The first two full weeks of class end today.  Went something like this: Monday, Aug. 22 - Orientation Thursday, Aug. 25 - Admissions...

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Orientation: "Just Do It!"

One move and several hundred shamelessly voyeuristic photos later, I am yanked rudely from my slumber by the familiar sound of Bob rummaging through the dumpster outside our bedroom window.  Finding my glasses, I notice he’s wearing two different shoes and recall with a twinge of regret that I gave three pairs away before leaving Alberta and, calculating his feet to be roughly the same size as mine, I now wish I had held onto at least the Adidas...

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Gotta-Read: Making Movies (by Sidney Lumet)

He's been one of my favourite filmmakers for years and someone I'd wistfully hoped to meet one day, so it was with a genuinely heavy heart that I learned Sidney Lumet had passed away in April at age 86. Director of a bundle of personal favourites like Network, Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico, and The Verdict, Lumet represented that old-school mix of irrepressible passion, inexhaustible work ethic, and an unrivaled ability to troubleshoot...

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Missing My Kids

Saw Sade last night with Mel at Rogers Arena.  Was magical.  Rocked out to "Smooth Operator" and "Soldier of Love", slow-danced to "Moon & the Sky". Wonderful to see her for the first time! Missing the kids a lot today.  Bit of a rough morning.  Maybe it was all the Sade the night before.  Just want to touch them and hug them, getting those same panic attacks I feel when I'm stuck on a plane for too long.  I thought...

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The Journey West

I questioned whether we'd pull off the move to B.C. with a 14-foot Uhaul trailer, but we did it! Well, once we sold or gave away two-thirds of our earthly possessions.  That and a solid week and a half of packing, two straight all-nighters' worth of cleaning and painting, address changes, tearful goodbyes, and an eleventh-hour BBQ move (thank you, Tom Hannam), before handing the keys back to our landlord and finally hitting the highway around...

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The Checklist

30 things to get done in prep for Van Film School: 1.       Assess personal finances (can we afford it?)2.       Determine whether 2011 or 2012 works better3.       Talk to the kids, make sure they’ll be okay with it4.       Ensure their mom will be okay with it (staying with her while we’re gone)5.       Build a “Plan A”, “B”, and “C”6.       Put aside some money (2-3...

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