Cleared...

As well as the unique and perfect music that Sarah wrote and produced for the top and the body of the film, we couldn’t resist a choice bit of Belle and Sebastian over the end credits. Clearing music is notoriously awkward - especially for short films where money is tight (see one of the first entries in this blog where I made a speculative call to Wixen Music in California who ‘handle’ the Doors). Failing to clear music is one of the major pitfalls pointed out by all the short film-makers’ guides. You make a lovely film and then someone says ‘you know that Nirvana track you are using…’ and corporate legal departments come down on you like a Terry Gilliam fist. Today the contracts came through from Beggars, who license Belle and Sebastian. Isobel Palos there and Lindsay Nieman at Sony ATV (who publish the music) have been incredibly patient with us first-time purchasers and I think fair too. Thanks folks.

Hot off the presses

The presses are at Purely Print here in Blandford where Andy and Nick have been in charge of creating Oscar and Jim ‘one sheets’ (A1 posters) and postcards from Phil Casey’s designs. After taking a poll of Executive Producers we have gone for a portrait poster but used a different slightly less ‘on-the-nose’ image. Printing individual Execs names has been a bit of a challenge. We’ll ping out the artwork so you can do it yourself but in the litho run we couldn’t alter each and every one. So the ‘Executive Producer’ on the poster is ‘You’ - we wanted to allude to the way that people have backed the film. There are three versions of postcard and I guess we’ll make these available to buy on the new site - which Dara is beavering away at. We’ll also invite reviews and do other stuff too.

'Borrowed grandeur'

… Woody Allen’s description of film music. It’s amazing how prevalent it is - and how often it’s too much: the music and not the drama telling you what to feel. We started out quite purist: Simon, Paul and I talked airily of a ‘sound sculpt’, using Parisian street sounds that Martin Wilson picked up in his ‘atmos’ recordings on location, and creating a soundtrack from them. With the action cut we all felt it needed something - over the credits at the top and perhaps at moments in the film too. I had heard and seen Sarah Llewellyn (http://www.myspace.com/sarahllew - I’ve forgotten how to embed links) at a circus - she took a break from her work with Tonal to be musical director of Gifford’s - a biannual touring circus. She led a Parisian/Balkan/gypsy/ band there which made a great noise and made me think she might be able to help with Oscar and Jim. She wrote an Oscar and Jim suite for us and her Tonal Ensemble performed it. The only pity is that we couldn’t use more of the music in the finished film. Here’s the opening theme. Oscar & Jim theme.mp3