June 4, 2004
Shortly after that early morning Harry Potter screening the day before yesterday, Curtis and I met up with Nick and Kara and we headed out for another camping trip, in spite of the many people warning us that a tornado-riddled storm was heading our way. It hit shortly after we set up our tent, and so we go to fall asleep to the beautiful sounds of a torrential downpour and heavy illumination from the interrupted bursts of lightining. In the morning we rented a canoe and set out over a lake; an hour in, for reasons we never quite figured out, we tipped over and almost lost our boat. So that was a lot of fun. Later we went rock climbing, which I actually used to be somewhat adept at, leading me to believe that I could scale some precipices without rope or harness. Which I did, although I had several moments of severe doubt, all at very high and precarious points. I was thinking about how my Eagle Scout brother, a died in the wool outdoorsman, would be terribly unimpressed by this so-called adventure, but consider it on a curve: for a bunch of urban vegetarian art fags to camp in a thunderstorm and capsize a boat and climb sheer cliffs is pretty impressive. Isn't it?
After the rock climbing, Curtis and I hightailed it back to Dallas to meet up with Yen and James for a technical test for our screening next week. The great news: it looks really good. Something must have been wrong with the projection we did at the Magnolia last month, because we were all quite pleased with how it looked and were relieved that we wouldn't have to apologize to peopleabout the image quality. The slightly less great news is that the museum's auditorium doesn't have the best accoustics; there's a tad bit too much echo. But I guess if it was good enough for Matthew Barney, then it's good enough for me.
I keep forgetting about the screening, actually, and I don't think I've posted the details here yet; so here's the e-mail invite we sent out:
~DEADROOM~ Hello friends,
Without further ado, you are all cordially invited to the first public screening of the feature motion picture Deadroom on June 11 (the 5 month anniversary of our first day of principal photography) at 9:30pm.
Make no misgivings, this is an art film. Thus, fittingly, the screening will occur at the Dallas Museum Of Art, in the Horchow Auditorium.
JUNE 11
9:30 PM
DALLAS MUSEUM OF ART (HORCHOW AUDITORIUM)
www.deadroommovie.comThis is not an official premiere, nor is it a gala event of any sort (feel free to dress down). Rather, the screening is being conducted for two reasons: to let the cast and crew see what they worked so hard on, and for us, the producers, to see what an objective audience thinks of the film. Consider it a test screening of sorts. What will it look like on a big screen? How will it sound? Will people fall laugh, cry, fall asleep? That's what we want to find out, and that's what we need your help in determining.
Thus: feel free to pass on this invitation to anyone who you feel may be interested. We've got 300 seats to fill. Worried about ticket prices? Never fear, the event is free (although donations to our sponsor, the Asian Film Festival of Dallas, will be accepted at the door). Need more information on the film? Visit our website, www.deadroommovie.com.
Will it be worth your while? We can guarantee only this: this is an independent film different from any you've seen before. Whether that's good or bad...well, that's up to you to decide.
RSVP if you like, or simply show up. We hope to see you there!
Yen's pretty sure we'll have a packed house. We've got about 75 cast and crew members who may or may not come, and the othe 225 seats in the auditorium will be filled with objective viewers. We'll be handing out comment cards to those lucky individuals, although their comments will likely hold no sway over the film itself. As James has said many times, if people don't like it, it's probably because they're just ignorant.
Posted by David Lowery at June 4, 2004 12:00 AM