The Directors Guild of America (DGA) hosts the DGA Digital Day to exhibit and discuss new technologies and techniques.  About five years ago, two companies presented new 3D technology.  Two years later, six companies presented their wares.   A tech surprise was the Panasonic AG-3DA1 Production System, which put a 3D camera system within reach of many small companies.  Another tech wave is the expansive use of Canon Digital Still cameras into the professional production arena because they can record full Hi-Def.  Major TV show episodes embraced the technology. The small DSLR’s can be purchased for less than $2,000 and outfitted with a variety of professional gear, including Follow Focus and matteboxes.  The Canon EOS 5D is leading the way.

Scott Billups, author of the essential “Digital Moviemaking 3.0,”  broke down complex digital concepts into accessible analogies like boxes of crayons.  Simple, but understandable.  The filmmaker must understand the limits of his technology. Great cinematographers like Greg Toland, James Wong Howe (who Billups worked with), Gordon Willis, and Vittorio Storaro worked in a photochemical process.  They were first photographers, framers, and interpreters of the dramatic moment.  No more. Today’s digital cinematographer must weigh formats, methods, and other emerging innovations for image capture of the dramatic moment into its final workflow for post-production and distribution.  The workflow discussion dovetailed into a panel discussing web series.  The creator of  “The Bannen Way” (available on Netflix) said that their strategy was to produce three-minute webisodes to be compiled into a thirty-minute series and, ultimately, a marketable DVD full-length DVD.

DGA Digital Day and a subsequent “Avatar” DGA seminar both discussed the “Smart Stage”  or “Virtual Back Lot.”  The Virtual Back Lot is, essentially, the use of a green screen stage with 3-D, motion capture suits and practical set dressing or physical models. These stages utilize digital filmmaking and green screen techniques to virtually eliminate the construction of huge sets and time-consuming driving shots.  Not that you avoid the cost of modeling those digital sets.

The “Avatar” seminar featured the UPM, Assistant Directors and the VFX team discussing their production methos.  At some point during production, the filmmakers had to stop and come up with nomenclature to quantify the new processes in this digital frontier to avoid misccomunication.  Now that’s cutting edge.  The “Avatar” clips demonstrated the “interactive” use of  3D models (in the computer), live actors against a greenscreen stage and other actors in Motion Capture suits.  Check out this YouTube video on “Avatar.”

The Virtual Back Lot can virtually (had to use it!) eliminate driving shot setups.  When you shoot driving shots, the entire crew stands around while the actors go off into a vehicle rigged up on the trailer and toed around the city to capture the background. The rigging is a time-consuming situation, and time is money.  With green screen techniques, cameras can be set anywhere.  You also might just need to rent a car just for a single day rather than three days to get the shot.  Stargate Digital made a presentation.  Check out Stargate Digital’s website. Review the Virtual Backlot, Visual Effects, and Driving Shot tabs to understand the possibilities of using green screen and 3-D software to expand your story and work within your budget.

The “live” quality of the Smart Stage’s interactive elements means that the director doesn’t lose touch with authentic performances in relation to a 3D modeling world.  And the actor’s interaction with, say, Zombies, aliens, or avatars as placemarked by live human actors.  Smart Stage is all the rage with the major studios.  I attended a showcase for the Universal Smart Stage.  But that setup is not really within the means of the independent filmmaker.  Just too expensive.  The Smart Stage’s place for the Indie filmmaker is to replace locations and justify creative digital model implementation as compared to higher alternative costs.  In addition, if in Los Angeles, you might schedule an expensive actor’s days sequentially on a Smart Stage – keeping their salary down or making a better deal.

In my discussions with VFX companies, the Smart Stage is not a one-stop-shop process.  While the technology is available, the practical application is not turn-key.  Yet, with diligent focus on the script and with practical considerations taken into account, you can come up with emotionally resonant scenes which can be done using a modest Smart Stage approach.  The approach might save hundreds of thousands of dollars in a production’s budget.  And maybe just get your film – your message in tact – up on the screen.

In Hollywood, every word has a price:

EXT. ROME – DAY

The Huns invade Rome.

Some people would say that this scene is only an eighth of a page, “We’ll finish it off in the morning.” In actuality, it would probably require weeks or months of shooting. In terms of production, this is a nightmare strip on your production board. For this one-eighth of a page (scripts are always measured in eighths), you would spend millions of dollars and months of work in construction, extras, stunts, visual effects, location shooting, transportation, crew and more.

Let’s consider some writing guidelines for modest budget indie feature, cable or TV films between $2 and 7 million, where there are more opportunities for a sale. The film unions have tiered rates for actors, crew and drivers in these budget ranges. Furthermore, a producer on a modest budget film may let you actually come to set – or direct. Another plus.

A Unit Production Manager (UPM) breaks down your script into Element Categories: Cast, Extras, Stunts, Vehicles, Costumes, Props, Animals, Set Dressing, Special Effects, Special Equipment, Addl Labor, Locations, Visual Effects, etc.,

Each Scene Element goes into a database like Movie Magic Scheduling. A low budget schedule is between 18 and 30 days. In very general terms, these Elements, plus crew labor, post-production and legal/bond fees, become the total budget.

With our Modest Budget Writers Thinking Cap, let’s put out some guidelines. You may want to avoid an ABC film.  Not the television network, but Animals-Boats-Children.

•Period piece films are expensive for costume, set dressing, transpo and location – write for the present.

•Cast. Keep your one-line actors to a minimum.  Children – costly if too many or too young.  They need Social Workers and have limited time on set. Teenagers can work longer days. At sixteen, they might be Emancipated Minors. Less restrictions, less money.

•Extras. Pick your battles – key events like soccer games, locations like malls, crowded public beaches – require lots of extras.    Make sure that the scene is worth it – and that you can shoot it one day. Ideally you call the extras in after lunch, work 5 hours and then release. And if you plan well, have the foreground extras switch with the background extras, take off their jackets and let down their hair.  A whole new set of extras. But pick two locations right next to each to overlap these calls.

•Animals. Frequently the Hero. Avoid a Zoo, but maybe a dog named ‘Skip’.    Dogs can be trained.  Monkeys can be trained.   Cats can’t be herded. Exotic animals require more money and time.

•Vehicles.  Avoid too many 1930 Ferraris and the like. Maybe one, or two.  A good gauge: Can you rent the cars? Airplanes and Boats take time and money.   If it’s far enough away, use a Replicar.

•Costume. Present day. Uniforms for firefighters, police, soldiers, etc., are available but can be expensive The best bet? Low budget costumers go to garage sales and vintage clothing stores.

•Props.  What the actors pick up and use. Machine guns require special licenses and use up bullets at $1 per shot. Keep your low budget actioner to pistols, rifles, shotguns and an occasional machine gun. Even better if you’re using Digital SFX to lay in the gunfire and smoke.

•SFX. Explosions, rain, breakaway glass, bonfires, all the fun stuff you did with your chemistry set as a kid.   Requires prep and skill.   Effects should support your plot.  A unique explosion, rain or bonfire can work for mood and stunning visuals.  Plan.   And again, consider digital SFX.

•Locations. USC campus costs $7,000 a day. Your fraternity film might have five days on campus but the rest at a cheaper house. Some government buildings are budget friendly – and even free.  But beware of Site supervisor costs. Ask before you write.

•Visual Effects. The shot on the Golden Gate might work with a green screen and a matte for a composite. Is it a critical plot point? Don’t just pick visual effects to shock the audience. It generally won’t work.  The is  pretty high with “Armageddon”, “The Matrix” and other high budget films.   It should be a story with VFX, not VFX and no story.  We’ve seen plenty of those in Hollywood.   As the saying goes, “They had $100 million dollars and couldn’t buy a script!”

These are general guidelines. A budget of $2 million is very different than a ‘low budget’ of $10 million.   With good planning and a tight story, you might be able to shoot a modest period piece, or have more explosion and visual effects.    Each movie is unique and so is the budget.      But my experience is that the imagination usually outpaces a budget realistic for the story – and the talent that it will attract.

If you’re a low budget filmmaker, lack of money compels more creativity.  Write lean and mean, rather than use shock and scope.   The theaters are cluttered with films that just throw money at the screen – but don’t have good stories.

“Kingdom of Heaven,” “The Island,” “Stealth” and other films didn’t work despite their major effects and high budgets.

Sit around the campfire and tell your story.

Some years ago, my daughter asked: “…so in the olden times, Dad, when did you see movies?” Hmmmm.  Olden times.  As if the wheel, the pen, writing, music, and entertainment were invented with her generation.  I explained that there were two places to see movies.  Theaters and Television.  That was it.  No DVD, VHS, iPod, or Hulu.com.  My TV Guide search was essential to find the right movies and straighten out my schedule for the week by circling and grading the films.  After all, if a movie came on at 11 p.m., you’d be up for two hours to “The End.”

But each week, when I got the TV Guide in my young hands, it was like opening a present.  Before the internet, I explained to my daughter, we had this ancient forum called a “library” where you could get books on movies and famous actors.

“Oh,” she said.  “You actually go someplace?”

But the TV Guide was a treasure trove.  My favorites –  “The Great Escape” – A.  “Dirty Dozen” – A.  “Run Silent, Run Deep” – A.  Any film by John Ford.  And at least watch anything with Bogart, Flynn, Coooper, Lancaster, Cary Grant, William Powell, Carole Lombard, Katherine Hepburn and others.  I was delighted to discover that stunningly beautiful Hedy Lamarr was granted U.S. Patent 2,292,387 in 1942 for an early version of frequency-hopping based upon a piano roll to change between 88 frequencies.  It was intended to make radio-guided torpedoes harder for enemies to detect or jam. Beautiful and designs weapons.  What a dish!

But around Christmas, the most essential movie was “Scrooge” with  Alistair Sim, a Scottish actor who portrayed Ebenezer Scrooge in the 1951 classic based upon Charles Dicken’s beloved “A Christmas Carol.” Nowadays, of course, you can buy the DVD with both color and black and white versions to our delight.

Alistair Sim

During my years of searching the TV Guide, this films was obscure and hardly remembered.  As I recall, its television screening would occur only once, on Los Angeles Independent channels of 5, 11, or 13 in the years before conglomerate takeovers.

Once.  Only Once.  For a year.

The film is now regarded as a classic but, at the time, Alistair Sim had become an obscure footnote in film history.  His stern visage and scattered hair perfectly complemented his impentrable dark miserly eyes for the role. It’s hard to believe that, with his harsh features, “in 1950 he was voted the most popular film actor in Britain in a national cinema poll.” His earliest successes as a leading man included the police detective in the thriller Green for Danger (1946); as the headmaster of Nutbourne College, co-starring with Dame Margaret Rutherford, in the comedy The Happiest Days of Your Life (1950); and as a writer of lurid crime fiction in the comedy Laughter in Paradise (1951).

He was the definitive Ebenezer Scrooge, the very personification of a miser in a vicious Humbug spirit that there was no chance of his redemption.  And then he was miraculously changed through the Ghosts into a man of such unexpected generosity that the frightened charwoman, played to perfection by Kathleen Harrison, could only flee with fear.

“Scrooge” was screened on near midnight of Christmas Eve.  It did not appear earlier in the week nor later. On Demand Media was science fiction. If you wanted to watch Sim and were one of the few people tuned in to his perfect portrayal as the definitive Scrooge, then you were a member of a group of film junkies who prized movie performances, film history, and pitch-perfect classics crystallized in celluloid.  There was a commitment one had to make to see the film.  If you missed it, you missed it.  No second chances.  No other way to see the film.  It required a decision.  Try explaining that to today’s teenager.  “All that, for a movie?!

What I remember about those Christmases was the sheer joy of Sim’s transformation.  His buoyant burst of generosity with the charwoman.  The little boy running across the snow who Scroorge beseeches to wake up the butcher for the prize meat.  “You mean, the one as big as me?”

Sim reminded me of the joy of Christmas, its real meaning, and the embrace of the Spirit in our lives to spread kindness and goodwill toward men.

Missing the film was like not seeing an old friend on Christmas Eve. Once a year, I made some time for him.  And he spoke to me.

Me: So, I found this article by Secretary of Defense Gates: “China Could Undermine U.S. Military Power in the Pacific.”  China is expanding its navy in the Pacific to secure disputed territories in the South China Sea with lots of oil and gas.  A Tom Clancy/Harrison Ford thriller.  I’ve followed the Chinese military since the nineties and it’s a central plot of my novel, “Stealing Thunder.” (Shameless Plug! 600 pages long; waiting for Amazon jerks to come through with the darn discount price…).   Think “Clear and Present Danger,” “Hunt for Red October”…

Executive: Liked ‘Sum of All Fears.’

Me: Yes, but the terrorists in the book become cliched neo-Nazis in the film, remember?  Gates said that we should be concerned with China’s “… cyber and anti-satellite warfare, anti-air and anti-ship weaponry.”

I studied “Unrestricted Warfare,” a book written by two Chinese colonels. Their strategy won’t bankrupt their Free-Enterprise-as-long-as-The-Generals-Get-Their-Cut Economy like the Socialist Soviet Union under Reagan’s brilliant strategy.  They said, “One war [1991 Gulf War] changed the world. [Look at] all the new words that began to appear after 17 January 1991. It is only necessary to cite the former Soviet Union, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, cloning, Microsoft, hackers, the Internet, the Southeast Asian financial crisis, the euro, as well as the world’s final and only superpower — the United States.”  New technology, a big canvas, a huge VFX trailer!

Executive: But, well, that implies that the socialist Chinese officials are, well, bad guys.  Just because they use North Korea as a proxy against Japan and the U.S. for nuclear weapons development, claim territory in the South China Sea disputed by a dozen nations and shot down hundreds of democracy activists in Tienanmen Square doesn’t really mean they’re bad guys.  Just a different…lifestyle.

Me: Okay, how ‘bout a Tienanmen Square angle? A few dozen activists morph into thousands hungering for freedom.  They even build a “Goddess of Democracy.”

Executive: Bit too much Statue of Liberty rah-rah, if you know what I mean.  Might be construed as supporting the troops.  That can’t fly.

Me: Ooooookay.  See, the demonstrators are crushed by Communist tanks and soldiers in a brutal crackdown that claims hundreds of lives. Thousands more go to jail.   Drama, and––

Executive: The DVD division is struggling for market penetration with the Blu-Rays, so can we call the country…oh, I don’t know…Mushamar, or Sinesia?  Gotta have that market.  How can democracy activists really be against a socialist government?

Me: Gotcha.  Let’s not focus on an event that might anger Beijing when it bids for the next Olympics and bans athletes and former athletes who’ve spoken out on behalf of Tibet, democracy activists — in a generic way of course – and minorities.  Consider a general human rights angle?  Small story, village in China having an election…

Executive removes shoe and plucks at string on his sock.

Executive: Small is good, small is lower budget.

Me: The village people are suppressed by the local left-wing Party Boss in Free speech, Free press, property rights, Freedom of Religion, etc… When local elections are held in these outlying areas in a “democracy experiment,” communist party cadre are invariably voted out.  We have our Hero and…

Executive: There’s that government angle!  And you said, “Village people.”  You’re thinking about a soundtrack deal?   Instead of “YMCA,” maybe something like, “Why My Blu-Ray…”

Me: No, not the Village People band but real village people.  Workers,  families, even people persecuted for their beliefs like the Falun Gong, and Christians.

Executive: Nobody ever believes that Christians have been persecuted…

Me: Only outside of Hollywood. Well, you can get into trouble for just distributing Bible’s for God’s sake. We could even include some Tibetans who walk around in saffron robes and get stun guns shoved in their mouths during interrogation–-

Executive: No Tibetans. That will kill our DVD sales in Shanghai.

Me: Okay, corporate?

Executive: Love it!  Corporations are always evil, always, always, always.

Me: But…don’t you work for a corporation?

Executive: Except mine.

Me: I see.  So this corporation censors Free Speech, working in collusion with an evil government.  And this company “has been assisting the Chinese government to censor and monitor its citizens’ Internet usage. It has removed web sites and articles that the Chinese government bans from its results.”  I even read an article  that  Jiang Mianheng, the son of the former President Jiang Zemin, wanted a demonstration of high-speed Internet searches.  So the engineer put his father’s name into the Google search engine. Shock!  Horror! Three of the top ten stories spelled out crimes committed by the senior Jiang during his socialist reign.  And ”Evil Jiang Zemin” came up as top hit! Jiang Mianheng ordered the website censored.   Favorable responses only! Media manipulation!  High stakes corporate shenanigans. Like Clive Owen and Julia Roberts in “Duplicity 2,” called “Duplicitious About Google.”

Executive: Google!  And damage our ad campaigns!!! Not to mention all the links we’d probably lose!

Me: But Google has a motto, “Do No Evil,” so it’s corruption between an all powerful dominating corporation with a despotic government. No?!  Okay, how about a reporter. Yahoo supplied the whereabouts of a Chinese journalist, Shi Tao, to the authorities.  Tao worked for Contemporary Business News. He got ten years in jail for violating a state secrets act: emailing the Chinese propaganda department guidelines for writing about the 1989 Tienanmen Square massacre on its 15th anniversary.

Executive: Can he be from the Post?  We could get great lead coverage.

Me: Okay, go with financial manipulation?  The two Chinese colonels maintain that, “…that the financial attack on East Asia… represent(s) semi-warfare, quasi-warfare, and sub-warfare, that is, the embryonic form of another kind of warfare.” A greedy international capitalist predator crushes the Malaysian economy for personal gain!  George Soros!

Executive: And lose all my dinner invitations?!  We have eight graphic novel comic book movies in the pipeline.  Where do you think we get our merchandise from? China!

Me: “Okay, forget it.  I’m going to write it on my own.  Somebody will buy it.  Somebody will make it.

If…only….I can…..  Why didddd the Inter…net get so slowwww? But….I hav to writ that sc…ipt…  My made hard drive is…buzzing loudly…now smoking…   Damn, it’s Made in China.

My movie won’t be.

Nowadays, when I trawl through Blockbuster aisles, I find films with major stars that never saw the dark light of a theater. I’ve never even heard of some films. And I wonder about the parallel between society and film. History may be defined as the intersection of amazing events with amazing people. Will Mallory make the climb up the cliffs of Navarone? People created history by their choices, hesitations, fears, desires, whimsy, obsessions and visions.  Will the Colonel give in to Saito’s brutality? Great films, anchored by magnetic personalities, cast wide nets across our consciousness. Will Lawrence survive the Devil’s Anvil?

“Epic,”film producer Frank McCarthy (“Patton”) once told me, “is defined as a man who changes himself, his community and his world.”  In short, all the great character arcs in a movie script have driven the creation of events and epics which, in turn, are pushpins in World History. A noted script consultant, Chris Vogler,  distilled and explained the work of Joseph Campbell, an expert on tribal storytelling and myth. Vogler explains the hero’s journey through the Ordinary World, the Call to Adventure, the Refusal of the Call, Mentor, Threshold, Tests by Allies and Enemies, Approach, Ordeal, Reward and The Road Back.

I recently watched “JCVD,” a feature about action actor Jean Claude Van Damme’s downward spiral and its intersection with a bank robbery. The film was fascinating, awash with the celebrity-spin culture and its detritus.  Jean Claude plays himself in a confessional return to his hometown of Brussels and speaks of celebrity, inadequacy and his impotence against drugs and hype.  I believe that the film will become a noted sociocultural marker in the decline of Hollywood’s celebrity-driven culture.

The Great Epic World will always survive because the human attraction to its form is too resonant and deeply embedded in our humanity. Anchoring the Great Story on a ‘Star System’ is like giving an old drunk uncle with a key to the liquor cabinet and the keys to your prized Mustang. The rise of the celebrity culture is shattering our present film industry model. Perhaps this is good.

The industry was initially only feature films, shown with newsreels, cartoons, a B-picture and then the “A” film. Aside from rallies and religious gatherings, the movie experience was our common cultural touchstone. Then TV came into our living rooms where the binding involved “I Love Lucy” and Walter Cronkite. You saw both or shut your mouth around the water cooler the next day.  Jump forward with VHS, DVD, Blue-Ray, Netflix downloads, blogs, internet, Twitter, texting and cheap cell phones. We have the news burst cycle of seconds in an ADD mediacentric world. As individuals strive to establish their celebrity to become Stars, we experience the banality of the personal expose’ for the sake of fame, or worse, infamy.

This sensibility is confirmed by the misuse of ‘fame’ and ‘infamy.’ People don’t know the difference because, in a morally relativistic world, meaning doesn’t matter. Only the end result. Infamy is an “extremely bad reputation, public reproach, or strong condemnation as the result of a shameful, criminal, or outrageous act.” Fame is gained through merit. Infamy through shame. Fame and shame. But both lead to celebrity and, so it is thought, to Stardom.

With the assault of posts on Twitter, Facebook, Digg and more, we have lost not only our ability to focus, but on the meaning and stature of hard work, merit and heroic ordeal. One must ask onself: In today’s world, would Ulyssess feel obliged to Twitter his bathroom breaks?

We have lost the distant mystery of the stage. Looking up at our heroes, we sought their thoughts and inner secrets, their interests an tod experiences. Mysteries that we wanted to unravel, discover, and unravel again and again. But no more. My friend’s grandfather laments the downfall of newspapers due to the Internet, but I remind him that the crushing of the candlemakers by light bulb manufacturers was equally tragic. Both are the forward rush of innovation. We cannot turn back the clock to the past’s delivery of the epic but we can adjust our targets for the new media world.

Story.

When all is said and done, the story makes the star. The Journey of a thousand leagues gives them the adventure, ordeal, the mettle of a tested battle. And it is within our grasp once again. The cameras, equipment and computers available now to the filmmaker are creative, inexpensive and flexible. The early cameras were no more than a box with a lense, requiring a sunny day to get exposure on film with an ASA of 8. And as Chaplin once said for writing a movie scene, ‘Give me a pretty girl and a policeman.’  Drama ensues.

So as the Stars plummet to earth, the Creator may once again become a King of storytelling. Forget the Stars. Concept is key. Heed the Call to Adventure. Accept the Ordeal.

Return with Your Reward.

The American Revolution was fired up in earnest with the Tax Stamp Act, imposed by the British Parliament on the American Colonies. This Act required that a Stamp be affixed to any paper or document such as bills, newspapers, correspondence, leases, bills of sale, etc. It was invasive, arbitrary and onerous.

The Federal and State governments are continuing this tradition of oppression with Stimulus Bills which our representatives neither understand nor read. Yet these bills are passed without any mind to the financial indentured servitude for future generations. I believe that this debt will be a ‘fiscal press gang’ against generations’ optimism, opportunity and Freedom.

The latest California budget fiasco is an opportunity in disguise.  Sacramento has become a laughable reference for a political class which spends like a drunken sailor making a port of call after months at sea.   I intend no insult against sailors. They can only spend what’s in their pocket – and they borrow from shipmates who know where to find them.

Sacramento’s Latest Budget Balancing Plan: Raid, pillage and burn the budgets of its Counties and Cities.

To maintain its reckless, gluttonous diet of a bureaucracy expanding faster than the guts of a hungry contestant in a hot dog eating contest (Joey Chestnut wolfed down 68 hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes at Nathan’s annual 4th of July contest), Sacramento has expanded employees, unions and ever-widening Chinese take-out menu of services that aren’t justified by the incoming revenues. Here is the effect of their plan:

• Several sources who have been briefed on the ongoing budget negotiations say that included in the pending deal are $2 billion in borrowing from local property tax revenues that would otherwise go to cities and counties and about $1 billion that would be taken outright from gasoline taxes that now go to local governments for street maintenance and repair. The effect of these actions, says local government lobbyist Anthony Gonsalves, would be dramatic. “They’re going to bankrupt the cities like they bankrupted the state. If this happens, there will be a minimum of 30 cities that are going to file for bankruptcy,” said Gonsalves, whose clients include the cities of Camarillo, Simi Valley and Thousand Oaks.

But here’s the good news. The States and Cities are going to fight back.  Guess what my favorite sentence is in this excerpt?

• The anxiety of local government officials is so intense that over the weekend more than 500 supervisors, city council members and school board members gathered in the Sacramento summer heat to vent their anger, listen to calls for a constitutional convention to dramatically reform state government, and attempt to organize the beginnings of a revolution that would permanently change the relationship between state and local governments in California.

This isn’t a problem. It’s an opportunity. Are you listening?  “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore” is spreading. The Tea Party enthusiasm is crossing over from select groups (or what Janet ‘The Terrorists Came In from Canada’ Napolitano calls ‘right-wing extremists’) to the mainstream. They just don’t know that it’s called ’smaller government’ i.e., conservatism. Some prominent council members are calling for a Constitutional Convention to “to give cities, counties and local school districts greater control over their revenues.”

• “After a series of Saturday workshops, the local officials identified the top four areas they would like to see targeted for reform: protection of local revenue sources, term limits, lowering the voter-approval threshold for local revenue measures, and requiring future ballot initiatives to identify revenue sources to pay for their associated costs.”

Most are conservative principles of fiscal responsibility, not that I saw them observed much over the last decade in either Federal or State government.  Nonetheless, this moment is a keen opportunity for conservatives to reassert the message that financial responsibility means safety, education, and the future.

The 10th Amendment of the Constitution says:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

ACTION: This Amendment echoes on the local level. You can push your city to keep its revenues, property taxes and assert more local control. You can push your state to affirm the 10th Amendment. A number of states are doing so. Even symbolically, the reassertion of state sovereignty means that the state’s representatives on the federal, state and even city level are more accountable to the citizens who elected them.

PROBLEM: “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work,”  said Thomas Edison.

You’ll have to roll up your sleeves, quick screwing around with your iPod, turn off the TV and head down to the local City Hall to give voice to your anger. That’s what they did in the pubs, halls and town squares to stir the populace. An overwhelming debt is an oppression of the mind. One that saps our optimism for opportunity, destroying creative impulses that cannot be entertained because they are suborned to the practical servicing of debt and obligation.

Our voices, together as Citizen Soldiers, can set fires in people’s minds with a walk to City Hall.  Revolution.

Letter of Appreciation [click to enlarge]

And they live across from us.   One such Hero is Adolph Arujo who served in the Korean war as a medic in the 2nd Infantry Division in the Punchbowl.  This area had some of the fiercest fighting of the war such as Heartbreak Ridge.

We have never spoken in detail about the War nor will we.  Courtesy of Hollywood movies, I can imagine the devastation of a friend’s horrible death at your side. I can imagine the onslaught of an attack and gut-bending fear that does not deter one from duty. I can imagine the alienation between a soldier and civilian life. But, of course, I’m still just imagining and not living this role. My words are wholly insufficient. Their valor, courage and service is far too incomprehensible in my experience.

I got to talking one day in general about the Korean War with Adolph, including marksmarnship, and then he said, “Nobody remembers and nobody cares.”  He shrugged and we parted.  That bothered me for a number of years and I had to take action. I wanted to get a letter, a declaration, anything from a Korean government official thanking him for his service.  I called the Korean embassy but they didn’t understand.  I tried to limp through conversation.  I even wrote a letter.  Nothing.

Flash forward five, six years.  I am working on a film, “Body and Seoul” that is set in Korea.  My producing partner, Robert Lennon, speaks Korean fluently, married a Korean woman and served in Korea.  He is in Korea for two months to arrange talent, finance and locations. Over this time, he speaks to numerous officials, politicians and others in pursuit of our film project – and this letter.   He is meticulous, unfailingly polite and determined.   At last, he gets a former Minister of Defense, a Major General, Chairman of their Joint Chiefs of Staff, Deputy Commander of South Korean-US Combined Forces Command, etc., to write a letter thanking my Korean War-vet friend.

In part, the letter says, “On behalf of the Korean people and government, I would like to express my belated appreciation for your extraordinary courage, noble sacrifice and contribution to the war effort that you have show during times of war.  We owe a debt of gratitude to you for your service in the Korean War and you will be remembered forever by the Korean people as our true friend, who protected our nation.”

Today, fifty-five years after the cessation of hostilities on the Peninsula, the Socialist Left-wing dictatorship of North Korea still threatens the Freedom and Liberty of the South Korean people.  The recent missile and rocket launches, blustering rhetoric and refusal to discuss its nuclear proliferation make the border between North and South Korea one of the most dangerous areas in the world. The thirty-eight miles between the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and the South Korean capital of Seoul is sewn with defense mines, huge tank traps and other methods to block any massive North Korean attack.

I got the letter, and with a family, career and other obligations, I found months had gone by trying to find the right day and time to present it. And then suddenly the Fourth of July was coming.  I hustled and put the letter in a frame, his other wartime photos and documents supplied covertly by his son.

I presented it to him on the Fourth of July, telling Adolph that as long as I am alive, that as long as my children are alive, that his sacrifice will never be forgotten for our Freedom and that of the South Korean people. Amazingly, my friend, Robert, and Adolph were both in the 2nd Infantry Division in Korea and share the same birthday. I do not believe that this is coincidence.

Freedom does not know time. The fight for Freedom comes full circle from generation to generation. My guess is that the experiences of Adolph in the Punchbowl are as real to him today as they were 55 years ago. But, hopefully, today and tonight, he and all our vets sleep a little better at night from the horrors of war. I believe that War is the second worst condition that humanity can experience.

The first is slavery. The South Korean people do not know of the first and the North Korean people know nothing other than slavery, starvation and brutality.

“We owe a debt of gratitude to you for your service in the Korean War and you will be remembered forever by the Korean people as our true friend, who protected our nation.”

What did I get out of all this?  The idea that we have to remember their sacrifices like they happened yesterday.  For them, it still does. And the  best Fourth of July.  Ever.

“Soraya” epitomizes a woman’s plight in the Islamic world and reaches across the globe into communities which welcomed Muslim immigrants into their secular societies.  But the question left unasked by these societies – face to face – is this:  Will you accept the strictures of our society based upon Freedom and mutual respect?

Some Muslim immigrants (not all) refuse to embrace their adopted country’s mores and behaviors. They choose isolated communities.  In France, a friend told me that many third-generation Algerians still don’t speak French.  News reports about “disaffected youth” riots veil the source of burning cars in Paris – radicalized Islamist youth.  Herein lies the question about enforced societal acceptance of multiculturalism and freedom.

Freedom is a tough concept to sell. You know it when you have it. You can see when it’s absent, i.e., Iran, Zimbabwe, socialist left-wing dictatorships like China, etc.,  But it’s taken for granted in America.   Unfortunately in our ADD, media-centric world of flash, celebrity and shock, the world’s impression of freedom is excessive violence, sexuality and degradation. Freedom is confused with approval. The best definition I ever heard for Freedom was “The right to do what you want and the responsibility to take the right course of action.”

The left’s misguided sense of multiculturalism is part of the problem. Ask somebody to define “Social Justice.” You won’t get specific policies but slogans and dogma.  To me, multiculturalism means living your life with acknowledgement and respect of your ethnic and religious heritage – learning the language, honoring holidays and remembering history. Irish history is not just drinking green beer once a year or getting tossed out of a bar on St. Paddy’s. It’s remembering the struggle for Irish rights and freedom, contributions to literature and the promises of opportunity and freedom in America.

Some of Europe’s Muslim immigrants (not all, but an influential number), hold fast to their “multiculturalism” as in Denmark’s immigrants experience:

• Muslims who left Islam have been murdered.
• Jewish leaders and citizens are openly threatened in a country that hid 7,000 Jewish citizens from the Nazis in World War II.
• Forced marriages with an unseen fiancee from the native country are common – and fulfilled upon pain of death.
• A $30,000 bounty for the death of prominent Danish Jews.

Denmark has taken steps to counter-act the isolated Muslim immigrant communities with welfare reform (Muslim immigrants constitute 5 percent of the population but consume upwards of 40 percent of the welfare spending.), language classes and restrictions on automatic family immigration and marriage.   Denmark’s Minister of Immigration and Integration, Rikke Hvilshoj, paid the price for these reforms.  When a prominent Iman demanded that the Danish government pay blood money to stop a revenge-bent family, she refused. Her house was torched. She, her husband and children escaped. The Danes remember these tactics. They happened once before between 1940 to 1945.

I believe this could happen in America. In Britain, Sharia is now used in civil cases. The British stopped Geert Wilders, a Dutch politician who speaks out against radical Islam, from showing his film there due to “security concerns.” AIG, the company receiving a massive government bailout, developed a Sharia compliant financial division. Remember: Shariah is not just a system of cultural or religious beliefs, but a religious and political structure. Some American politicians have no problem embracing Sharia Law.  No less than Yale Law School Dean, Harold Koh, suggested that Sharia law might be applicable in the U.S.

Would that include ‘Honor Killings,’ unimaginable horrors of electrocution, stabbings, rape and more?  They have happened in America:

• Atlanta: A Pakistani immigrant allegedly strangled his 25 year old daughter with a bungee cord because she wanted to end an arranged marriage.
• New York: A man stabbed his 19 year old sister because she went to clubs, wore immodest clothing and wanted to live in New York City.
• Texas: Two sisters, 17 and 18, were shot numerous times by their father upon him learning that they had boyfriends.

Immigrants deplore the hyper-sexualized exports of America. Decency and manners demonstrate that not all Americans support these abuses of freedom. But this is the image of our freedom, our human rights, our Constitution. Media trumps reality.

What can be done?

1. Realize that this entire business – Shariah, laws, media – is incremental. Tiny blips repeated a million times. Change it with your dollars, your votes, your conversation. Every day over and over.

2. Oppose the import of “trans-national” law from neurotically corrupt and pathetic organizations like the U.N., Sharia and any other international law. The law comes from democratically elected representatives and our Constitutions. Keep it that way.

3. Forget everything I’ve said. Don’t do a damn thing. Turn up “American Idol” and vote. Oh, and don’t  worry about  stones hitting your window. Your children and grandchildren will.   And just be honest enough when they ask, “Why are we slaves and why did you do nothing?” to look them in the eye and say, “It wasn’t my problem” or “I didn’t have the time” or “I was a coward.”

The fight is on. The fight is now. When you watch “Soraya,” imagine a loved one. Your sister. Your daughter. Your granddaughter. I hope that it’s painful for you. That’s usually when humans decide that enough is enough.

Soraya never had that chance.  You can give that chance to the next generation of Sorayas.

First Arabic Language comedy in Saudi Arabia in 30 years

This last week, “Menahi” became the first feature film shown in Saudi Arabia in more than 30 years. I worked as a supervising producer on the film last year in Cairo, Egypt for two months. I even appear briefly in a scene in an airplane as an American asking the film’s principal, Menahi, if he is crazy – “Ana magnun!?” – in Arabic.  Since I wrote the “Citizen Soldier Handbook: 101 Ways For Every American To Fight Terrorism” and Saudi Wahabism is a primary ingredient in terrorism these days, my head spins with the juxtaposition of my work and the film’s groundbreaking venue. The fact that “Menahi” is an Arabic language comedy makes it all the more surreal.

Films are prohibited in Saudi Arabia.  Shown in the western city of Jeddah, more “open” than Riyadh, the audience was composed of men and children younger than 10.

Well. It’s a start.

The film was shot primarily in Cairo in March 2008.  The crew was Egyptian, but other actors and reps were Jordanians, Syrians, Kuwaiti, Saudi and Lebanese. We had Christians, Catholics, Muslims and Egyptian Coptics. News releases claim that Rotana Studios produced the film but its visionary was a producer in Lebanon who hired me through his American contact to improve Middle Eastern production standards, strategies and methods. I met poor crew-members, essentially production assistants and runners, working for $5 a day (without camel) to well-educated producers. Attempting Arabic, I earned points for my efforts and opened doors for candid talks.  Everyone was genuinely proud of their nationality – though that didn’t necessarily translate into respect for other nationalities.  What bridged nationalities, religion and even politics were Movies. Favorite films. Favorites shots in favorite films. The Moving Picture.

Cairo was a mesmerizing collision of not only the West with the East, but the past with the present.  Egypt bills itself as the ‘Hollywood of the Mideast’ as its particular dialect is more easily understood in neighboring countries.  As the only country that has made an uneasy peace with Israel after bearing the brunt of four major wars, Egypt is a crucible in the cultural and political landscape – and movies play a very great part.  Movies are the only insight into America and Americans unless one has been to our great country.  These impressions are both good and bad.

Freedom is a double-edged sword, I told them, wondering how a sword translates into a cultural, political and terrorist metaphor in this part of the world.  One edge is the Freedom of Expression.  The other edge is that such Expression does not need everyone’s approval. And that not every movie is an accurate portrayal of every community in America. As Hitchcock said, movies are life with the dull parts taken out.  I convinced many that Americans also decry the coarsening of culture and humanity with film’s excessive violence and freewheeling sex.  The most difficult concept to explain was the First Amendment.

Egyptians are fighting for their own Right to Free Expression.  While there, I learned Egyptians are depressed that the Mubarak dynasty will be borne as power passes to Mubarak the Younger. They deplore that a young Egyptian woman was jailed for starting a national protest about higher prices on Facebook.  They engage in texting and phoning about news absent from national controlled media.  Religious clothing is on the rise in Egypt.  Many were tolerant about it.  Some were openly disdainful.  When spotting women with the head to toe hijabs that cover their faces, crew-members occasionally said, “Here come the ninjas.” I was surprised, but the humor was pure National Lampoon.  They may not approve, but can it or should it be stopped?  Freedom of Expression? Or cultural imposition?  And at what point?  America will soon be confronting these questions.  In a media saturated world, Egyptians worry that their society will be crushed by the Americanized ‘pornstitute’ driven exploitation of women, the loss of their Muslim and Coptic Christian Faiths and a volcano of violence.  I assured them that many Americans share their concerns on decency, Faith and civility.

One sentiment stayed with me through the Saharan heat with its roaming dogs, the mud and grass huts with satellite dishes, the insane traffic of Cairo where white lines are considered optional. Even though “Menahi” was in Arabic, we all understood the hilarity of a mother nagging her son, the comeuppance of wealthy elitist mistaking a simple man for a rich rival and the desire of the downtrodden to embarrass powerful fools.  Chaplin did it to perfection almost a hundred years ago.

Laughter comes in every culture, every country, every human being. Perhaps the bridge we build is made of celluloid and demonstrates our understanding of Humanity is not so different than theirs.  One reel at a time…

Such is the power of a single word.

That power has not diminished but only increased with an ADD, multi-channel, hyperactive media-centric world. The silver screen has long given us immortal dialogue which now blends so deeply into the culture that people may not know their origin, but we know the meaning.  A wise man I know said, “Image creates perception, perception creates reality.”  It couldn’t be more true in the film business.

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In a media-centric world, from motion pictures to internet to phones, we are pounded with images, forming our perceptions and then creating our reality. How fast did the Internet meme “Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys” become a daily reference at the coffee klatch, in your email, or on phone calls?  Not long.  We forget how powerful words can be when written in a clever and pithy way.  The masters of dialogue like Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond, and the Epstein brothers, knew irreverent and immortal lines.  And as producers, writers or just Americans who appreciate a good, nimble turn of a phrase, we should excel at creating phrases that demonstrate the values we hold dear.  Don’t understand?  “What we have here is a failure to communicate!”

Why bother?  Movies (and other media) create the Culture.  Culture creates America.  America creates the world.  When we talk media and politics, this nimble phrase can radiate far and wide.  Great dialogue resonates in our brains for weeks, months, even years.  Our own snappy comebacks to important values issues can demonstrate a better point of view, an attitude and an insight.  Of course, you could use radical phrases like, “I love America” and “I’m against terrorism,” but write up your own snappy comebacks on issues and policy to share with friends.  As human beings, we remember great Moments.  Movies create moments.  Great dialogue reminds of those moments and their images.  And great lines can change minds.

We cannot forget the line, used by recent Tea Party groups, “I’m as mad as hell, I’m not going to take it anymore.” And in political theater, who uttered the line, “There you go again”?  Ronald Reagan in the debate with Jimmy Carter.  It pounded Carter on national TV.  Reagan was the President who best understood the nexus of the Power of Media and the Power of Strength when confronting enemies like Soviet International Socialism.  Reagan knew from his long career in radio, films, television, and public speaking that people longed for memorable phrases by which to guide their lives.  The simpler, the better – easier to remember, easier to repeat, easier to live by.  Why else are words of wisdom from great books and the Ten Commandments short and to the point?

So what does this have to do with any of us?  The genius of the American people is self-evident.  No society on earth has created such a robust population, teeming with energy and creating a vast marketplace of ideas.  When talking with friends, family or working in the media world, each of us can create dialogue that spreads our values and our message about the troops, our country, and more.  I saw a TV show one day where some actress proclaimed that a man who tried to sexually assault her was either a “pervert or Clarence Thomas.”  A few words and this image becomes a perception that morphs into a reality for millions (or in the case of this show), thousands of viewers about this noble Justice.  When Homeland Security head Janet Napolitano reframes terrorism into “Man Caused Disaster,” she’s putting auto exhaust sparks that accidentally caused a thousand acre fire on the same level as planes slamming into buildings of innocent Americans.  “The greatest trick the devil every played was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”

Words everywhere matter. “You want answers?  I want the truth!  You can’t handle the truth!” Words are weapons.  When you refer to China, use the term, “Socialist Left-wing dictatorship.”  The prisoners in Chinese gulags, persecuted Christians and political dissidents will attest to that.  If somebody mentions “Religious Right,” then counter with “Atheist Left.”  It’s never “Gun Control” but “Second Amendment Civil Rights.” Newspapers are infected with political correctness.  “Islamic rioters in France” are “disaffected youth,” according to some reporters.  Does “cheese eating surrender monkeys” come to mind?

Whenever I’m given an application or form with boxes for “Race,” I  check “Other:________” and write one word.

“Human.”

“Human,” Hollywood…single words can be powerful.  Revolutionary.  Watch the words you use in your everyday life and in your work to reflect the values we hold dear about Freedom and America.  There’s great tradition in snappy comebacks and immortal phrases to change the culture, America, and the world.  Words are our First Freedom, but everyday we have to ask ourselves…

“Is it safe?”