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It’s funny but when you are doing an independent feature, by nature, there is an inherent lunacy with the whole process.  Literally, the entire dynamic vacillates between being excruciatingly frustrating and balls-to-the-wall fun all at the same time.  And for us, we definitely had our moments of teetering on the razor’s edge of success and utter collapse/failure.  But as they say, what does not kill you, makes you stronger.  One specific incident comes to mind…  the last few days of the Albino Farm shoot were some of the most challenging.  Not only were we hot, exhausted and tick-infested, but we were now about to shoot deep in the bowels of the Earth in the world famous Fantastic Caverns (right outside of Springfield Missouri)…  oh, and did I mention it was strictly night shoots?  Talk about losing perspective on what time of day it was – or even what day it was!  The next few nights we shot what essentially was the climax of the film in the cave, with no natural lights and just bats to keep us company.  Fortunately, Fantastic Caverns is a major local tourist attraction and the staff of the facility were beyond helpful.  One of the arrangements we had to make was to only shoot during their off hours – basically from 9 pm until sun-up.  As filmmakers, our obvious objective was to get the best footage we could, but we also wanted to keep a conscious eye on the integrity of the cave itself.  Last thing we needed was co-Director Joe Anderson wandering off with his turkey sandwich from catering and utilizing one of the natural rock formations as his own personal picnic table.  Fortunately, Joe learned the artful skill of eating standing up.  Nice job, Joe.  It’s interesting because caves are such fragile eco-systems unto themselves, not to mention, the actual business of running the cave as a tourist attraction, so caution and sensitivity to our workspace was paramount for all involved.

Without giving away too much, one of the final action sequences involves two of our heroes, on-the-run, aided by a lit flare to offer them light and lead the way.  The lighting of the flare and its purpose was actually integral to the story and not something we could do without.  Problem was, every time we lit the flare, the entire cave filled up with this hardcore, thick as pea-soup, smoke and mist.  If felt like ghost lepers were gonna come out of the fog and methodically kill all of us one by one.  (Ha!  2 bonus points for Sean for the not-so-subtle reference to a John Carpenter film!)  Now let me say, this was a BIG cave – humungous!  But with little to no ventilation, the smoke literally just hung there!  (SIDE NOTE – for all we know, that damn smoke is STILL there!)  So, two problems here…  one, we now have to contend with the fact that the atmosphere is already smoky if we are to do multiple takes – which would look strange if the characters were just lighting the flare for the first time.  Problem-o number 2, the cave was about to open for morning business soon and needless to say, murky, smoke-filled air that makes it hard to see ain’t too good for the cave showin’ business.  As I mentioned, the staff at the Caverns were amazing.  They brought in some super-duper fans to try and accommodate our needs and dissipate the smoke.  We did a test run, lit the flare, smoke filled up the entire place in seconds, we hit the fans and…  nothing.  That damn smoke didn’t budge!  Uh-oh, problem “kemo-sabe”, we still don’t have our shot and now, the fine cave folks have said there’s no way we can light another flare.  Not to mention, the bit we needed to accomplish definitely needed multiple takes.  Yikes…  what to do?  Well, fortunately, we talked them in to letting us have one take – and one take only – to get what we needed.  If all went well, we would nail it, yell “cut”, douse the lit flare, fire up the fans and pray the place would clear up.  But to successfully execute this, everyone, and I mean everyone, would have to be on point.  We had one shot at it.  Again, not to give away too much of the story point, but we would need to have two cameras running and shooting a very specific succession of action so that the scene would even have a snow-balls-chance-in-hell of cutting together correctly.  We’d also need to do – and you won’t believe this – a wardrobe change, a special effects gag, the action and the lines all in this one take – once lit, we couldn’t put that damn flare out no matter what!  No screw ups!  Talk about nerve-racking!  Needless to say, methinks Michael Bay never had to block, map and execute an entire scene around one tiny, fast burning, smoke-creating flare!  Ugh!  So we rallied the troops…  1.)  Told the actors – “don’t fuck up” (SIDE NOTE 2 – come to think of it, that was pretty much the consistent direction we always gave them before each scene J)  2.) Got wardrobe set up just off camera, poised and ready – think of it like attacking a quick change, just off-stage, during a live theatrical production)  3.)  Got the special f/x guy standing by with his gallon of blood-colored corn syrup  4.) Got both cameras locked, loaded and ready – and away we went…  And you know what?  It worked.  I still can’t believe it to this day but somehow, the gods-of-film were looking down from high-atop their mountain on our little Albino Farm movie, because it actually worked!  Everyone nailed everything they were supposed to in a perfectly synchronized and coordinated one-take shot and the damn thing worked!  Whew!  And, with the fans blaring full-force as soon as the take was done, the cave cleared of smoke just in time for Ma and Pa Ozarkian Vacationer and their kids to see the wonders of Fantastic Caverns in all its full and uninhibited glory!  Ha!  They should have been there half an hour earlier and they really would have gotten a show!

All in all, just chalk that one up to another “interesting” night in the fun-filled world of independent filmmaking.  You gotta love it!  Oh, and did I mention that the entire cave experienced it’s “once-every-75-years-flood” only 24 hours after we left?  Well, that’s another story for another time…

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