Marching On With Hope

Jentri Chancey

Mon, 07/12/2010 - 21:50

With all the unanswered questions floating around, and the clock ticking for our fall shoot deadline, (i.e., when (exactly) can we make the film, how will our financing (continue to) manifest itself, and how will I contain myself when it does?) I find myself reflecting on the last couple of years, this process, and how lucky I am to be living and making movies in this town.

Yesterday, we drove around Austin and shot video/stills for a real estate company in Austin. This city is really stunning. With every step I take, I live and breath hope for the day I'll begin 'official' pre-production on Lost In Sunshine here, too. As you know, we've been in the preliminary stages for a little while now. The script process took an additional two years to master, alone. The (sometimes very long) process is just a part of it. And it's something we committed to, without turning back.

But I can feel Austin waiting for this event... every time I look at a breathtaking hill country landscape, the peacock just outside my door, or an awe inspiring open field of nothingness and everything all together, with a sunset to die for... my heart melts into the dream once more... and I feel hope & prosperity knocking at my door saying, "hey, make sure to have plenty of me right now, ok??... I'm coming back with more."

I've run into a couple of people who actually thought I might say we weren't going to make LIS anymore. My heart couldn't imagine such a thing. So rest assured, peeps, we're doing this thing!!! But the universe has its say on 'when,' too. And that much, is out of our hands.

Everything we create, we hope will bring us closer to an official shoot date. The reality is, that the reality of all the not-so-fun stuff has to happen, too (i.e., the paperwork, planning, pitching (selling), marketing, promoting, website, researching, etc.). A movie doesn't create itself. People do. An army of folk, who share the same dream you do (or something close enough that inspires them) and work endlessly to see it through. That's why I think that there's such a feeling of gratification once a project of this magnitude is created. If it's not (initially) studio funded, especially. All the extra leg work just makes our legs stronger.

So we keep marching on.

Austin