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koko-ni-inai-im-not-here-us · 6 years

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Blog 3. The Class Competition

We're still in 2015. At this time I started the Film and Media Club at Hunter. I would tell you the story of how that got started and how somewhat successful that was, but again this is about Koko Ni Inai. All you need to know is that the club was new and I was the President.

As the president of the new club, I was asked by one of the advisors from the film department to help make fliers and spread the word of the Archer Craig Mathias Screenwriting Award 2015. I know, it's a super long name. We'll call it the ACM Award.

I thought "Yeah, sure I'll help out." I designed the fliers with my awesome cut and paste skills, printed them out and went around the building putting them up. I don't know when but I found out much later this was the competition my screenwriting professor was talking about. But the scripts for this year's competition was from the class in 2014. I don't know why it took me so long to connect the two competitions together.

Now, I'm pretty sure the ACM Award happened before I had to hand in my script. I attended the award ceremony to show my support and for some free pizza.

My professor presented the awards to the chosen scripts, and he had a way with words. I don't remember the synopsis he said for each script, but I remember being impressed and wanting to read their work.

As the students were called one by one I think I felt happy or almost teary eyed. Something about talented people receiving an award for their hard work always moves me. It reminded me of the feelings I get when watching the Oscars.

Do you know what I'm talking about? You know when they call the winner to the stage? Everyone is clapping, the winner hugs theirfamily and theyhug the people they spent months with just to make a great film. They get up on stage and they're shocked, happy or crying. It's a great moment of accomplishment! It's like a huge stepping stone to other possibilities for them.

So as I sat there in a room, clapping with maybe ten other strangers, watching these talented students I've never seen before getting their awards- it felt kinda awesome. I thought "I want to be like them."

Now-

-we're in the screenwriting 1 classroom. When I say "we" right now I mean you, me and students you've never met before. This is probably the second to last class...or was it the last class? I don't know, who cares.

I was in the very last group to have my script read. It's me and two or three other people. You don't have to do anything. You can sit next to me and I'll summarize to you what's happening...I'm nervous. I don't know if it's just me, but when I'm really nervous I shiver as if it's 30 degrees in the room. I shiver and sweat. It's a great combination.

The professor asks "Who wants to go first?" No one raises their hand. I'm thinking "Let's see how the first person's script goes, then I'll go." Someone raises their hand. I don't remember who went or what their story was, but I do remember some of the stories from various days. There was one script about a girl living in that perfect family with a white picket fence. The girl comes downstairs in dark make-up, with red lipstick, and wearing punk clothes for the first time. It turned out it was all a faze. Another script was about two sisters I think. They sneak into the woods and something about a cabin, it was kind of mysterious I think?...I forgot what happened but I liked the flow of that one. There was another where an older brother is telling his young sister about mermaids. I really liked the setup. I could see it shot in claymation with dark clouds, on a gritty dock and a fog machine would be on throughout the whole film.

After hearing everyone's scripts it turned out I was the last person left. The professor says, "Okay Emel, you're up next." I'm still shaking. My script sounds insane compared to everyone else's. I felt like I did my homework wrong (it wouldn't be the first time). Almost all the scripts we read were set in today's world with real people. My tone is so different, it is just toooooo out there. Maybe they won't get it. It is pretty abstract. Maybe they'll think I'm trying too hard.

*Sigh* Whatever they're going to think I can't stop it. I need to pick who's reading for what character right now. It's too late to turn back.

I chose the students to read for the characters. I then choose Doorknob kid to be the narrator because he has a nice narrative voice.

OK. Let's do this.

Doorknob kid begins. As he reads, I tell myself to listen as if it's not my work. This is the first time I'm listening to it. It's weird, my memory is a little blurry of what happened when he read it. I can't remember hearing any reactions such as laughter, sighs, gasps or anything. Doorknob kid finishes with "The End."

Okay, now time for their critique.

It is super quiet. No one says anything...........Oh, my, shuck! It was bad!!

Look around the room with me. You see those blank faces?? Do you see them? They didn't get any of it. I was right, it was too abstract. I probably wasn't clear. I put too much story into 15 pages!

The professor breaks the silence. I think he said, "It was poetic." He then asked about all the symbols in the script. And said there were too many. A girl said she agreed and asked what a Daruma was? I said, "It's shaped kind of like a Russian doll but Japanese." The professor then asks what was the connection between Ojisan and Kyoko?

In class, the professor told us that the writer is not allowed to answer questions. They can take in the feedback or ignore it. I wrote down their questions so I could fix/answer them later. Someone said the story was a little too ambiguous and confusing.

I understand why they felt that way, but I also think if they saw everything on screen, the story would be a little clearer...but I should still fix some of the things they said.

"Okay, everyone. You will now vote for your favorite script." We all take out a sheet of paper. One of the students volunteers to write the writer's name and title of the scripts on the whiteboard. We all sit for a while unsure whom to pick. There were some good scripts. The professor said, " Fine. You can pick your top three." Yes!

I choose the cabin one with the sisters, the mermaid story and...I'm too nice. I can't write down my own script as choice #3. It doesn't seem fair. So I'm picking my classmate friend's script...now that I think about it, her's was set in the future about a daughter leaving her parents because Earth was drying up and the government was sending teenagers to a new planet or something like that...I can't believe I forgot about that one.

Yeah, I'm putting her script down.

I fold up my votes and hand it to the professor. Good luck reading my messy handwriting.

When I got my grade for the final, the professor gave me an A! It was a rare sight.

The professor gave me some notes saying (in his exact words), "I thought a lot about this script. First through your use of imagery, pace and actions. You really nailed the tone of this sort of Japanese allegory. That, in and of itself, is a real accomplishment..." He then says having the story split by two different characters might be too much for a short. He again states the overuse of symbolism and didn't understand the meaning of the coin. He ends his comments with "...good job and I really think you should put this away for only two to three weeks and then jump back in with a re-write."

And that I did.

-Emel

#kokoniinai #imnothere #script #writing #competition #class #school #indiefilm #film #blog #scifi #fantasy #vote #2015 #sci fi & fantasy #future #hunter #huntercollege

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koko-ni-inai-im-not-here-us · 6 years

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Blog 2. Writing the Script

Awesome! We have a story. Well, the world the story takes place in. But it got the creativity gears moving.

For those of you having a tough time finding a story to write, it helps to think of ideas as puzzle pieces. There are a lot of ideas floating around out there. All you have to do is take a few of them and put them together.

If the shapes don't fit get some scissors.

It's okay no one will know ;)

Unless you're not good with scissors. For that, you just need to practice!

My memory of writing the script is a little fuzzy. I think the first character I wrote was Chiemi's character. She was originally an old man named Ojisan. I thought of Ojisan first because he is one of my inner selves. He doesn't like technology. It sucks.

Ojisan grew up without technology, and once cell phones came about he hated it. For his name...well..." names", in general, are difficult to come up with. Soooo I pulled out the Japanese word "Ojisan," meaning "old man." And that is how Ojisan was born!

Please don't call people "Ojisan" now that you know what it means.

I got my first character down, but I felt I needed something else. Ojisan was my point of view on technology but it felt like the film needed a character relatable to general people who love technology. Plus it would be more interesting to have a different point of view in the story. So I wrote out the other main character. A teenager who grew up with technology and can't get enough of it. Then I was faced with that same problem. What should her name be?

Toooooo many people use "Yuki" as a Japanese girl's name for a character. Hmmm...why not Kyoko? Yeah, that sounds good. And that's how she was born!

From my two main characters, I was able to start writing my story. I kept two things in mind when writing.

1) Use as little dialogue as possible! This was my first real script (with a beginning, middle, and end). I didn't have much practice writing dialogue at the time. So I didn't want my character's way of talking to take the reader out of the story. Also, in a lot of Japanese films it's more visual. The characters rarely say anything. Lucky me this worked out. I didn't want the characters to say anything and it fits in with the Japanese style I was going for.

2) Keep it simple (Japanese simple). I told myself not to add anything that might make me stray from the main idea. And the main idea is to "show the audience we need to connect with the people around us (such as friends and family), and being on our phones all the time is stopping us from doing that."

After writing these two rules down, I put the people I saw on the streets into the world of KNI (Koko Ni Inai). All the parents I've seen giving their little kids a phone or tablet to keep them busy, the groups of friends together but on their phones, parents playing on their phone and ignoring their kid, and the groups of friends pretending to have fun in their photos to look happy for social media. I used these people to build KNI's society. The story was slowly coming together.

In the last class, before summer break started, the professor said there was going to be a screenplay competition between all of the screenwriting 1 classes. "First, each class will vote on the top screenplay from each class. The judges will read the chosen scripts and then pick the top 3. The winner will win some money, and there will be 2 runner-ups."

I was packing up my stuff to get ready to leave. I didn't care about the competition. I've entered a lot of photography and art competitions (mind you they all those online competitions) and I got rejected so much it doesn't sting anymore. I worked really hard for some of them and I never got anything out of it. So with this class competition, I didn't expect anything. I said to myself "Who cares. I'm just going to write what I want."

Also, I had a feeling this one student in my class was going to win. He wrote some great dialogue between two characters at a bar. One of the characters pulled out a doorknob from his pocket and...and-I don't know how to explain it, but the writer put so much meaning into that doorknob in less than a page I was like "Whoa!" That kid is a writer right there.

During spring break I was traveling to see my friends and my sister at their schools while working on the script. One of those friends I got to see was Seiichi. He's from Japan and for some reason decided to attend a college in New Hampshire (which is where we met before I studied abroad). I told him about my story but I couldn't tell if he was interested in it or not. He was pretty busy with his finals (he'll appear again in a later blog). Thanks to my friend Ashely, I also got to see most of my old hallmates from freshman year. Almost all of them were music majors. In our dorm, we had some nice times singing and hanging out in the hallway together.

When I was visiting we had dinner and were catching up. One of my hallmates was Dimitrios (if you read the crew bios you'd know who this guy is). I think I remember him saying he wanted to go into music scoring for films. At the time, he was making some music for Anata No Ato de (I watched it. It's really good). I made a note to myself thinking if I ever need music for a film I should ask him. Funny thing was I completely forgot about my "note to self" and what he said for a long time.

The next person I had to visit was my sis Peri (for those who checked out the crew's bios you did a good job!). On the train ride to see her in upstate NY, I was writing down a bunch of notes for the script. I giggled to myself as I looked out the window. Didn't J.K Rowling write the train scene in book 1 of Harry Potter when she was riding a train?

When I got home I typed it all out. I just made it to 15 pages. The ending I have to say was similar to a Japanese film ending. It left the two characters happy but there was no real conclusion about the message. I didn't know much about endings, but I thought it fit the Japanese tone I was going for.

I left it as is.

#scifi #fantasy #future #kokoniinai #imnothere #writing #script #blog #japan #japanese #story #film #indiefilm #blogger #scriptwriting #tips #train #harrypotter

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koko-ni-inai-im-not-here-us · 6 years

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Blog1. Writing the Story

Hello,

My name is Emel Saat. I am the Writer, Director, Producer, Casting Director, Location Scout, Editor and blah blah blah-other hats. All you need to remember is that I am the Writer and Director of Koko Ni Inai (I'm Not Here).

Now, sadly most of these blogs will not be written in real time. I'm going to do my best to write in as much detail as I can remember for you. There were so many things going on at once that I didn't have enough time to write in my journal every day. Now that things have settled down a bit (that is a lie) I have more time to share KNI's story with you, the filmmakers and moviegoers (another lie).

O-K! Many people ask me "Why? Why a Japanese story?" Because clearly, I am not Japanese (you can tell straight from my name. Which is 100% Turkish). Let's skip about my ethnicity and go straight to how the story came to be.

It all started during my sophomore year of College, spring semester 2014. This was an amazing semester. Why?? Because. I. Lived. In. JAPAN. For six months! I attended Kansaigaidai (took me weeks to memorize that name) in Kansai, Osaka in Hirakata-shi. Living there was a good balance of city and rural. It reminded me a lot of the themes Hayao Miyazaki uses in his films. He would always show "old" against "new," and technology versus nature. Even though Miyazaki did not live in Hirakata-shi, the landscape could one day be in a Miyazaki film (if he never retires).

Living there sparked a lot of my creativity and possible stories for future films. But we're here to talk about Koko Ni Inai (I'm Not Here).

I learned a lot living in Osaka. I learned that in Japanese culture simplicity is beautiful. In their art they can take a simple design and use it over and over again. When you step back you see it is actually a complex piece of work.

In America, we're about "bigger is better," and "We need more glitter...no, not glitter, we need sparklers. Wait no! We need fireworks. Come on people we need more pizzas!" Which can be fun and all but I sometimes find myself getting lost in all that "pizzas".

I felt "If I can focus on a single idea and really dig deep into it maybe my films would be better."

Going back to Osaka, my friends and I used the train when we wanted to get outside of Hirakata. As a person who loves stories, I love watching people to see a glimpse of their own story, that day, in the moment. When I watched the people on the train I was super bored. You wanna know why??

EVERYONE was on their phone.

Have you ever tried watching someone stare at thier phone? Try it for a whole train ride. It's completely uninteresting. I was watching businessmen in their fancy suites play candy crush.

Now, I understand in Japan you have to be aware of other people on the train. You can't be loud if you're going to talk to someone. But the silence on the train was too much!

Let's fast forward through the semester--studying, biking, writing Japanese, crying, applying to transfer to a school from New Hampshire to New York City, finding food with pork in it, saying goodbye's to friends, going back home to New York, first day at a new college, aaaaaannnd STOP!

Okay, we are in the first month at Hunter College. It's 2015. I'm back in the familiar city, but with a new start. A new start means new professors, new classmates, and new friends. All of that was true except that last part...

"friends." (I promise you this is leading to the film. Thank you for sticking with me thus far.)

This college was no ordinary college. Everyone who attended commuted. Hunter has every kind of kid from every borough. A lot of the people there were interesting and cool. Once you got to know someone you could tell they had a story. But the thing was...that's if they talked to you. And even if they did talk to you, that first conversation you had with them would be your last. Why?? Because everyone went straight to work or home after class. Also, because dorms were only for kids who came from outside NYC. The rest of the students lived with their parents or shared an apartment with three other people. There wasn't a sense of community. What made it worse was that everyone would be glued to their -*hisses*-phones.

Walking down the halls you would see kids (when I say "kids" I mean students) sitting on the floor with their head down looking at their phone, waiting for their professor to come and unlock the door to the classroom. The halls were always silent. No one looked at each other. I was back to watching boring people.

I saw groups of friends (from their old high school) sit together while playing games or texting on their phones. What was the point in hanging out if you weren't going to talk to each other? Do people not socialize anymore??? In person??

As my boredom grew so did my curiosity. I tried waving at someone on their phone. Not one glanced at me. I then did some Jazz hands...nothing. I did a little dance in the hall. Again, nothing. I tried my hardest to really stare at someone. I used my imaginary telepathy on them...the kid didn't look at me.

I would sit on the Hunter bridge looking at all these students wasting what was supposed to be the best years of our lives --to looking at their phone. I could only think "What a waste."

For my first semester, I took screenwriting 1. We were learning about script format. Every time we finished writing a few pages, we would read everyone's script out loud together and then critique it. I'm used to having my drawings critiqued, but writing is kind of different. Instead of letting an image speak for itself you had to do all the talking (writing) yourself. It was a little uncomfortable at first, but I was so determined to learn story and format, there was no room for embarrassment.

It was around the end of the semester. Our final for the class was the best kind of final a professor could possibly give. He looked at all of us and said,"Do whatevah you want!!!!" ( Note: this was how he sounded in my head). I was blown away at all this freedom. All we had to do was keep it under 15 pages.

Once the class finished I had to go to my Sociology class (which focused on nuclear families and whatnot). I sat there...early for class. I was thinking about what to do for my final project. I was missing Japan so I chose that to be my setting...but what was the story? I was watching the kids sitting around me. Everyone was keeping to themselves on their phone......

wait....wait....ooooOOOHHH! That's what my final script is going to be about!

And that was how Koko Ni Inai (I'm Not Here) was born.

#scifi #indiefilm #film #fantasy #imnothere #kokoniinai #Story #blog #behindthescene #nyc

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