Wellywood Woman

lisa gornick new script   Yes, I’m still working on my novella. And envious of Lisa Gornick , if this image is a self-portrait. It's so much less pleasurable to open Word than it is to open Final Draft. And once Word is open, it's so much easier to get distracted and into another Word file (or two). And I’m much much slower with a novella than a script. Not surprising. And I'm distracted by a surprising amount of email feedback about the New Zealand Film Commission (NZFC) statistical update I did for WIFTNZ and also added to the Development Facebook notes , where some overseas correspondents picked it up. The feedback came from women who feel they’ve experienced a (negative) change in attitude towards women’s projects at the NZFC. From women concerned that their feedback from the NZFC (and elsewhere) names “too much dialogue” as a problem. From women all over, who decide to write screenplays about men, not because they feel they should be able to write about anything ...

lisa gornick intense drawing face   I'm working on a novella. Up early, 45 minutes on the egg timer, breakfast, another two lots of 45 minutes. And then a bit of gardening, as I think about where and how to go next with the story. A VERY quiet life, because I've never written a novella, and want to see how it differs from a feature screenplay, which has about the same number of words. And was interrupted by the Wellington NZFC review meeting, and the Fresh Shorts announcement, and rounding up statistics for a wee report about NZFC gender inequity, available here , but without a couple of graphs; I can't load them onto the Development FB notes or onto this blog, but they're included in my PhD thesis .* So far responses to the report are very positive, and I am hopeful (as always) that things may change for New Zealand women filmmakers. And then have to complete some work for which I was paid before I started my PhD (embarrassing, yes, even though there was also ...

Something I enjoy about working on the Development project is that it is transmedial, part of a new storytelling world where fiction mixes with non-fiction and where For the first time since ancient cultures, where stories were passed down from generation to generation through verbal communication…the world has now found a new, communal space to share and grow its stories that represent humanity. … In other words, stories are no longer simply stories, they are world views that will evolve with discussion, creation, and review In that communal space, here on the internet, Development is linked with an informal, global, transmedial project to increase the numbers of feature films that women write and direct, and that tell stories about women's lives. (I hope that New Zealand will be the first country in the world where women write and direct half of all features. But I’m not holding my breath.) This blog, and Kyna Morgan’s sister blog over at HerFilm , are as essential to the De...

1. Sometimes, it’s hard to resist. I’ve got lots to do, but something else clamours for attention. Today, it’s the bone people (always lower case), the only New Zealand novel to win the Booker Prize. First, I had a big cleanup and found a newspaper clipping from 1 November 1985. Here it is—the late Irihapeti Ramsden, me, and Miriama Evans, shortly after we received the Booker Prize on Keri’s behalf. Irihapeti and Miriama wearing korowai lent by George (Geordie) Fergusson. Me in my Moss Bros tuxedo (and white leather sneakers with pink satin laces, best pair of sneakers I ever had). And a tiki that Irihapeti asked me to wear. If you slide the clipping onto your desktop and zoom in, you can read the text. My main memory of the photograph is that the photographer suggested that we stick our tongues out. I think he wanted us to pukana. l.-r.Irihapeti Ramsden, Marian Evans, Miriama Evans, after the Booker Prize ceremony 1985 It was a strange night. No-one knew what to make...

Anyone read this? Sounds wonderful-- Off I go to check it out. Here's a link to an article by Helen Jacey, "Finding the woman's voice". And another, to Helen's blog . And UH-OH, Helen posted this from the London Screenwriters Festival: Really enjoyed myself at the London Screenwriters Festival. First time EVER had more guys in the room than gals for my session. Sunday morning at 9.30 but what a buzz in the room. I'd wondered if her book would be especially useful for men, and although I'm not into 'pink & blue' thinking for writers, I worry that universal access to her ideas will offer male screenwriters more opportunities than women.

After the Waterfall , Simone Horrocks' responses to my questions, is one of the most popular Wellywoodwoman posts ever. So all of you who read her story and loved it, here's your chance to see the movie, if you live in New Zealand. After the Waterfall opens in cinemas on November 4th. Our other women-directed features, Gaylene Preston's Home by Christmas , and Rosemary Riddell's The Insatiable Moon (currently number 7 in New Zealand's top 10, and accompanied by Mike Riddell's legendary blog ) have done so well this year. I'm hoping that After the Waterfall will too, if we all support it, especially on its opening weekend. (And there are more women's features to come: Roseanne Liang's  My Wedding and Other Secrets  is in post-production and has a brand new  Facebook page . Kirstin Macon's  The Most Fun You Can Have Dying  is on its way.) And for all you  Outrageous Fortune  fans, at some After the Waterfall screenings there are opportuni...

Well, nearly it. Just one more deadline to meet, before 11.15pm. But having a little rest, and seeing a link to Joni Mitchell (yep! still checking out those Girls Like Us ) I found this clip. Spot on at the end of this Hobbit -filled week, with enough conflicts and characters and secrets and revelations for fifteen movies. In the end, what's a girl to believe? Especially if she's read Lorraine Rowlands' thesis , and learned a little more about what working in the industry costs New Zealand film workers (and the health and social welfare systems)-- You might enjoy Joni too. If you've got a drink in hand, are pottering about between #FF tweethearting & FB. If you're a bit lost because Russell Brown finally closed the Public Address Hobbit party in the very early hours of this morning (Islander still in fine fettle). If you've caught up with Gordon Campbell's analysis . If you're a mite confused about it all, remembering especially those John Campbe...

lisa gornick: desk life Lisa Gornick , you're a star! This is me today. And I needed to know that I am not ALONE. All that's missing from the drawing is my big white board with a looooong list. My little red Moleskine diary with another list. And my brief visits to the garden where something's eating the new beans, I've moved the compost bin, and where I may later scatter some organic sawdust. Oh yes, & the visits to the fridge. But otherwise, the desk is where everything happens. And must keep happening, for the next few days. Thank you, dear Lisa.

I HATE reading and writing treatments, the short, ‘selling’ documents that tell screenplays’ stories, often with an emphasis on the plot points. They’re a special kind of synopsis and they bore me, whether I’m the one writing or the one reading; I’ve almost never read a treatment I’ve enjoyed, or that made me want to see the movie. So, not surprisingly, I’m also hopeless at writing treatments, whether they are one or ten pages long. And the ones I wrote for Development -the-movie, at the Branchage Directors Lab, were awful. At the end of Branchage we were offered an opportunity to rewrite our treatments and send them to Peter Strickland, writer/director of Katalin Varga (see links below if you’re not familiar with this lovely, multi-award-winning, film). I wrote a nine-pager, trying to use the feedback I’d been given at Branchage to make something that was a whole lot better. And yesterday Peter sent his response. It was so generous, one of the best bits of feedback I’ve ever had....

Keri Kaa, at Rangitukia 2010 Keri Kaa’s Te Whaea Whakaata Taonga , presented at the recent Women In Film & Television (WIFT) awards, acknowledged “an exceptional woman whose meritorious contribution to the arts, culture, and heritage over the last 50 years has had an immeasurable behind the scenes impact on film and television”; Keri's worked tirelessly with funders and policy makers to forge the pathway for Maori filmmakers to tell their stories. And that’s just one aspect of her extraordinary life and work. When I met Keri, more than thirty years ago, she was a Wellington Teachers College lecturer and a writer, associated with the artists and writers in the Herstory diary, Haeata, and Waiata Koa collectives. As a pakeha, I knew her as the translator—with Syd Melbourne—of Patricia Grace & Robyn Kahukiwa’s classic children’s picture book The Kuia & the Spider/ Te Kuia me te Pungawerewere , and I loved the poems and a review she contributed to Spiral 5 . Keri also...

I wanted to take  Development  out to a bigger world, to get a fresh perspective on the project. So I went to the  Branchage Directors Lab. It preceded the quirky Branchage Film Festival, where many movies are shown in unusual places—on a tugboat, in a polytunnel (the compelling  Vanishing of the Bees ), in a sushi bar, in a herd barn, onto a dam's wall one year. Accompanied by lots of live music and performance with and without movies, and even a magic lantern show. And amazing parties, one in an ornate mirrored Belgian Spiegeltent where people have caroused for 100 years: the extraordinary Ziveli Orkestar and their associated performers completely seduced me that night, lovely to want to dance again.

Lisa Gornick   tonight i channel the wisdom of my inner sages So here I am in Jersey, at Branchage Film School's directors lab. I needed a new perspective on Development -the-movie. And at the end of today's masterclass with script editor Kate Leys and the others in the group, I have one. To do the necessary work, I now have to channel my inner sages. THOSE girls. They're different than Lisa's sages (of course). But her drawing reminds me that they exist. Many thanks Lisa. You've delivered yet again.

Canterbury house after September 4 2010 earthquake I. I’ve been trying to write about Chris Vogler’s visit to Wellywood. And just can’t get there. Mr Vogler’s the guy who wrote  The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. You probably know about it, a classic that many writers love. As you know, I’m a woman. A woman writer guided by Jane Austen’s words in Persuasion : “Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story…The pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything”. So I’ve avoided most books on screenwriting, though I love Linda Seger’s take on some women’s screenplays, where some linear narrative remains to move the story forward, but action is de-emphasized, and the proportions of emotion and psychology become greater. And I work hard to reduce some risks she identifies: [S]ome women…may not yet have the craft to make these different models work. Although these kinds of stories can be done for a much lower budget than the mo...

Lisa Gornick's Film Drawing site is AMAAAAZING-- I group her with Alison Bechdel-of-the-Bechdel-Test for quality. But, unlike Alison Bechdel's multiple frames and long stories, Lisa's stories are usually self-contained, within a single frame. Those single frames invite me to enter them with my own story. And then they make me think, think, think. And then try to reconcile the thinking with my feelings. Often, they make me laugh. Sometimes they break my heart. Collectively they're so full of life & complexity. And this one's just the ticket after yesterday's post. Would love to know what you think and feel when you look at it! The Feminist Male: Do Not Be Afraid is Lisa's title. Lisa's latest film is DIP , made for Channel 4's Coming Up series and screened last week. She wrote in a blog post that DIP is "some poignant suspense set on a London nightbus. A French take on the British crime drama. (I’ve always wanted to make a French film ...

There’s so much discussion about the Bechdel Test now (see links below for some examples). I love it all, am interested that men are writing about the test. AND I relate to @marnen’s tweet today: "I'm feeling snarky enough to propose the Laibow-Koser test: can 2 female writers have a conversation that doesn't mention Bechdel test? :)". And then this morning on FB, Scarlett Shepard from the San Francisco Women’s Film Festival (@sfwff) provided the link to an Indiewire article, Summer Box Office Report: Women Rule The Art Houses , by Peter Knegt. Peter Knegt explains that men directed every one of the 22 summer 'Hollywood' films that earned more than $50m, and women actors received top billing in only five, including the three that women ‘flocked’ to: The Twilight Saga: Eclipse , Eat, Pray, Love and Sex & the City 2 . But in the ten top-grossing ‘specialty’ releases* "women dominated: in audience seats, in front of the camera, and, perhaps to an un...

TAKE 100 The Future of Film 100 New Directors Where did I learn about this book? Not sure. Anyway, Phaidon, the publishers kindly sent me a BLAD, so I can admire a sample of the book’s beauty, and do a gender count. And it looks like a beautiful book, even has excerpts from scripts, which I love to see. But, of the 100 directors (one, Taika Waititi, a New Zealander) only 17-and-a-half (one director is a mixed gender couple!) are women. Nine of the book’s eleven ‘curators’ are men, two of the men joint curators, and all past and present directors of major film festivals. Azize Tan, the solitary woman, is director of the Istanbul International Film Festival. And the women are (druuuummmmm roooollllllllll): Maren Ade, Andrea Arnold, Sophie Barthes, Aida Begic, Anna Boden (the half), Valeska Grisebach, Mia Hansen-Love, Miranda July, Farah Khan, So Yong Kim, Liu Jiayin, Lucrecia Martel, Shirin Neshat, Asli Ozge, Sarah Polley, Kelly Reichardt, Axelle Ropert, Esther Rots. I’ll be look...