Toronto Premiere

After a year and a half on the festival circuit, To Rest in Peace will finally have its Toronto premiere!

Screening at the Toronto Beaches Film Festival, on Saturday June 30th at 11:30AM. We are screening before the feature documentary, If I Should Fall.

It's been a good run. We've screened all over the world, including Cannes, Kuwait, Dubai, London, New York and Los Angeles, and won awards for writing, directing, cinematography, editing, music, audience choice, and best short film.

But this screening holds a special significance. The seed for To Rest in Peace was planted in Toronto, in 2005. Producer Josh Clavir and I had just finished our second collaboration, Her Music Led, an adaptation of John Keats' La Belle Dame Sans Merci. We sat talking about the adventure of making that small film in the woods of Caledon in the dead of winter, hauling HMIs with a wheelbarrow down a slippery slope, and standing for twelve hours in a foot of snow with the water seeping in to our cold, cold toes. It was during this meeting that we started sharing stories that had inspired us, that we thought would make great films 'one day.'

I told Josh about my uncle Malek, and his heroics during the Occupation of Kuwait, including how he buried two dead strangers by the side of the road. Years later, while doing my masters in film production at USC, I wrote a script, and that script became a thesis film. Josh flew down from Toronto, and spent a semester with me in Los Angeles, getting the movie made.

That 'one day' had arrived, To Rest in Peace was finished, and now, as we travelled the festival circuit and worked on other projects, we talked about premiering the film in Toronto 'one day.' Now that new 'one day' has arrived. It's June 30th. We hope to see you there.

Ridley Scott

DGA Quarterly has a great interview with Ridley Scott in their Fall 2010 issue. The bit about his early directing days is particularly interesting. I won't spoil it with a summary here, but look for the advice he got from actor Ian Hendry. "From that moment on, I just changed gears."

Ridley Scott's work was an inspiration for To Rest in Peace from the very beginning. Sean Conaty and I watched Body of Lies and Black Hawk Down. And Leah Curtis and I listened to the score of Black Hawk Down and Gladiator.

Going way back, it was Gladiator that inspired me to study history in undergrad, with the dream of directing historical epics. Which is why it was such an honour to have Mr. Scott as an Industry Mentor on To Rest in Peace. His guidance raised the film to a whole new level.

Enjoy the interview!

Storyboards

Several months before production started, I sat down with Sean Conaty (the DP) and shotlisted the entire film. We had no locations yet, no cast. We were still making the decision of whether to shoot the entire film in Kuwait, or whether to shoot the entire film in Los Angeles. But I wanted to have a first draft of the visual design, to inform these choices.

Eventually, we made the decision to shoot principal in Los Angeles, and 2nd unit in Kuwait. To fully understand the division, I looked over our shotlist, and storyboarded the entire script. This was a second draft of the visual design, and it helped in choosing locations, and forming the production schedule.

But the storyboards also proved useful in a surprising way. For the second half of production, there were some off-set problems that made it impossible for Sean and I to properly plan our shots. The storyboards were a life-saver. They helped us keep focus, and we continued to read each other's minds each day.

The Eve of Production

On the eve of production. Call time 6AM.

Everything is prepped and ready to go.

As a reminder of what we are trying to accomplish, I watched some of my favourite scenes from my favourite films. I watched the opening of Gladiator, and the Non Nobis Domine scene from Kenneth Branagh's Henry V.

Also watched this inspiring and informative interview with my favourite director, Ridley Scott.

Tomorrow is the first of ten days, after which production on To Rest in Peace will be past tense. I look forward to sharing this journey with you.

Two Days Away!

Two days away from production, we had an intense production meeting to review all the logistics. Left to right, Producers Cat Youell, Josh Clavir, Brad Crowe, 1st AD John Dion, and Director of Photography Sean Conaty. The empty chair is mine, with the production schedule up on the computer.

Wednesday is pick ups and prep. Thursday we start rolling!

The plan is to post a picture and a report every day of production. Tune in next time!

Green Light!

We were officially green lit today!

The green light process at USC is a series of meetings with all the thesis department heads: producing, editing, sound, visual effects and physical production. We start shooting on Thursday.

I also visited the workshop of our production designer, Katie Byron, which is now hosting our wonderful art department team. The picture above is art director Henry Alvarado with one of two stop signs he made for us, with some help from the good people over at 24.

Toys

Little toy cars are very helpful when you've got a complicated set up to plan. (The red one has the two dead bodies in it).

While playing with... err... while seriously planning out the car moves, Sean and I figured out how to shoot our discovery scene in a much simpler and more beautiful way than previously planned.

The fun of making a movie is in all the little discoveries. (And in the toys you need to make them).

Ghosts of Movies Past

This picture recently surfaced from the second film Josh and I worked on together (Her Music Led, November 2005).

Warning: Don't mess with this producer.

Our first film was also shot in the freezing cold of winter in Toronto. By contrast, To Rest in Peace will be a desert movie shot in May. From one extreme to the other. It's how we do things.

Josh is heading back to Toronto for a week, to attend Ryerson University's Film Festival, where he will screen three films he produced, and one he directed. You can find more info here.

It all comes together...

Last week Fawaz, Brad and I had our first visual design meeting with Sean (DP), Katie (PD), Prasanna Iyengar (Costume Designer) and Henry Alvarado (Art Director). It was really incredible for me, because it was the first time everyone in charge of the visuals put forward their ideas and unique take on the film. Don't ask me why, but most exciting of all for me was seeing that Prasanna had already created our badges for the Red Crescent volunteers... There's just something really official about the film now. I can't believe we are less than three weeks away!

Parrot

No Kuwaiti home is complete without a pet bird. Here is Joey, an African Grey who will join our production.

Kuwait Workshop

Last December, I went to Kuwait to look into the possibility of filming. While I was there, my cousin Esam organized a workshop with some of his acting troupe. We put up two scenes from the film, which was tremendous fun and good practice. Ali Kakooli [picture above] played the soldier in the climactic scene. He learned his lines on the spot, and contributed a few more through improv — with English as a second language! I was impressed.

In the end, we decided to shoot principle in California, but I'll be going back to Kuwait to shoot some b-roll and plates for visual effects. I'm hoping Esam has a play in production at that time, so we can see the troupe in action.

The Cool Factor

Ultimately, the reason we make movies is so we can go on field trips. This from Los Alamitos National Guard Base. Left to Right: Josh, Brad & Cat. The producers.

Anniversary

This past April 9th, quite by coincidence, I was meeting with Sean, the director of photography, to go over the script for visual themes. We arrived at one scene that we agreed was the heart of the story, a scene in which Malek draws his frightened eight year old son out of hiding. Out of curiosity, I wanted to see if this scene was in the first draft, so I did a quick search and stumbled onto this date: April 9th, 2007.

It was two years to the day that the script was written.

The story was germinating for a long time. After Josh and I finished Her Music Led, our first little movie shot on film, we talked about possible inspirations for our next project. Eventually we mentioned Antigone [pictured above], a classic that always reminded me of my uncle's story. I related this story to Josh, as best as I could remember, and his eyes lit up. That was 2005.

Spring 2007 was my second semester at USC. I had a writing class with a wonderful professor, who required us to write every week either three one page treatments, or a ten page script. I decided to write my uncle's story, and I put together a treatment for the first assignment, but my professor refused to let me. I wasn't ready, he said. Maybe later, he said.

Grumble, grumble, grumble. But he was right. After a romantic comedy, two ancient period pieces, and a couple of bizarre experiments, I finally understood what he meant. He gave his permission, and I wrote the first draft of To Rest in Peace.

Which did have the scene between Malek and his son, almost word for word.

Location, location, location

As the saying goes in Real Estate: "Location, location, location", so it goes in film (unless you have the budget and resources of George Lucas, haha!) This couldn't be more true in our case.

To Rest in Peace is set in 1990 Kuwait, a very unique urban landscape which, as I have had to constantly keep explaining to various location support personnel, is not at all like the mud huts in Kandahar, but more like the mansions in Beverly Hills. However, even Beverly Hills is only a close approximation and still has many problems. For one, the vegetation, generally speaking, is all wrong: it is far too green and has too many trees.

Currently, we have been able to find a house interior for the film, but Malek's neighborhood has proven to be a lot more difficult, and is something which we are still searching for.

The process of scouting and securing these locations has been a movie in itself. For the climactic burial scene in the film, where Malek is confronted by an Iraqi soldier, we needed to find an area that could work as an urban highway and where we could control traffic. We approached the California Film Commission and they recommended we look into something called the US Air Force BRAC list: Base Re-alignment and Closure. The list is comprised of non-active Air Force Bases which are often used for film shoots, car commercials and the occasional episode of "Myth Busters." We approached a few of these bases and ultimately found one in Orange County that seemed to work.

Around the time we found this base, we were given word about a US Air Force Base in Los Alamitos that might work as well. I called the base and ended up being referred to a National Guard Colonel, who as it turned out loved student films and had two grown daughters who were members of SAG — huh? The most bizarre part for me was that it turned out Los Alamitos was actually an active National Guard Base, but they would be more than willing to let us film there. We were all quite stunned. Within a week, we were able to set-up a scout of Los Alamitos and Fawaz, Cat, Brad and I soon found ourselves talking to Gene, a retired Vietnam Vet, about where we might be able to film on the base. He was an incredibly decent guy, but since we needed to be able to dig a grave — which was an absolute "no" for them and the Army Corps of Engineers — it turned out the base would not work out. Either way, it was an awesome experience for us, and part of me would love to go back and film something there one day.