Leave a Message
Leave a Message
Our award-winning short Leave a Message screened at ArcLight Cinemas in Hollywood on September, 2006 as part of the Los Angeles International Short Film Festival. I had a great crew and this film wouldn't have been made if it weren't for them - Carsten, Mike and Dan. It was an honor and a thrill to be part of this fest.
I decided to quit my dream job at USA TODAY and moved to SoCal to get into film. Not easy when you don't have a film education, background or connections in the film biz. But I love films and I'm more of a Californian than an East Coaster. I was always a good writer so I figure I'd write the screenplay.
My childhood friend Carsten finished his music education at Berklee School of Music in Boston then moved to Berkeley, CA. He also wanted to get into film. We reconnected and our first attempt to do a short in L.A. was a bust because the cafe where I wanted to shoot it wanted $5K. So we shot it in East Bay and the unofficial screening of X10 (Kristen) was a hit. Too bad I missed it!
Our second film was Leave a Message. I was in my French New Wave mode so I wanted to do something avant garde so I wrote a story where the lead character had no dialogue so the story would be told through an answering machine. Cheaper to film in East Bay so we shot it up there.
So that's the quick version of it. Screening it in Hollywood was so fun and it was one of the highlights of my life. It screened on Saturday night and around 40-50 friends went to the screening. Even the guy who cut my hair put a poster of my film on his shop's window and he went to the screening. You'll never forget things like that. If you want something so bad you can make it happen.
DC Asian Pacific American Film, Inc.
I moved back to DC after the recession in 2008. Had a great run promoting films for this all-volunteer organization. I wrote a couple hundred stories for their website, got them press on NPR, front page of the Washington Post EXPRESS, The Washingtonian, and many other local media outlets. I also developed partnerships with organizations who contributed yearly to the festival, composed music for the festival trailer, and my band also played at the closing night party. We had a fun staff and it was a pleasure meeting and hanging out with many of the filmmakers.