LIZKO PRODUCTIONS
News Pitch Ideas
I want to find a couple of the people who worked at Spiral Press before it closed down and ask what happened that made it close down. I have heard a bunch of rumors about it, but I don't know what's actually true. I think it would be really interesting to see what ex-employees have to say about the company. I was just reading a bunch of yelp reviews that said things like, "the staff is losing their minds, keeping everyone waiting, getting everything wrong, and yelling at each other. Not under their breath type yelling, really yelling at the top of their lungs like I would yell to someone way down the street. And not yelling because it's loud in here and they can't hear each other, yelling because they're tweaking out and pissed off at each other for some reason." So that's already something I wasn't expecting
Spiral Press Interview
(video is unfinished) Our group started off with the idea of interviewing someone about the closing of Spiral Press Cafe. To do this, we needed to track down someone who had worked there. Muench mentioned knowing a blue-eyed girl, who had a lot to say about it. After we tracked her down, it was pretty easy to email Olivia and ask if she could meet during A block. I think the interview was probably the easiest part of the whole thing, as she was really composed and well spoken. One issue that I had, which I'll remember in the future, was that as soon as we started, I could tell she was looking directly into the camera and not always looking at me, but I didn't say anything to her. If I were to refilm this, I'd tell her to make sure she was looking at me, not the camera. Editing was fun. There were a couple of parts-- they may have been cut out-- where one word
or phrase she said was hard to hear in a sentence. For example, I think a part that's still in there is when she's talking about the former owner, she originally just said "He," without clarifying who "He" was. I had to search for a part where she mentioned his name and then replace the "He" without making it sound too choppy, and that was something I've never done while editing before. We had some issues with B-roll, because of my car, but I think it worked out okay. It's still unfinished, I think I need to find B-roll to cover one of the cuts and add some music in the background. But after that, I am pretty much finished with it.
Color Correction
Capturing the Friedmans
I watched the movie “Capturing the Friedman’s” for my documentary review. This documentary follows the life of the Friedman family. Honestly, I was trying to focus on the cinematography involved in the movie, but the story was so insane I was distracted. As someone who finds psychology really interesting, the way that all of the different people involved in what happened responded was so crazy for me to watch. It showcases how differently people respond to very emotionally disturbing situations. Every person that is presented shares a different mentality about how the situation should be handled. The way some character’s recollection of events varied so drastically from others made it so compelling to watch.
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It’s so strange that they decided to film all of their arguments and discussions about potentially going to jail. I can’t imagine having any of my angry outburst’s being displayed anywhere, or even being okay with them being recorded ever. However, it ended up being such an important element of the story, though, because it showed just how messed up the family actually was. This is sort of random, but I noticed in a lot of the interviews had a weird vignette filter over it. Probably a personal preference thing, but I didn’t like it at all. Also, I believe that this was made in 2003, so it would make sense that it isn’t the most cinematography advanced film out there. One thing I did really like about the documentary was the way the information was revealed to the audience. Going in to watching it, I knew almost nothing about what the movie was about. The only piece that I knew was that they recorded a lot of home videos. I liked the way it started out by introducing this nice, average, all-american family, yet included elements that made the viewer anticipate that there was a lot that wasn’t being said. With every small reveal of information, I was surprised and confused all over again. I think that kept it really interesting. The viewer is waiting to hear something that will explain which side is telling the truth and who is actually lying and that moment never comes. Which is really annoying because I want to know the truth, but it also shows why unchecked biases can lead to so much confusion.
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I would definitely recommend this film to anyone, specifically people who take an interest in psychology. Obviously, there were a couple very concrete and evidence based claims that there were a lot of things wrong with that family, however, it makes you wonder how much of an influence the police and parents of children increased their problems. It also really looks at how the good intentions of parents and police could have potentially lead children to misremember situations. Perhaps that wasn’t what happened in this situation, but it shows that it is definitely possible. It also really shows how much biases in the police force could potentially cause drastic and disproportionately large problems for accused individuals that are innocent. (That sounds like I veering towards the side of the Arnold being innocent, but I just want to clarify that possession of childhood pornography was enough for me to want him to be locked up in a mental hospital far far away from me.)