My one-quarter

Last night was interesting.

The purpose of going out was the screening of N's films. He's raising funds for his big feature film. There are no words to describe his enthusiasm and passion for film. I'm hoping some of it will rub off on me.

So I went to the venue with a friend. She was driving and I was the navigator. I obviously got a lot of phone calls one after another throughout the way, and before we knew it we were far away, almost out of the city! We managed to reach the venue in time for the last two short films, and the Q&A session. That was enough for me to seriously consider investing in N's film. He is just too good, and I would love to support his film, if only I had some money of my own.

Then we all moved on to a bar, where I was thankfully let in, despite not carrying my passport, my I-20, or a parental permission letter! I'm being mean I guess, but it is stupid for them to ask me for a NY state ID when I am not from here. I did find out about getting a NY state ID, and will start the process soon, just so that I'm not discriminated against anymore. Anyway, so we all went to this place, even Evil E, Aki, and BOZO. I wasn't very excited about it, and took a lot of time to settle down. After half a glass of Merlot, I was ready to socialize. It was mostly fun then on - high point of the evening surprisingly being my conversation with Aki.

I finally spoke to him about my film next quarter. He is going to be my subject for the documentary I'm planning to make. He was very open in his thoughts on the film, and very accommodating about mine. I often tend to forget why I decided to make a film about him - but last night I saw it again, a glimpse of that honest, vulnerable, troubled, strong, witty, positive, hurt, caring, soulful person that he always is.

I began to make notes of my ideas about the film today in the long bus ride. There is a lot to think about, and brainstorming to do with Aki himself. Hopefully I will have a concrete POA by the time I meet Hyper Howard in class. A piece of useful advice given to me last night, which I'm accepting in my new spirit of trusting other's experiences, was that I shouldn't take too many courses, as it will affect the quality of my one-quarter film. I'm registered for eighteen credits, but do plan to drop one course, against my obsession for utilizing every penny I spend on tuition. In fact when I started thinking about my film, I thought I won't even have enough time to help RH, Aki, Evil E, and BOZO on their films. Ten weeks is too short a time - but it will be less of a challenge for me considering I won't need a lot of equipment, crew, etc. All I need is good research (which I love doing), a good tentative structure for the film, and then a good edit job at the end.

For now, I need to do a lot of introspection regarding the purpose of the film, and what I hope to achieve with it.