This finished film was well received by all, except for the film festivals…it was not accepted into any films festivals between 1998-2001 because it DID NOT ORIGINATE ON FILM. I wrote, co-produced, directed and edited this film, or should I say video?
An artist, working to find her artists ‘voice’, creates a self portrait with inspiration from her recently deceased Grandmothers scrap book.
The Artists self portrait is brought to life by it’s noisy, annoying neighbor… With a little magic , the portrait makes a new friend for the Artist and deals with the woman driving her up the wall!
Up The Wall was born out of the desire to explore the theme of artistic expression further, my own as well as a fictional characters, through a dramatic film.
Corinna, a visual artist, has fallen into the trap of imitating her favorite artists and in an attempt to find her ‘own voice’, inspired by the portraits in her grandmother’s old scrapbook, she takes on the task of capturing the essence of herself in a self portrait.
Now…there is a unique psychological thing that takes place when you look into your own eyes and face and paint your own portrait. Your own face suddenly becomes a mirror to your soul, the real you, and strange things happen as you paint, in pursuit of the prize, ‘know thyself’.
When I (Patti) am creating, and in ‘the flow’… time stands still… the muse takes over. So I gave Corinna this same experience but with a twist, the muse doesn’t take over Corinna, it takes over the self portrait.
The next morning, this muse spirit is rudely awakened by the noisy, annoying neighbor and is left to it’s own devices to create it’s own peaceful existence.
As the self-portrait needed to come to life in order to interact with the world around it, I turned to technology to help me achieve this action. In 1996 I wrote this script and in 1997, after much research into technology, I approached the film as a new technology piece; a pathos driven comedy, in the fashion of silent movies, using new technology to make it come to fruition. The film was shot in 1997 with a Sony Canada sponsored prosumer video camera with interchangeable lenses. (As seen in the photo at the top of this blog) My intention was to do everything I couldn’t afford to do if I shot on film and pitched it as “how filmmakers will make films in the future”.
The film was finished in 1997. It included title on picture and numerous visual effects, as well as being delivered in three formats; digital letterbox, ‘filmlook’ digital letterbox and a 35 mm kinescope transfer.
1997
Canada’s First Digital-to-Film short film finished in 3 formats.
A New Technology piece.
Funded by Sony, BC Film, NFB.
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