12.2.12: L For Leisure by Special Affects Films
For the last three years we have been working on our first feature film L FOR LEISURE. We’ve already filmed over 70% of the film in seven separate locations. The end of production is finally in sight and we need your support to get us there.
L FOR LEISURE is an impressionistic, episodic comedy about laziness, wandering and wasting time. Hanging out with teenagers when you’re thirty, smoking nutmeg to get high and eating pie until you fall asleep. Training a dog how to boogie board. Set to the rhythm of the school-year calendar, L FOR LEISURE tracks the changes to the collected spirit of a group of graduate students through 1992-93 as they go on various vacations. Out of their elements and hyper-aware, the students are gradually drawn into a highly casual metaphysical struggle. In its focus on highly thoughtful but somehow clueless characters, L FOR LEISURE is an homage to the 90s films of directors like Hal Hartley, Whit Stillman and Eric Rohmer. But L FOR LEISURE takes a more panoramic approach, treating its characters and scenarios as deeply contextualized moving parts and using them to explore ideas about adulthood, lifestyle, alternate universes and friendship.
Production has taken us to Coastal New Jersey, Newport Beach, the California mountains, Connecticut, Côte d’Azur France, and in November 2012, twighlighty offseason Iceland! The locations are exotic but each shoot has been accomplished as cheaply as possible. Every aspect has been DIY and not just by ourselves. Our wonderful actors have regularly pulled double and triple duties as drivers, cooks, lighting assistants, you name it. Locations, cars, props and countless meals have been generously donated. Our funds have come from a number of sources: our families (thanks guys!!), foreign extreme sports enthusiasts (thanks bro!), and our own pockets: nearly $40,000 in contributions. But we need you to help raise the $14,000 necessary to complete production.
There are just three shoots left: the opening scene set in Los Angeles, the closing scene set in Mexico and featuring a surfing dog(!), and “Laser Wars” set in the apocalyptic future. These final three shoots are slated for January 2013, so to be able to buy plane tickets, hold locations, and secure actors we need these funds soon! Our deadline is December 10, 2012. THANK YOU FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS!
Making films as a two-person operation has always been a challenging process. L FOR LEISURE has involved scheduling shoots with nearly thirty actors, arranging locations and lodging far from everyone´s homes, and running production without a professional crew. On top of this, working in 16mm leaves a very small margin for mistakes or on-set corrections. Every time we shoot, the film could be damaged or exposed and all our work would be lost. Working together on nearly a dozen projects these last ten years has taught us to build on what works for us and accept our limitations as a two-person team. And most of all, be patient when the inevitable setbacks come. We´re confident with your support that these last shoots will be completed and will look great. Nearly all the actors and locations are scheduled and confirmed – a much better position than we´re usually in at this point. However, finishing the shoot will not be the end of the process. Post-producing a film: mixing and mastering the sound, color correction and promotion present demands that are not within the scope of this Kickstarter campaign. After the film is shot, we will be able to either prepare the film for festival tours ourselves (as we did for BLONDES IN THE JUNGLE), or to partner with organizations that can bring this innovative and fun project to the larger scale we think it deserves.
Special Affects Films is Whitney Horn and Lev Kalman.
Film blog: leisureiswar.tumblr.com
Artists Website: specialaffectsfilms.com
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