Making more uniforms

So, after some days of personal heaviness, life goes on and gotta keep moving. Like if life hits come from many directions at once and you are forced to stand still and close your eyes for a while. Certain experiences always makes you feel odd but one's strength pushes you up in order to move on with one's dreams. No one will do it for you anyway so I just have to put on my social face around.

Now that I'm like 65% done with the filming of the movie, there are certain additional battle scenes to be done and completed like the battle of Alto del Alianza and the Morro siege where more soldiers than I have used so far are gonna be needed to make it look massive as I want it to be. So I decided to make more uniforms.

Called the textile workshop where I made mine like 7 months ago and it was good to see the same people there. Of course I don't have the budget to make plenty as before because this is an impromptu situation so I'm ordering 300 more. The people I'm gonna use are thicker so I'm making the size "large" for all. The locations to be used for those battle scenes are gonna be outside of Lima in the desert outskirts.

Today I went to Gamarra to get around 3,100 buttons and rolls of red fabric to make the chilean soldiers pants.
It is kinda weird to be doing all this walking around and uniform-making again.
Will keep me busy for a while.

At least I know that no matter how hard I try to fight for this movie, it comes out close to the way I need it to be...not like a human being where no matter how much effort you put there, it always has a mind of it's own and not necessarily it's one that you'd like.

Hacienda Buena Vista: planning the siege.

The past days I filmed the interior scenes to be the continuation of the Quinta Heeren ones.
This time in Chorrillos at an old republican house of the era that belongs to a good friend of mine from my theater years.

Mac Lennan, Calvo, Sarmiento, Villavicencio and Zarauz portraying Chilean officers Baquedano, Lagos and others and also Abrisqueta playing Peruvian engineer Elmore.

Script lines were a bit difficult to memorize as I used several tactical words of how the Morro de Arica was taken over.

Calvo invited a couple of young filmmakers who happen to have a web show interviewing poeple in this field so they were around while I finished the scenes for the day to interview me. Perhaps it will be online soon.

Another interview

The impromptu interview made by Alejandro Nieto for his gutenbergtv. site after wrapping up filming a few days ago.
Igor Calvo (who plays chilean Carlos Weguelin) asked them to drop by and this is what came out.

Arica siege

Another day of filming the Arica siege streets scenes.
This time again with Weguelin and all extras/actors doing their best.

I enjoyed it yesterday. Filming went smoothly good and without much worries compared to other days.
A big thank you to all the new extras who played the town people and women.

It's always fun to have rifle shot scenes....The extras were definitely fire-hungry, right people?
:)

Accent Rehearsals

This week is being dedicated to rehearsing the scenes with the Chilean officers actors (Gustavo Mac Lennan, Pepe Sarmiento y Patricio Villavicencio) together with civilian hacienda owner Weguelin (Igor Calvo).

It is important to reach a level of realness with that accent. I have seen many chilean videos where peruvians are depicted and portrayed and their accent seems a bit exaggerated or highland countryside sounding. There are typical highland and urban Peruvian accents as I'm sure there are in Chile too. The coast cities here have their own accent and usually officers live there as the main headquarters of a countries capital is in there. So I'm telling my actors to keep the accent noticeable but not too "amplified" with the high and lows of the typical Chilean accent but keep it more compressed and normal. More city-like. I showed them videos of Chilean politicians and learned the sound and fluctuations and then we practiced the script with that.

So far it's doing good. We just need to practice more so they don't have to concentrate on the accent but on the scene. To have that accent so natural that they don't have to think about it.

On a side note, Pepe Sarmiento was so nice to host a nice meal for us as we had the rehearsal at his apartment. Thank you Pepe, you are a good cook!

Music score progress

Had a late night meeting with Fernando De Lucchi to listen how the main melodies and compositions are coming along.
So far it is very interesting and good. Found many melodies that will suit precise scenes of despair and anguish, martial scenes and inner thoughts of Bolognesi and other heroes.

Can't wait until all is ready. Music score is 50% of a feature so it is an important part I'm focusing on a lot here for my film.

Hacienda Buena Vista

After a difficult day filled with delays in rifles delivery we finally shot yesterday Sunday the scenes where Weguelin arrives at his country house hacienda Buena Vista. where he was lodging the chilean headquarters. The horse was somewhat adamant in pulling the chariot at first (was a bit heavy for him) but then after the persuasion of a few carrots ( lol), he agreed to cooperate.

Sun was perfect, weather was nice and all was covered nicely and ready for the next shots tto be filmed there soon. I simply love the Quinta Hereen. I was thinking out loud if that place could be transformed into a movie set for films that require it. The place is simply beautiful. Just a bit uncared for.

First scenes with renowned actor Igor Calvo. I have to say that I am very happy with his performance and overall professional attitude. Very helpful and very supportive. Definetly someone I can also call a friend. His demeanor truly states someone who has learned about life and comprehends things that make it happen. A very positive energy.

A gentleman indeed.

Tonight: 9pm rehearsal with Mac Lennan, Sarmiento and Calvo and go over their scenes. Last saturday, we had one and noticed some chilean accent practice is needed. I want that scene to be perfect accent wise and script wise. Keeping accent and remembering their lines is what Id like to flow seamlessly.

Here we go again!

So today was good news in general for the production.
The last weeks I was in talks and meetings to renew the support from the Army this year as it's ran now by the new Commander in Chief.
I was told today that he has just signed my petition of support-renewal after seeing my film progress and the impact it's gaining.
Also wanting to thank the former Commander and waiting for the meeting to do it. I think it's important to always thank the ones who in one way or another gave you a hand to push your dream forward. He doesn't even know me but just by name as being in office is a very busy task. Now retired, I want to thank him like I've done many officers on duty who have tagged along with me on this wild crazy film.

In the meantime, also confirmed is the hacienda in Chorrillos and only still looking for a location to shoot it's interior scenes in.

Starting again people....now time for the early wake up calls for the next couple weeks as we finish interior scenes and move on to the last battle scenes to be filmed in Lima.

After that, next stop, south of Peru: Tacna....here we come!

Casa Hacienda

It is being somewhat demanding the "hacienda" search. The one I was gonna film at in Surco isn't fitting the requirements of the movie anymore.

After finishing the last set of scenes at the Casona downtown, started looking for alternate haciendas that could work as one closest to the one in Arica back in 1880. Looked all over the city but many were already transformed into "countryside-outback style" restaurants, or simply in ruins so I had to go as far as the valley of Lurin and Pachacamac and...nothing quite close to the thing I had in mind. Now, for the past few days -after researching more over the internet- I took a spontaneous trip south to Cañete and beyond. Visited the Montalvan, Arona and Unanue haciendas. Beautiful ones in the middle of the valley kinda way out of that southern town and far from civilization to say the least. Remains of what seemed like a bountiful era of crops and commerce.

In the end, the one in Chorrillos here seems to be the place that I'll finally take to shoot the hacienda scenes. Interiors is at another location for this one is simply too modern.

Time and the city's growth seem to alter not only our historical buildings but also it's legacy. All of what once were "chacras" and crop lands were slowly digested and annexed into what is Lima now....a huge urban metropolis of almost 10 million people.
I simply don't like that.

Finished filming downtown

Finally wrapped up filming a the Casona downtown. This location has allowed great shots and also has been a blow of fresh air on the crew and actors as its more of a controlled environment compared to the desert location where we shot the battle and trenches scenes. The heat, dust and circumstances were simply hard to endure. And we are not done yet as we'll be back there to continue filming battle scenes in two weeks approximately.

This last weekend was just full of tight schedule hours and fast filming solutions but still making it look aesthetic. Finished filming a bit past midnight and counting the packing up and putting it all in the car we ended going home at around 5am!

One anecdote was that we had schedule Sunday to shoot the heroes meeting with More when he talks about the shipwreck of his Independence ship. I wanted it to be touching and very heartfelt. The actor had to make a quick trip to Huancayo (5 hours away from Lima) and due to be back on Tuesday. Had to pay his trip back as we had only till this Sunday to finish in that location. Early that day he called me and said there were some floods and mudslides that blocked the highways and there were no buses coming to Lima until further noticed. It was worry-some as all was set for that scene and we had that last day to shoot it. Thank God he found a way and arrived onset at around 6pm. Long scene but made it finally.
Definitely, The Lord has its ways to put us to the test.

Now...preparing the next scenes in our next two locations: Chorrillos and Callao.