I
Tend to
Sometime last Christmas, when I was (as usual) broke and gasping at straws for presents to give to my friends, I decided to make a little movie for Bernard Kelly for Christmas. He had narrated one of my stupid short films (quite well) and had become one of my closest friends and confidantes. I couldn't think of what to do for him, and buying him a present seemed awkward; until one day I remembered that his brother Nick was a musician and songwriter, and that Bernard missed his family back in Ireland very much. "Aha! A music video might be fun to do!" I thought, not really taking into consideration that it was rather strange behaviour to be stalking one's brother's music. I went to Nick Kelly's webpage and downloaded a 30-second snippet from Kelly's first song, "Faint Heart," and listened to the scratchy, compressed file. Nick Kelly won a vote that day for my own personal Most-Expressive-Irish-Singer-Since-Bono-But-I-Think-Kelly-Is-Better Award. I found it - well, exquisite.
I also found Nick's recording story very touching. He had been involved with a band called The Fat Lady Sings for years, and, after a while, tired of the pressures placed on him by the music industry. Desiring complete artistic freedom, Nick Kelly completely withdrew from these pressures, and started his own recording company, Self-Possessed Records. Perhaps Kelly now had complete artistic freedom, but at what price glory? Lack of funding for recording sessions. No means of mass distribution. Ah! But he had a strong, loyal, fan base to help financially support him, and in 1997 Nick released "Between Trapezes" - financed independently. It was a small kick in the ass for the music industry, but, judging from the quality of this CD and the contacts he has, a painful one. So I thought
that making a worthwhile music video (for free - and for my own personal
entertainment) would also be a nice testament to all Nick had to go through
to get that album produced. He deserved something decent and I wanted
to do that for him, even though I'd never even spoken to the guy.
I had been experimenting for some time with photo-animation; and envisioned some kind of floaty Enya-ish image when I initially gave "Faint Heart" a listen. I had some interesting digital still self-portraits lying around on my hard drive and decided to experiment with making them float around a bit over the image of the "Ladder in the Pyrenees" photograph by Clare Langan. Just to see what I could do with it, mind. Several hours goofing with PhotoShop later, I discovered I'd invented a form of animation that wasn't really all that different than traditional cel-animation in principle; but in vision, it proved unique. I wanted to make a video to the ENTIRE song,but the only way I could do that was to ask Bernard to borrow his brother's CD, Between Trapezes. One night when Bernard came to my little studio to narrate, I decided to show him what I had been working on. I was a little apprehensive about showing him at first, but luckily for me, Bernard liked what I was doing and encouraged me to finish what I had started and do the entire video. Having his approval (and now the entire CD), I went to town. One cold November evening, I filmed myself (looking extremely moody) in various locations around Penn State - places that weren't obviously university property, however. Somehow I didn't envision Old Main or the Lion Shrine in a song about falling madly in love. My friend Saurav also helped film the many scenes of me running up and down stairs (and has a cameo as a blinking eye). Bernard ended up giving me Nick's CD as "an early, cheap Christmas pressie;" but with that, he also gave me the opportunity to experiment with music I wanted to work with, badly, that I, otherwise, would probably have not been able to obtain without him. With that, he gave me his approval, his encouragement, and his support. Never before have I received such an honourable gift from someone who does not share my gene pool. So I cobbled together this little video and finished it sometime in late November-early December 2001. I was extremely pleased with the results of my little animation experiment and told Bernard that this was my present for him.
A couple of professors had seen my work as I laboured in the studio, and when I finished it, I showed my advisors. Dori Lemeh demanded that I get "Faint Heart" released and that I keep my mouth shut about how I accomplished the animated bits. Which was easy, because explaining it to people is impossible for me, anyway. But Dori insisted my work was professional-quality and worthy of film festivals. Arrgh! This was a whole other ballgame. It was one thing to make a present for someone for Christmas and getting a convenient grade out of it as well; but QUITE another to actually release it without permission. I emailed Bernard and explained my predicament. Bernard, luckily, comes from a family of lawyers (one of them quite prominent) and he had a shitload of things to say in regard to it and how his brother might react. I had no intention of making any money off of it whatsoever; to me it was just something nice I had made for someone else. Bernard promised to speak to Nick for me and assure him I wasn't out to steal his music. At this point, Bernard hadn't even SEEN the finished product, because I hadn't put it on cassette before he chucked off for Dublin for Christmas holiday; and because at that time I was flitting back and forth to Philadelphia to care for my very-ill grandfather. And he did, the blessed man. Bernard wrote up a permission letter for Nick to verify his allowance of my using his work for my video and to release it; as long as I did not make a profit. Fine by me. Some months later Bernard actually got the letter posted back to him, along with his birthday present. In the meantime Bernard had helped me write a nagging script that I didn't want to get asinine, and narrated it; he also inadvertently gotten into a short film I made for a class about the death of love, solely for saying something eerie and mathematical. Call me shallow, but it sounded creepy. In March my digital media class held an exhibit in Bellefonte's Adam and Art Gallery. I was so happy to be able to share with about 80 people the music of Nick Kelly, and I made up small brochures to advertise his CD. I was fortunate to have Bernard there as well, because without his meddling I would not have been able to display it without feeling rather odd about it; and it was nice to be able to present my work for the first time publicly as well. And thank heavens, because I had gotten much kudos from the local art community for my cinematography; but even more happily, people asked who the singer was for the video. They loved it. I knew then that I had done my job - that on a shoestring budget and with mediocre editing skills, I had made something worthwhile. Maybe not something you'd see on MTV; maybe not something you'd see in an advertisement; but a well-crafted short film to a beautiful, beautiful song. It was then I knew I had found my calling. Aside from the
fact that I was completely shitfaced on 6 pints of Yuengling.
So the next month, as the semester wrapped, I was encouraged by my art-school cronies to submit "Faint Heart" to the Penn State CAN Film Festival. Being an integrative arts student, I was rather apprehensive about it - it's well-known that non-film students have a bitch of a time getting anything shown, due to grave bias from the film department's posse. I have no hard feelings, because I know the film students work hard as well, but I decided to enter it, a spoof of Robert Palmer's "Addicted To Love" that my friends Kim and Matt and I had done one night in a fit of boredom - and another video I had made for Nick Kelly: "The Night Cesare Lombroso Met the Elephant Man." I thought, what the hell? I'll submit all three! By this time I had become rather adept at photo-animation and was having a ball lifting photos of old cinema stars, disembodied body parts (particularly Bernard's floating arm, which I found hilarious) and other nonsensical things and making them float around. The spirit of Terry Gilliam had entered my soul. Imagine my utter elation and shock when I received an email saying that all three of my videos had been selected for the CAN festival. For an integrative arts student, this was unprecedented. Another unprecedented event this year - of the small myriad of films selected this year, there were SIX done by INART students. It was a happy day for my department indeed. As it turned out, the 2002 awards were not judged by film students - but rather film PROFESSORS. We all received
feedback comments for our works. People liked "Addicted To Love Redux,"
but couldn't tell if it were a tribute or a mockery (I in fact love Robert
Palmer and had never seen the original video prior to making this....much
to the surprise of everyone on the planet) - but the real kudos shone through
in regard to "Between Trapezes" (which was just "Faint Heart" and "Cesare
Lombroso" stuck together so I wouldn't get disqualified for submitting
more than I should have). One told me it was "nearly perfect;" all said
it was very professional and the editing was splendid, even though they
couldn't figure out the correlation between the two VERY DIFFERENT songs.
No matter. One final person said the music and the visuals complemented
each other beautifully, and that really pleased me.
So I asked Bernard to accompany me to the CAN Festival, as my way of thanking and honouring him - for all of his support and involvement in my work, of course; but more importantly, for finally giving me a purpose for whatever talent I have been given. In Bernard, I have a fan, a friend, a faith in my abilities, creative input, an intellectual challenge, and quasi-legal advice at the drop of a hat when I'm freaking out about something. That is worth more to me than anything else in the world, and I deeply, deeply appreciate it. I am frequently told that I have brains and talent and could go far if I wanted to - which would be nice, of course, even though that's not really my priority...but for me, those qualities are useless unless someone can not only appreciate, but nurture them. I am glad to have been able to give back to him by sharing his brother's work with hundreds of people who would otherwise have never heard of him, and also making them remember Nick's music. One woman came
up to me several weeks after the film festival asking where she could acquire
that fantastic CD - and she HUMMED "Faint Heart." That, people, is
more rewarding to my heart than the little gold naked statue that the Film
Department gave me for Excellence in Animation.
But anyway, thanks
so much to Bernard and Nick for everything.
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