45 45. «Character Template» and Filming Begins.
Disclaimer: The story that I have written here takes on the names of real people, but this story is based in an alternate earth with some changes in its timeline.
This story does not intend to represent the celebrities/real people or make any commentary on them whatsoever. This story is entirely fictional, and it should be viewed entirely as such.
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Recap of the previous chapter -
Mark accepts Johnny's invitation and meets with Keanu and River outside. They head out for lunch and have a great time talking about their hobbies, likes and dislikes, their dreams and goals, etc.
They talk about which one of Mark's books is their personal favorite. Furthermore, they asked Mark about how he comes up with the ideas for his books. The conversation then headed towards Hollywood, and the trio asked Mark who were his favorite actors and who he thought had the potential to make it big in the industry.
Mark answered that he had a really strong feeling about them, and then very subtly he steers the conversation towards the pitfalls of higher and higher salaries for actors. And then at the urging of Johnny tells them how they could avoid these hidden dangers. Their outing ends with Mark giving them a tour of the estate and giving them a small motivational speech.
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~ Mark's POV ~
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Date: 12th May, 1990.
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Location: At the Knives Out estate.
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Time: 08:09 am.
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The last few days had been really busy, thankfully the secretaries and assistant that Eva had hired for him weren't just flirtatious and sexy but also highly competent. He had been able to get the marketing of Knives Out started in high gear.
He took a $10 million loan against his invested assets from the bank to pay for the marketing budget to Universal. The bubble hadn't been reached yet, so he didn't want to sell off his assets too early.
It was a good thing as well, cause now this loan would be treated as a business expense he could write off his taxable income. He had also started shifting his investment and put a small amount of his money into some startups and emerging IT companies.
Most of them would fail if the timeline follows his previous one, with only Microsoft, Cisco and Oracle coming out as profitable of the companies he had invested in. This would make him seem like a normal person investing their money and not a guy who has insider information.
On the teaching side of things, Sophia had also contacted him and told that the conversation with her dad went well and that she would join CalArts as her Uni of choice. He had provided her with all the basic knowledge of shooting that he thought would be necessary for a novice director in training to learn.
Mark had the idea of teaching her the advanced things like camera angles, studio setup, character blocking, etc. with practical demonstration while shooting Knives Out. The second Sophia in his life, Ms. Vergara, had also arrived in LA.
This time with her two sisters and her only remaining brother in tow. He had pulled some strings and helped get them into an appropriate school. A favor which he knew had raised his favorability in Sophia's eyes.
She had also been admitted into CalArts for their intensive BFA acting program. The diet, exercise and acting classes had all begun. She had even started getting comfortable with him calling him at random times to complain about her strict diet. But she always remained respectful and did it in a joking manner.
He had been getting close with both of them, in a way he was helping both their careers to advance. While one was just being taught and mentored in his ways, the other was slowly being molded into his perfect heroine.
He could see her in various genres - horror, comedy, action, maybe even a musical. He had all the power in the world, to make or break someone's future, the power was heady and addictive.
Furthermore, he wondered, 'maybe it's why the saying was invented. If you really want to test a man's worth, give them power.'
He didn't lose himself in the rush of power though, as he was once one part of those nobodies in the industry, and he spent decades trying to climb that ladder.
Even before his system activated, with just his future knowledge, he had already gathered millions and became a renowned author.
To lose himself now would be a disservice to his past life and the hard work he put in this one to become the best version of himself. Today was the day of the shoot, he could have already used the character template to take over the directorial skills/talents of any famed director.
But he wanted to push himself and see how much he could do himself, his stats had improved a lot compared to his past life. A formal education on the art of filming had taken him far.
But there was still an 'Everest' left for him to climb if he wanted to stand shoulder to shoulder with the giants of the industry like - James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, S.S. Rajamouli, Christopher Nolan, etc.
Another reason why he waited so long to select the character template was because the template he had gotten from the system was 'Grade A' so it would last for 2 consecutive movies. The second movie which he planned on directing was the origin of Joker, now named The Killing Joke due to Warner's intervention.
He wanted to select a director who could direct both Knives Out and The Killing Joke and take both of them to the next level. After much contemplation and comparing the stats and styles of the top directors, he decided to go with Steven Spielberg.
He went with Spielberg because of his ability to do almost everything perfectly, he immediately felt a rush of power in his body. He felt the years of experience flow through him, his body language was still the same, but now he had an air of confidence.
It was only after using the card did he realize that the Steven Spielberg he had copied wasn't of this world. No, he had copied the Steven Spielberg of his past life when he had passed away. Now he had over 50 years worth of directorial knowledge and skills, with this he was sure he could make a better 'Knives Out' and 'Killing Joke'.
He immediately started redrawing the storyboards of the first few scenes to be shot, ideas swirled inside his head how this scene could be enhanced, how the lighting should be, how the camera angle should be lowered, etc.
He couldn't wait for the shooting to begin.
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The crew was gathered, the day of shooting had arrived, the auxiliary crew members hired by Eva had also been briefed on their roles and dos and don'ts when working in Mark Spencer's set.
Their salaries were also 20% higher than the industry standard, so they had no complaints, and silent started setting up all the equipment to get the first shot of the film. It was around 8 and the sun rays had dimmed a lot due to the clouds, it was the perfect as the weather had been forecasted as rainy.
Mark had already discussed the color grading to be used, and he wanted it to feel cold and uncomfortable. As it was the beginning of the movie and Harlan's death was about to be revealed.
He would try to delay the scenes of Benoit Blanc and Meg to give time to Johnny and Jennifer to build their bodies up to what the script demanded. Johnny even though he didn't like it much had been regularly been hitting the gym, his trainer had informed him of such.
The dialect coach that he had hired for Johnny was found useless, though. As in just 3 days, Johnny had almost perfected that iconic yet slightly exaggerated southern drawl. He had found a new use for him, though, now he gave classes to Sophia to get her Columbian accent in control.
The shot was ready, the dog handlers had also been specified what the dogs would be required to perform. He still made sure to keep it very simple, they run along from the left side to the right of the camera. A special fog machine had also been set up to give the vibe of an English estate.
They had taken some test shots with no dogs, Mark had reviewed it thoroughly. The differences he could feel from embodying Steven was huge. The small imperfections he could pick up, things that would be needed to be changed, how to change them to get the best out of them, etc.
After the changes were made, mostly a small enclosed fixture to concentrate most of the fog around the camera lenses and using darker tone for the lenses. The final test shot came out perfect according to his new standards, it looked like a beautiful painting had come to life.
He gave the go ahead, a studio hand came forward with a slate to begin the first official shot of the film. He sat on the director's chair, looking solemnly as he took his second step on the ladder of Hollywood.
It took them 3 tries to get the perfect shot. He had selected this scene because it was one of the easiest, and he wanted to smoothly start the film and not be stuck with NG's. After dismantling the outside set they moved over to the inside, the next scene which was Marta's and Harlan's flashback scene.
He planned to show Harlan, asking about getting her involuntary tendency to vomit under better control. Salma could be seen practicing the scene with Chris Plummer on the side, trying to nail her expressions and emotions. She had been trained under expressionist school, where actors focus on controlled expressions and not delving too deep in character.
After 15 minutes of prep work and set up, the shot was ready to be taken. He could see that she was nervous shooting for her first film, as she had only appeared on telenovelas before this. He called her over, to give her a pep talk.
"Salma, how are you feeling?" He asked, handing her a cup of tea. "Here, drink this, it will soothe the nerves."
"Really?" she asked back, wondering if it had something special.
"Of course, it's specially imported from India, this specific type is known for their calming and soothing properties." He made up stuff to help her relax.
"How are you feeling now?" He asked her again after she drank half her cup.
"Better, thanks for the tea." she thanked him for his thoughtful gesture.
"It's my job as the director to ensure that everything is working as it should be, that includes the mental state of my actors." Mark said, waving off her gratitude.
"Are you doubting yourself, Salma? If you are, then I can only ask you to please don't. If you don't believe in yourself, then believe in me, in my judgment that you are the Marta Cabrera I was looking for, and I only pick the best. Now, go prove me right." Mark said at the end, it was twisted, but it was his own way of encouraging her.
And it seemed to work as she gave him a smile, she said thanks in return, drank the remaining half of her tea and went back to Mr. Plummer requested a final rehearsal. Mark smiled at her, knowing that she would do well.
He signaled Jon Favreau towards him, asked him if the cameras were set up. This specific scene had the different angles they needed to shoot from, one was stationed adjacent to Marta and would capture Chris and the other would be doing the opposite with capturing Marta.
Jon gave him the okay, he asked if the color grading had been switched to a lighter yellow and said that lighting was a little too powerful. After some quick adjustments, the scene was set, Salma was deep in her thoughts.
Her thoughts were broken by the slate hitting the board and a male voice barking out "action".
Her features had already shifted, now more gentle and demure, she wasn't the aspiring actor Salma Hayek now. No, she was Marta Cabrera. She asked Harlan how he was doing and if they needed to take to see the doctor, her voice now filled with genuine concern for Harlan's health.
Chris, now in character as Harlan, said, "I am fine, rather I wanted to ask you how are you coming along trying to get your problem under control?"
She told him that she had been working on it and now could hold on for at least a minute or two, if she tried her best.
Harlan nodded appreciating her trying to overcome her problems and said well at least it's not as instantaneous as before, that everyone started somewhere.
She nodded in agreement, "yeah, so what did you want to ask me, was it this?" she asked at the end.
"No, it was about this." He said, handing her some photographs of Richard, his daughter's husband, kissing another woman in a car. It was quite obvious from the photos that Richard was having an affair.
He asked Marta what he should do and if she thought it was something he should reveal to his daughter. Marta seemed distraught, as she didn't want to break their family apart. But she knew a relationship built upon lies would only last so long. This internal monologue would be added later in the post.
She said that he should tell his daughter the truth, as that would allow her the freedom to choose for herself whether she wanted to stay with him or not and not be kept in the dark.
"Cut," came the sound, and it was over. She let out a breath, that even she didn't know she was holding in, as she relaxed her body.
"Ms. Salma," a studio hand called out to her. He told that Mark was calling her. She nodded and stood up, heading over to the director's chair. There Mark was sitting reviewing the film they had captured. She didn't know the camera was rolling.
She felt like she should be nervous, but a sense of security and peace enveloped as she came close to Mark. He gave her the feeling that no matter what he would get the best out of her. She trusted him to do good by her, by his movie.
"Salma look at this scene." He called her to see herself on the monitor. This was taken from a secondary video camera that he had prepared to review the scenes on the spot. This type of shooting hadn't really been adopted much due to its costliness, but it saved a lot of time by identifying a good scene.
"It looks good, did I do a good job, Mark?" She asked with a nervous smile.
Mark smiled back and said, "You did an excellent job. So much that I don't even feel like we need to shoot that scene again."
Salma smiled back at him, and he told her to rest, as the next scene didn't really need her. It was the one where Fran the maid would discover Harlan's body. Mark was trying to get all of Harlan's scenes done as soon as possible, due to him having signed up for another movie.
He still had at least a month to get Harlan's scenes over with, so there was no hurry. But he didn't like to waste time, as 'time was money,' after all. That "maid scene" would also be the last official scene to be shot today, as the rest of the day would be spent on rehearsals.
The rehearsal was for a major scene, it was the flashback scene of Harlan's birthday. It was set to be shot after two days. It was a grand thing with a lot of moving set pieces that he already dissected into manageable sections.
His [Steven Spielberg Template] really came in clutch, the way he calmed Salma and controlled the set by delegating tasks through Jon and Todd was so smooth that he could see the look of amazement in his friend's eyes.
He knew he might have to answer some questions later, but he was a master at misdirection and making shit up on the spot, so he wasn't really worried.
The scene of Fran discovering Harlan's dead body was a bit more complicated as the actor had to pretend to fumble with the prop cutlery yet not drop it actually at the end. It was a parody in the original movie towards the trope of someone screaming and dropping whatever they're holding after seeing a dead body.
Thankfully the prop cutlery were more sturdy, as the actress playing Fran actually dropped them multiple times, and it took over two hours just to get a shot that his new standards would be satisfied with.
He knew that the original Knives Out hadn't really been that big of a success at the Oscars, but his new and improved version, with the "forced" backing from Universal and the decades worth of experience and skills derived from the template, should give him enough of an edge to win multiple nominations and maybe even win a few technical awards.
The rehearsals were going on, and he had already left for his office, before leaving he had met up with River, given a small yet powerful speech to all the actors, extras and crew members thanking them for their hard work for the day and with the rehearsals ahead.
The rehearsals would be overseen by Jon and Todd. They were his eyes and ears, especially when he was not on set. They were picking up things pretty fast, Jon was wonderful at communicating with the crew and setting up the set exactly how he asked him to.
Whereas Todd was a little rough around the edges and had a little temper problem, but Mark had decided to curb that problem at the bud and recommended Todd to come see him after the day was over, reassuring that it wasn't anything bad.
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Mark went back to the Eidolon HQ, where they were setting up a small diner where ransom would take Marta after "saving" her from his family. He had tried to find a diner that was in a quaint little spot, but doing so in LA proved quite difficult.
He decided to just build a small section of the booth where Marta and ransom would be sitting together and build a fake front that would look like an actual diner. After asking how long it would take, he got a deadline of 12 days.
The number of workers were small, so the time needed to set up was high, but their quality was impeccable and quality was what Mark was aiming for when looking to hire his employees.
After taking care of that, he left for his office. There he thought about all the scenes that need to be shot for the movie, the best order to shoot them in and the time required to finish the shooting provided nothing went sideways and even then he gave himself 10 days to fix any unforeseen problems that may arise.
According to his calculations, it would take him a little less than 3 months to finish the shoot. Then he would be left around 45 days for the post-production work of the movie. Normally that would be cutting it close, almost next to impossible.
But with him already having seen the movie and being empowered by the [Steven Spielberg Template] he could say it would be super easy, barely even an inconvenience. He chuckled at his joke, ah he loved YouTube, he really liked the content creators on that platform.
He would sure to get as big of a stake as he could in it and help it grow by using it to share his songs and such.
It would be around the last week of September after the post-production was over, that would give him around 45 days to 2 months to promote his movie.
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{Author's Note: So this was definitely a hard chapter to write. I had to research a lot about how films used to be shot in the 1990s and how they didn't really have a digital monitor to check how the scene came out, at least not in the small budget movies. But Mark is going all out to create the best version of Knives Out he can.
I tried to show a small scene that has been changed compared to the original. It was a small complaint of mine from the original movie, because Marta held in her urge to vomit for at least like a minute at the last scene. Whereas before that it had always been an instant reaction to lies, so here I have changed that. Nothing too big, just trying to close some plot holes without ruining the essence of the movie.
Once again, thanks for reading my work. I am entirely motivated by interaction, suggestions and feedback. So please leave a comment or review and I will probably write faster.
If you like my work please throw a power stone my way so my book can climb the rankings. Slurp some nice ramen and I hope you all have a beautiful day.
Update schedule for this book: 1 chapter every 2 days.}
