Mike Marino in His Own Words
Re: Questions About Your Movie
By: Michael J. Marino
"I actually was born in New York, but my dad was transferred for
work when I was 5. I grew up in Phoenix, MD, which is about 10 minutes
outside of Hunt Valley in Baltimore County. My family and I used to do
big family trips to Bethany Beach and Ocean City even before I moved to
Maryland, however we didn't get a house of our own until I was about 11.
That same year was when I saw Scream for the first time. At that age I was absolutely terrified of horror films, yet somehow fell in love with the movie. First of all, the beginning 15 minutes are an absolutely perfect short film. Second, the film taught me about genre conventions and how to play with them. Scream was not only a horror movie, but it was a horror movie making fun of horror movies while also trying to be one! The writer Kevin Williamson knew exactly what was expected of his film by an audience, so he found ways to both mock the genre and twist it unexpectedly. To me as a kid, it was genius. In a lot of ways I have tried to apply the same methodology to Titans of Newark. People watching the film can probably predict much of the storyline based on the genre, but the fun is seeing how we try to exploit those expectations or unexpectedly twist them. There are dozens of other movies (such as Clash of the Titans) that have inspired me, but I don't want to rant for hours.
That same year was when I saw Scream for the first time. At that age I was absolutely terrified of horror films, yet somehow fell in love with the movie. First of all, the beginning 15 minutes are an absolutely perfect short film. Second, the film taught me about genre conventions and how to play with them. Scream was not only a horror movie, but it was a horror movie making fun of horror movies while also trying to be one! The writer Kevin Williamson knew exactly what was expected of his film by an audience, so he found ways to both mock the genre and twist it unexpectedly. To me as a kid, it was genius. In a lot of ways I have tried to apply the same methodology to Titans of Newark. People watching the film can probably predict much of the storyline based on the genre, but the fun is seeing how we try to exploit those expectations or unexpectedly twist them. There are dozens of other movies (such as Clash of the Titans) that have inspired me, but I don't want to rant for hours.
In 2008, I received an undergraduate degree at Temple
University in Philadelphia for Film and Media Arts. While there, I shot a
short children's film that went on to a few of my first film festivals.
After that, I spent a year working on some of the various Hollywood
films that came to town, including Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and Law Abiding Citizen. However after awhile, I realized that I still had a lot to learn about directing and didn't want to give up on my ambitions as a filmmaker.
In 2009, I started to attend Dodge College of Film and Media Arts,
which was a graduate conservatory in Orange, California where I solely
studied directing. The experience was overall amazing. We got to shoot a
variety of short films, study the nature of directing actors under
industry veterans Martha Coolidge (Real Genius) and John Badham (Saturday Night Fever), and make use of resources ranging from sound stages, motion capture rooms, Foley stages, etc. I graduated in 2012 with Titans of Newark to show for it.
 |
| Duke Valenti as Zeus in scene from "Titans of Newark" |
Though Titans Of Newark was not my first short film endeavor, it is the one I am most proud of. The film was produced as a graduate thesis while I was studying directing at Chapman University in Los Angeles. I got to work with some of the most talented and supportive people I've ever met. Despite some colleagues believing we had unreal expectations shooting a fantasy epic, both the crew and I aspired to reach for the stars. Only together were we able to create a Mt. Olympus set on a sound stage, experiment with both practical and digital effects, find an amazing cast led by TV-regular Joel Brooks, etc. We even spent two days filming on the 'New York Street' at CBS normally used for their CSI shows! The cast and crew showed so much ambition in making this film, which is the true reason it turned out well. Since completion, the movie has screened at 19 film festivals, won 5 awards including Best Humor Film at this year's Comic-Con International Film Festival in San Diego, and was nominated for Best Casting in a Short Film by the Casting Society of America against the film's of Bryce Dallas Howard and Olivia Wilde. It has been a really exciting year!
 |
| Joel Brooks as Levi Katz in "Titans of Newark" |
Titans was written in 4 months back in May 2011,
shot in October for 9 days, and post-production was completed in March.
Overall, it was about an 11 month process to make the film. To help us
cast the film, we worked with a wonderful casting director named Pamela
Guest. She reached out to many of the actors, while others she had
previous working relationships. Joel Brooks was a perfect embodiment of [the character of]
Levi and he was kind enough to reach out to his good friend DeeDee
Rescher as a recommendation for [the character of] Marnie. Previously, they had acted
together as husband and wife in a John Ritter film called Skin Deep. Everybody
who read the script was incredibly excited by both our level of
ambition and the lengths we were willing to go for strong production
value. As I said, we built all of our "heaven" sets on a stage and shot
in locations ranging from CBS to an old abandoned hospital called Linda
Vista.
Maintaining our strive for production value was also the most challenging aspect of production. Because many of us had never handled special FX, most of it was experimentation and very time consuming. Additionally, the locations were all fantastic, but very spread apart in terms of distance. Most film sets are made easier by being able to 'soft wrap,' or leave equipment out at the end of a shoot day to help with making a simple setup the next day. However, every day was a new ambitious location, which meant we had to spend a chunk of every day's schedule unloading and packing. Yet, in many ways, our biggest challenge was also our biggest success. The movie is often complimented for its ambition and the various elements we were able to pull off!
Maintaining our strive for production value was also the most challenging aspect of production. Because many of us had never handled special FX, most of it was experimentation and very time consuming. Additionally, the locations were all fantastic, but very spread apart in terms of distance. Most film sets are made easier by being able to 'soft wrap,' or leave equipment out at the end of a shoot day to help with making a simple setup the next day. However, every day was a new ambitious location, which meant we had to spend a chunk of every day's schedule unloading and packing. Yet, in many ways, our biggest challenge was also our biggest success. The movie is often complimented for its ambition and the various elements we were able to pull off!
The Rehoboth Film Festival has always been a lifelong
dream of mine to be a part of. While I was growing up, I had
consistently followed the festival's entries and studied the film
program. Sadly I've only been able to attend the festival once for a
short film program 3 or 4 years ago. Every year, the festival has had
such an unbelievably impressive lineup and it is getting better each
year! Many of the films at this year's showcase are some of the same
that I saw at Sundance and Cannes! It is amazing.
To learn more about Mike Marino and his movies, go to:
http://www.michaeljmarino.com/
https://twitter.com/MarinoOfTheYear
https://www.facebook.com/TitansOfNewark
Comments
Post a Comment