It’s yet another one of those quirky little odd-ball films that speaks to me on so many levels, simular in fashion to Buffalo’66. And just like Buffalo’66, I stumbled across this film, years ago, on cable one late night and was instantly sucked into its crazy world. AND JUST LIKE BUFFALO’66, this film made with want to make films.

The Rules of Attraction is a story about some wacky college students caught up in a unsual love triangle, that really isn’t a love triangle because there is a fourth person that none of the other characters are aware of.

I thought that alone was pretty cool, but what resonated with me the most is the theme of rejection all throughout the film. Every character in the film, at least the main characters, including the “invisible one”, gets rejected by the person they’re in “love” with.

Nobody wins.

How much like real life is that?

My favorite scenes/sequences in this film deals with the pitifully sad suicide and aftermath of one of the characters. I totally understood the intense emotion and sense of self-worthlessness behind it. That character ultimately became favorite of the cast though she was barely in the film, lol. I dug her.

Yeah, I’m dark like that.

Outside of the main characters there are a bunch of morally corrupt supporting characters that help depict wild college life. From an off campus drug dealer praying on rich college kids, to a college professor who abuses his power with his female students.

I can’t say it enough. What a great depiction of life this is, right? lol.

All of the characters are looking for something, a connection to another person. A real connection. They think it’s “love”, but is it really?

I often wondered what would each character do with their love interest if they finally got their wish to be with them.

Would it be everything they thought it would be? Would the novelty of it all wear off shortly there after spurring them to look for another connection with someone else?

The film’s soundtrack brought a lot of ambiance and added depth to the viewing experience, not to mention Avary’s odd directing elements: like letting a scene play out, then rewinding the scene and then showing it from another characters prospective.

The film is also host to some great lines like, “I only slept with her because I’m in love with you!”.

You gotta see it!

NO! Really, you do!

Bout to take all my pills

Wish this pain would chill

Locked in my room alone

Better turn off my phone

They won’t understand

And I don’t give a damn

I can’t live without you

What’ve I got to lose?

 =x= 

I think I’m going crazy, baby

Don’t know what else to do

Cause you’re not here

I coming to see you, baby

Hope my ride is smooth 

I’m almost there 

=x=

 They take me to see a doctor

What’s he supposed to do?

He ain’t go nothing for me, baby

Cause he is not you

They watch me everyday

Want to put me in restraints

So I don’t hurt myself

If only they knew how that felt

 =x=

I think I’m going crazy, baby

Don’t know what else to do

Cause you’re not here

I coming to see you, baby

Hope my ride is smooth

I’m almost there

=x=

 I don’t want to live this way

If it means living without you

They tell me what to say

Try to tell me what to do

I don’t really want to hurt them, baby

But, this is what I gotta do

Gotta do things my own way

And my own way leads to you

 =x=

I think I’m going crazy, baby

Don’t know what else  to do

Cause you’re not here

I coming to see you, baby

Hope my ride is smooth

I’m almost there

I’m a gamer. Have been since the days of Atari. I’ve played and finished hundreds of games. Some good, some bad. Do I wish some of the endings were different, or better? Yes, but I accept the crappy ending because that’s how the story ends. it is what it is.

From my point of view, I don’t see what the big deal is about Mass Effect 3′s ending is. Granted, I myself have not finished MA3 or ME2 or ME1 for that Matter, so I may not be as attached to the game’s storyline as many other gamers out there, but I don’t understand the need to have an ending officially changed to make people “happy”.

In that case, why not change the ending of every story that “we” think is “bad” or “disappointing”. I’ve watched plenty of movies that have crappy endings in my opinion, but I accept the crappy endings for what they are. It’s not my story. I didn’t write it. So, I accept it.

Fans to some extent may be the life blood of a product, but at a certain point enough is enough. In that case, Let’s change the ending to Romeo and Juliet, or the endings to all the other stories “we” don’t like. Stories are art. And art is subjective. I’m sure there are some gamers out there who think Mass Effect 3′s ending was fine. What guarantees that the “new” ending will be any better? And how much impact will it really have when everyone will know that it is not the original ending?

I wonder, How much power should/can fans have on a product/Art?

As a writer, I have stories that I want to tell, and sure, through the development and writing process things change throughout the story. But I think that once something, like a story at least, is officially put out, it should be left alone. Going back in, after the fact, and changing things, would cheapen it for me. It makes it all REALLY trivial. If we can go back in and change the ending of all things, then why not go back and change everything else?

TITLE: I’m Sorry!

THEME: A broken relationship. A phone call to make things right, but the caller is kind of…deranged, obsessed, possessive. Can you say STALKER?

SCENE: An abusive guy in a phone booth, in the pouring rain, calling his “ex”-girlfriend to once again say he’s sorry, but she has changed her phone number and he’s not too happy about it.

Related articles

• SCRIBEREGLYPH and The AUDIOPUZZLE (scribereglyph.com)
• Another Piece of The AUDIOPUZZLE (scribereglyph.com)

In an earlier post, I wrote about my Go To Programs, Final Draft, Scrivener, and Personal Brain. I’ve added another tool to the list and it’s:

EVERNOTE

I first came across Evernote back in 2009, but didn’t really use it until the end of last year. Now, I can’t stop using it.

What is Evernote?

It can be almost anything you want it to be. Basically it’s a note taking application, but not only can you store text, you can also store images, audio, and other types of files within it.

What makes it so great?

The fact that with a desktop app, web app, and a smart phone app I can edit, upload, and access all my stored information pretty much from anywhere at anytime; and it all stays synced between applications. So, If I’m out and about and make a note on my phone app, when I get back home and crack open my Mac, the note is already there or, if I go to someone’s house and want to show them the note and they don’t have Evernote installed on their computer, as long as they have an internet connection, I can log on to the Evernote web app to show them.

For me, that means I don’t have to lug my Mac around everywhere I go, or keep track of a millions flash drives.

How do I use Evernote?

I use Evernote both for work and personal life, but mainly for my writing. Evernote has become my new tool for all development work for my projects. Because I can access it anywhere at anytime, EVERYTHING starts in Evernote. Once again, I can be anywhere, and as long as I have my phone, or a computer with internet connection, I can work any of my projects.

I’ve been using Evernote to work on my latest screenplay: Sylvia. I’ve used it to develop the characters, the Acts, the Sequences, and the Scene Map. With all this information in Evernote, I can work on it anywhere, anytime, and don’t have to worry about transferring it all back to my main computer because once I open the Evernote Desktop app on my Main Computer, guess what? It’s already there.

So, using Evernote allows me to travel light, so to speak.

I’m adapting my Screenplay “Things People Do” into a web series and I’ve written the Season Summaries and Episode Summaries in Evernote. After chopping my script up into episodes with Scrivener and polishing those episodes in Final Draft, I can save the Final draft files to notes in Evernote, along with ready to read PDF’s of the script to access at, you guessed it, anytime anywhere.

Another great feature of Evernote is it’s sharing ability. You can share notes, or entire notebooks with anyone. You can email notes from your account, and send emails to you Evernote account.

It’s another great application with nearly endless possibilities and applications.

I recommend Evernote to Everyone!

The best thing about it is that it’s free. So go on over to the Evernote website and give it a try. What do you have to lose? Nothing. What do you have to gain? Everything!

TITLE: I Don’t Understand

THEME: Breaking Up/Divorcing

SCENE: A husband pleading with his wife to stay in their marriage. Emotionally lost, he doesn’t understand how everything went wrong.

Of course, let me know what you think.

So, I figured, why not share with you all these sounds I’ve grown to adore. Who knows, maybe some of my favorite songs are your favorites too, or maybe you’ll hear something you’ve never heard before that will become one of you new favorites.

Every Friday, for the next couple weeks, who knows how long it’ll go, but I will post some my favorite songs from back in the day, when I used to build forts and battlefields for my toys out of my mother’s album covers, and the very 12′inch and 45 records themselves.

Today, I’ll share with you two of songs from my youth by a band/group from the 60′s called The Association.

I hope you enjoy them as much I did as a child and still do as an adult.

“Along Comes Mary”

“Cherish”

Along with fiddling around with “Pretty”, my Acoustic Guitar, I’ve been learning Garage Band on my Mac  and I’ve been working on a little music project called “AUDIOPUZZLE” named for how I’m piecing things together. I’m not sure exactly what you’d categorize the songs based off their sound alone. I figured I’d share a few tracks that I’ve “composed” while learning to use  music program.

The track below is the most recent one and my favorite so far. It’s called “I Remember You”. Basic theme is a love lost that, no matter how hard you try, your heart won’t let you forget them.

I really like the main piano that starts the track and flows throughout the entire song.

Tell me what you think of it.

Last year, I set out to finish a screenplay and submit it into competitions, which I’ve done with Things People Do. Right now, the script is making it rounds through Scriptapalooza, Cinestory, and Script Pipeline.

So, Mission Complete!

Whether it will win, I can only hope.

This year, I have a few more goals to achieve.

Writing wise, I want to finish two screenplays this year. One will be Sylvia, a Sci-fi/Psychological Thriller, and I would like the second to be a Horror. I say I would like it to be a horror because I don’t want to force it. I don’t want to write anything about a group of friends, or a family, who go out to a remote place for no good reason just to be killed off one by one by one. If I can’t think of a great concept that’s “different”, at least to me, I’ll go for another genre, maybe fantasy, or even comedy, or maybe another drama. I have couple ideas rolling around that I can jump on.

Ultimately, with Things People Do completed, I want to have three finished and polished screenplays in my screenwriting portfolio to shop around, each in a different genre to show versatility in my writing. Once I get that done, I’ll sit down and get back to one of the two fantasy novels I started before switched to Screenwriting.

I’m also working on a Sci-Fi Webcomic with one of my childhood best friends. I’m tweaking the story while he solidifies the art style and direction. The website is mapped out on paper and will hopefully be up and running in the near future so you all can get a glimpse of the psycho characters and the dark world they live in. As well as a stand alone comic, it’ll be a spring-board to introduce a slew of other characters and stories we’ve created throughout the years that we’d like to share with the world.

Outside of my writing goals, personally I have a few things I want to achieve this year.

1. Learn how to shoot.

2. Learn the guitar.

I like guns even though I’ve never really been around them. Rifles are my thing. Particularly “sniper rifles“. Some acquaintances of mine are hunters, and are into guns as somewhat of hobby and they have spurred my interests in that world. So now, I want to learn more about guns, expand my knowledge of them, how to shoot them, how to take care of them, how to respect them. Besides, I think first hand knowledge and use of a gun/weapon can definitely add to my writing. There’s nothing like writing from experience.

I’ve always wanted to learn to play an instrument since I was a child, but the environment I grew up in didn’t foster such things. My wife bought me an Acoustic guitar for Christmas which I’ve since dubbed “Pretty” for the sounds she makes. I haven’t taken any classes yet, so I’ve been messing around with her on my own. I’ve bought a bunch of different picks to sample the different sounds they produce. I didn’t know that was even an element of consideration until now. I’m able to pluck out some pretty cool melodies on my own, which I’ll share with you all once soon. The only thing kicking my butt right now are chords and only because it feels like you have to be plastic man to get down some of the finger placements, lol. I do have some pretty good callouses on my Fret fingers though, and I wear them like a badge of honor, lol.

Pretty: For the sound she makes.

So, that’s what I’ve been up to and what I will be up to.

Till next time.

What goal did you achieve last year, and what goal are you on your way to achieving this year?