Caught in a Trap

There are certain parts of a film that, no matter how much you love the rest of the movie, will always stand out. These can be anything from a simple line to an entire sequence to even just one single shot, but as an audience member you'll always find yourself remembering something. Unless the film is terrible, in which case you won't remember anything and you'll be all the better for it.

The same is true as a writer. And it's bizarrely true of your own work. As I writer I have found myself more excited by certain scenes or lines or whatnot that appear in my own scripts than I have for others. I try to make sure everything is something I'm excited about, but there will always be that moment that creeps out from all the others and announces itself as your favorite.

When we began shooting Follow The Crows I knew which part was my favorite. I was excited to get to it, and I still am. But during the rehearsal stages for this last block of shooting I've found myself face to face with a pleasant surprise. One of the sequences I had given a little less thought to, more of a throwaway moment than a favorite plot point, has fast become on of my top parts of the film. And it's all down to watching the actors work.

We have two very talented actors working on this part of the movie, and it's to their credit that the entire sequence works as well as it does. They made suggestions on their characters that, individually, felt as though they were cartoonish nonsense, so far removed from what it was that we were looking for, after all, Follow The Crows is supposed to be a bleak, uncompromising look at a society in disarray, a world stripped of rules and order, but then, as I watched the scene unfold in the hands of these two very talented actors I realized what it was that they were doing.

They weren't going against the feel and themes of the film at all, in fact they'd created something special, something that worked together in a way that I couldn't even fathom when I was told about them individually. They created two of the best characters to join the cast, two characters so enjoyable that it was a shame to leave them behind once their sequence came to an end.

What the future holds for these two characters is up for debate (I see a web-series in there somewhere) but for now it's safe to say that Matthew Mordak and Craig Fox managed to take two twisted but thankless roles and turn them into something all their own.