Planing the rest of the year. Colorado in June. Paraguay in July/August, New York in September. We just bought another camera (Sony) and the slate arrived yesterday.

I emailed to a friend in Paraguay. She found a  wild life preserve that might come in really handy when we are on location there.


My move is coming to an end. I tossed many things away, found more pictures for locations, put many things away in boxes. It is time for a fresh reading of EL RIO DE LAS VIDAS.  But now, I am having a delicious dinner with my friend Gustav Alsina in his house in Cordova, NM., an old remodeled church --the perfect place to live for a set designer.

So how bad can things be? They just look that way in the moment. All happens for a reason. On the other side, things look bright. I am back to Paragweiss and Wisdom Tribe Films. This feels right. I wish Marie all the luck and fortune with the restaurant. I believe it is going to be a success. We gave it a beautiful facelift. I am proud of that. A good amount of experience in a very short time.

Yesterday was Maddalena's birthday. April 29. I asked Monta to visit her and take her a flower. 

I guess, having a restaurant with friends is a good way to test friendship. The universe has unusual ways of sending messages. After a few sad episodes, where the words money and fear play stellar roles, I will be bought out of 317 Aztec. That is not a place for me. And I believe I am being saved from something. It is time to move on.


On the good side of life, I might be able to donate 20 or 30 laptops to two organizations in Paraguay that work with children. One of them helps children with HIV/AIDS; the other with homeless children. There are bigger things than the "kitchen confidential" side of life. Human dignity and courage.

Having a Coffee house or a restaurant looks more glamorous that what it really is. We are there every day all day. It is time to re-focus the mind while in the midst of all these tasks so I can look forward to Paraguay in July (most probably). In the meantime, 317 Aztec will be a test to our strength, egos, fears, and ultimately our friendship. 
On BETWEEN LIFETIMES/EL RIO DE LAS VIDAS, my brother  Julio found some interesting locations. This in Guairá by Colonia Independencia.

Click once on the image to enlarge

317 Aztec will open on 3/17. Not a bad thing to start in the year 2012. The place looks radiant.

click once on the picture

Back to 34th, a few more errands, one more meeting and dinner.  Tomorrow it's back to the land of enchantment.

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Carrie and I went to West Virginia to meet with some business friends. Beautiful Land. We passed by Harper's Ferry, where the Potomack and the Saskuahana meet. This is the place.

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On the way back to New York we stopped at Gettysburg. It is strange to walk peacefully right where people were shooting at each other and knifing each other to pieces.

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We are back in New York just in time for the last third of the Academy awards. Just like Woody Allen, we decided to watch it from home. :)

After a little hiatus from EL RIO ENTRE VIDAS, we reappear. I am busy with Marie and Alisa. We are taking over a coffee house in downtown Santa Fe. We have been cleaning it, fixing it , painting it, and we should open around March 6th with one of the best coffees in town and wifi to go with it.

But mostly cleaning for now. The good pictures will surface in one or two weeks.

Interiew with Bill Georgenas, a cross between Hieronimus Bosh and Jackson Pollock. Click on image.

Now, back in New York for a few days. Carrie and I are getting a second Cannon 5D on our preparation for Paraguay. So we are of to downtown Manhattan to B&H and we are coming out with a camera, adapters, and a few LED lights. Exciting.

Could not help it. Had to go to the Metropolitan Museum.

In the mezzanine of the Met listening to a classical string quartet with Carrie.

The strip-board for the breakdown is finished. I took the precaution of making it as well on a physical board. I don't want to find myself somewhere in the middle of nowhere and discover that the laptop decides to quit. I had a dream about that.
In the meantime, I will work on tension between two of the characters. We have to make a short with the new camera before we go to Paraguay. Let's make all of our mistakes here, not in the jungle. We have the right sound gear for the Cannon 5D.  After we have our production gear in place, we will work on our post-production landscape. 
This is the day I should have been on a plane to Paraguay, and solve every single issue in two weeks, including and especially actors and locations. Instead, we can breath a little while we strengthen ourselves. 

A good friend of my, and father of one of my dearest friends, renown artist Hermann Guggiari, died in Paraguay. He was a living legend there. Cheers Hermann. Sprinkle some of your talent this way.

We purchased our first Cannon 5D Mark II. We are now on the process of aligning our hardware to it. We have zillions of Nikon prime lenses. Hopefully we can use them with an adapter.  The auto focus worries me a bit, since I would like to do most of EL RIO ENTRE VIDAS on a moving camera. Let's see how much movement the Cannon can handle. One bridge at the time. In the meantime, with so much technology, I try not to feel like:

They are really smart

First Snow at Crystal Mesa.

Trooper and Duke (click on the picture)

And with it comes the silence. A good time for introspection.

White Christmas is in the air.  (click on the picture)

All this after a good week of meetings and setting goals for 2012 and 2013.

At Jinja with Carrie, Lauri and Mary, our lovely hostess and friend. 

What a week!! Paraguay is coming together slower than I expected. In the meantime, Marie and Alisa (Davis) found this restaurant for sale in downtown Santa Fe. It is hard to resist the lure of getting one's own restaurant and turn it around. However, ... easy,and easy with Paraguay as well. Location and casting logistics will take their own time. To start right away could mean throwing money down the drain.  


So, next in schedule is a preliminary trip to Paraguay for those two things: locations and casting. This will be around March or April. I am sure all sorts of logistics will pop out of their box once I am there, like wardrobe/costumes, catering, etc. So one must breathe and count to ten grasshopper. All in it's good time -restaurant included if fate should dictate so.


In the meantime, I had fun with Lucas before yesterday. He played a song in his guitar, which he received as a present from Mary (Kiedis) and decided to learn it two weeks ago. Lucas already plays the piano. 

click to watch

I just finished a short on Edgar Mitchell for our Documentary on INVISIBLE HEROES. Dr. Mitchell is one of the 12 human beings who was lucky enough to walk on the moon. What a special human being!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ANgKY8yGsQ

And last but not least, since I speak about the moon, I have been up since 4:30am watching the full moon eclipse as it slowly hid itself on it's back, partially covered by the earth's shadow, right behind the hill in "my backyard." How lucky can one be?

The partially covered moon went down right behind that hill, as the sun was rising.

Now, back to wardrobe detail:

One of the lifetimes

Had a quiet Thanksgiving.  Working on re-writes and getting a Cannon 5D setup. Anne Foster recommended that I watch ORLANDO, with Tilda Swinton, since she lives several lifetimes in the story. So we watched it over a delicious pizza, salad and ice cream for dinner. Big pageantry, an incredibly actress, interesting subject, and yet, a bit short of hitting the right spot. In 1992, it must have been quite a splash with it's premise. Tilda Swinton would be perfect to play Boudica in our script (with Marta Townsend) UPRISING.

The end of 2008 for Lucas and I.

This afternoon, we are making a small video to help Walt promote his on-the-road show.

Virginia's house in EL RIO ENTRE VIDAS

Locations are beginning to appear. This is a waterfall close to a similar location I want. This one would be my second choice. The one I want is from what I remember further in the forest. But that was 20 years ago. The forest could be no more... as when I finally drove under the big redwood in California with an opening for cars. On the other side was a Pepsi machine.

Those who know it far back call it Salto Boening. Here, Raúl holds Cristobal above the water and faces his actions years back on the bridge over the Paraná river.

Marie Bartels’ Chappel. She is Marie’s mom. Werener, Marie’s dad comes every morning here to fix it, clean it and make sure the flowers and greens are doing well. He cherishes the memory of his wife.

A peacful place at Crystal Mesa

Werner. He can be very elegant when he wants, but  here he looks like he escaped a novel by Victor Hugo.

Werner would have played a Jew in BETWEEN LIFETIMES. He was a soldier in WWII in the marshes near Stalingrad. 

I’d  better learn to cook more. This single man-eats-canned food and microwaved stuffed, has to  improve. 

Marie making sure I put the potatoes in my potato soup.

In the meantime, BETWEEN LIFETIMES has a name in Spanish: EL RIO ENTRE VIDAS. While I work on the schedule, casting and locations, I made a short video for Kickstarter - a simple talk-to-the-camera-type video. The link is on the top bar.

Iris Apfel

Before yesterday, I met with Orren. He asked me about the possibility of going to New York to interview his dear friend Iris Apfel who is a fashion Icon. It would mean changes in schedule for BETWEEN LIFETIMES/EL RIO ENTRE VIDAS, since this is sort of an emergency. Iris hurt herself, and everyone wants a piece of her from filmmakers to photographers to magazines etc. We want to be with the person. She is 92 and has had a wonderful life full of experiences in the fashion/decor world. Decorating the White House through nine administrations since Harry Truman is just one of the things she accomplished.

Iris

Budgeting

Scheduling was not a breeze. Budgeting is even harder, not so much in budgeting but in understanding Gorilla Software and using all the cross referencing possibilities at hand. There are so many wrong turns that I wonder weather this project  -since it's a small one- would be better left in Excell.

Hiking with Mary, Molly and Sawyer for a change of pace.

Sheduling, budgeting etc

Yes!!. Finished scheduling… at least the first part. So we are on to budgeting, locations and actors. I found an actress who could play Maria. She is incredibly natural. Her first film as an amateur just won Camera d’Or in Cannes 2011, in an Argentinian Film called LAS ACACIAS. This is a trailer for a short/PSA she is working on these days. LA PARTIDA:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2H-57SE4OM

This is a place where Maria would live. My father took me up that  peak once in a hunting expedition that took 3 days and 20 miles.

Predators

Last month, a bobcat jumped the fence and took two geese and one duck. We were hoping to catch it, like the one we caught last year. But alas, all we trapped was a little skunk. Peppi Lapiu. I let it go on peril of being sprayed.  He was probably too scared to do anything. But there he goes free.

The bobcat was taken to a faraway place and released; the skunk ran under the pig's house. They are probably buddies.

Ok, enough blogging for today. That'll teach me to keep up. Let's go back to... budget. Any bored oil heirs out there?