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So A MAGA Bro May Have Sabotaged A Friend of Mine's Film...


skillzdadirecta

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Or at least attempted to. So a good friend of mine and her husband shot a short film this summer as a first step to making it a full on feature. They got a decent chunk of financing since it is a period piece, and they had a budget of about 60 to 70K. They were looking to work with well known actors in the leading roles and were TRYING to get Jessie Plemons but he was unavailable so they went with an unknown I believe. My friend was looking for professional people to work on her short and they were paying industry standard rates for most of the positions. I even referred a few folks to her that had worked on bigger projects... I couldn't work with her myself because I was booked most of the summer and was unavailable.

 

So anyway, they shoot the film and I ask her how it went and she tells me that they had a couple of nightmare crew members who were OPENLY hostile and disrespectful to her and her husband. See, my friend is Lebanese American and she was the writer and producer of the film and her husband is Iranian who has only been in the States for a couple of years. They are two of the sweetest people I know and are generally good people. She told me that one of the crew, the sound guy, was particularly hostile and disrespectful to her and her husband as well as other crew members... particularly the ones of color. This guy was so hostile that she suspected racism was part of his hostility but of course she had no proof. Well they shoot the film and wrap and when she and her husband are reviewing the footage weeks later, they are horrified to find that the sound is HORRENDOUS. It is so bad that she is certain that it was a deliberate act, this sound guy was a professional and had worked on other larger projects and had a decent resume and recommendations. That's why she hired him in the first place... but yeah she says the sound is AWFUL and they are looking for a good audio guy to hopefully clean it up and fix it in post. I recommended a pretty good audio engineer I've worked with on a couple of projects so hopefully he can fix it, but sound is pretty tough to fix after the fact. Usually, you can't make bad sound good... only slightly less bad and it can RUIN a film.

 

On top of all this, she found out after the fact from other crew members that the sound guy was DEFINITELY racist... was a hardcore Trump supporter who wore MAGA paraphernalia behind their backs or under his clothes and threatened to beat up a Black Assistant Camera person and WOULD NOT speak directly to him when they were shooting. I asked her this guy's name and I was gonna put the word out about him but she asked me not to. She feels like he's unhinged and a potential physical  threat and just wants to work on getting her film finished. I told her I would do everything I could to help but damn this is beyond fucked up if he deliberately tried to tank their project. We live in crazy fucking times.

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CHUD is a slur now? If it is I'll edit the topic...

 

EDIT: I changed it to be on the safe side... 

 

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Chud

 

Quote

It means Canibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller and originates from the 1984 film C.H.U.D. But is now used to describe ugly stupid people. Most notably in the Kevin Smith film Clerks 2(2006). The phrase is mostly used in America but is now starting to become popular in the UK.

Jamie: Why don't girls like me? 
Scott: Because you're a fucking chud! 

 

:lol: This is how me and my friends always used it.

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16 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

On top of all this, she found out after the fact from other crew members that the sound guy was DEFINITELY racist... was a hardcore Trump supporter who wore MAGA paraphernalia behind their backs or under his clothes and threatened to beat up a Black Assistant Camera person and WOULD NOT speak directly to him when they were shooting. I asked her this guy's name and I was gonna put the word out about him but she asked me not to. She feels like he's unhinged and a potential physical  threat and just wants to work on getting her film finished. I told her I would do everything I could to help but damn this is beyond fucked up if he deliberately tried to tank their project. We live in crazy fucking times.

I honestly believe that you should put the word out as discretely as possible through the film community, especially among minority members of it.

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Just now, SFLUFAN said:

I honestly believe that you should put the word should be put out as discretely as possible through the film community, especially among minority members of it.

 

Oh believe me I plan too... but I was initially gonna put the dude on blast on social media publicly and on a bunch of film boards and groups I belong to. 

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That really sucks for her. Obviously the financial impact hurts, but the artistic outpouring that goes into making a film (feature or short) from all involved can’t be replaced.

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Can you make a clear comparison as 'evidence' so to speak? As in, a sound file comparing sound on his previous work versus this one and so forth? I don't know shit about the film industry, but it seems like it'd be nice backup if you're going to call him out. 

 

The guy sounds like a total twat, that's for sure. Even if you want to believe all that, keep it out of your workplace and just don't work on that project. 

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3 minutes ago, Bloodporne said:

Can you make a clear comparison as 'evidence' so to speak? As in, a sound file comparing sound on his previous work versus this one and so forth? I don't know shit about the film industry, but it seems like it'd be nice backup if you're going to call him out. 

 

The guy sounds like a total twat, that's for sure. Even if you want to believe all that, keep it out of your workplace and just don't work on that project. 

 

I haven't heard the sound myself, but a guy who works professionally as a sound person wouldn't give you bad raw sound. From what she's told me it's VERY bad. Like worse than a student who has never done sound before. She heard his previous work or else she wouldn't have hired him so she's knew what he was capable of. Again, I haven't heard the sound so I don't know how bad it is. Shortly before I posted this I reached out to her because I'm curious to see if it is salvageable or not. 

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1 minute ago, skillzdadirecta said:

 

I haven't heard the sound myself, but a guy who works professionally as a sound person wouldn't give you bad raw sound. From what she's told me it's VERY bad. Like worse than a student who has never done sound before. She heard his previous work or else she wouldn't have hired him so she's knew what he was capable of. Again, I haven't heard the sound so I don't know how bad it is. Shortly before I posted this I reached out to her because I'm curious to see if it is salvageable or not. 

I meant it as in I wonder if you can splice his previous, and most likely clearly higher quality, work next to a snippet of your sabotaged/fucked up sound as an example to show to people if you wanna indeed put his ass on blast. Any clear evidence helps was my point.

 

I just don't know if there's a copyright issue with that.

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6 hours ago, Pikachu said:

That's terrible. Only question I have is, why would this guy accept the position from a minority filmmaker if he doesn't like minorities? Just to sabotage the project?

 

I don't think he knew... He was brought in by the Line Producer who is White. My friend had to approve his hire, but yeah. Plus given the subject matter of the film, He definitely didn't think that minority filmmakers were producing the project.

 

6 hours ago, Bloodporne said:

I meant it as in I wonder if you can splice his previous, and most likely clearly higher quality, work next to a snippet of your sabotaged/fucked up sound as an example to show to people if you wanna indeed put his ass on blast. Any clear evidence helps was my point.

 

I just don't know if there's a copyright issue with that.

 

Oh yeah, she could definitely do that. I'm sure he has a show reel of stuff that's public. Like I said though, she doesn't want to do anything... she would probably be upset if she knew I was talking about it here :p

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5 hours ago, Pikachu said:

That's terrible. Only question I have is, why would this guy accept the position from a minority filmmaker if he doesn't like minorities? Just to sabotage the project?

 

Plenty of racist pieces of shit out there working for brown people.  The money is green and they get to to bitch about shit like affirmative action and all sorts of other stuff to help themselves feel superior.  

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I just heard back from her that they may have to ADR all of the dialogue which is a pain in the ass and is very hard to do and have it sound and look natural. I also found out that she got a pretty well known TV star to star in it, her first choice (Not Jessie Pleamons). She's heart broken and really wants to save her film since they put so much money and effort into it. Once she sends me a couple of clips I'll have a better idea of what she'll need to fix it, but it doesn't sound good.

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56 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

Why don't you guys just kick the shit out of him? Remember back in the day when you were an asshole and you got your ass kicked, so there was a reason to not be an asshole?

 

It's very effective!

I think he mentioned that the guy was somewhat unhinged and could pose physical violence towards her. 

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On 9/8/2018 at 6:54 AM, Xbob42 said:

Why don't you guys just kick the shit out of him? Remember back in the day when you were an asshole and you got your ass kicked, so there was a reason to not be an asshole?

 

It's very effective!

 

Yeah, Ye Olden Days were sure known for their civility and people not being horrible dicks to one another.

 

Oh, wait, it was the exact opposite of that.

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On 9/8/2018 at 1:43 AM, Nokra said:

That really sucks, sorry to hear it @skillzdadirecta . I don't quite understand why she wouldn't want to hold the guy accountable though. I mean, even if she isn't sure his motivations were racially-motivated, it's still a crap job. 

 

She's sure it was racially motivated... I just don't think she wants to deal with it and is more concerned about her film.

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7 hours ago, LazyPiranha said:

 

Yeah, Ye Olden Days were sure known for their civility and people not being horrible dicks to one another.

 

Oh, wait, it was the exact opposite of that.

I don't mean 1137, I mean like... 20-30 years ago. People have had the violence trained out of them at a fundamental level. Which is good overall, but bad for dealing with situations like this when clearly this dude needs an ass whoopin'.

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Just now, Xbob42 said:

I don't mean 1137, I mean like... 20-30 years ago. People have had the violence trained out of them at a fundamental level. Which is good overall, but bad for dealing with situations like this when clearly this dude needs an ass whoopin'.

 

...are you seriously suggesting that the 80's and 90's were somehow better about people being rampant dicks to each other?  Has our collective short term memory really eroded that badly?

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