GUEST BLOG:Coffee in the Blood

“A Yorkshire lass living in Scotland and married to the great grandson of an African chief who would eat people if they caught him having a bath. My husband prefers showers… and chicken. I’m a TV bod, script supervisor, production manager, writer, swimmer, believer, wife and full-time working step-mum to two fantastic girls (11 and 8) who are my stylists, my daily cheer and my reasons for cleaning.”

I had my first cup of coffee when I was 5 years old. Dad had a new percolator. Proper 80s swish. The 70s Teasmade had died its passé death, relegated from the bedside table to the local dump. Ground coffee was the new thing and my early love affair with the liquid black gold began right there as I watched the bubbles, listened to the gurgles and saw the clear water transfer from its see-though container to appear as if by magic in the waiting coffee pot next to it. Drip by dribbly drip. The smell was divine. The taste was not…

… Not for a 5 year-old anyway. But somehow a Saturday morning ritual had begun: coffee with my dad in the kitchen as he made my mum her morning porridge in bed. I piled in the sugar and sipped at the tiny cup with pursed lips. Half was always left. The taste was bitter, thick, an unexplained adult delicacy. But I liked the social aspect. Just chillin’ with my dad in my PJs.

Cut to 27 years later and I still remember that percolator as I screw on the top of my Bialetti espresso pot each morning, preparing my morning mug of the stuff, understanding now better than ever the adult allure as my bleary eyes beg for the thick voluminous ‘shot’.

I have a problem.

That is until last week, when I decided to do something about said problem, addiction, dependency, caffeine crutch… whatever you want to call it. It wasn’t really a voluntary thing. In fact it wasn’t really a voluntary thing the last time I did a coffee detox either. In fact both times have been necessary due to my job.

The first time was when I was observing true detox bravery. That of the heroin kind. We were filming a documentary about an astonishing detox tool called NET (www.netdevice.net).

Perhaps I first realised I had a problem when we were watching Barry shoot up for the last time in a cold barn. In silence he tightened his tourniquet. I clasped my coffee mug tighter. As his syringe sucked up the concoction, I supped at my cup.

How terrible to have such an addiction, I thought. Then I looked down at my empty cup. Oh.

A while later as part of a follow-up documentary I found myself visiting a detox farmhouse where no stimulants were permitted. Including coffee. That was it, I thought, if these girls can go through heroin detox, the least I could do is support them by detoxing from coffee. The girls found it very amusing.

In the morning  I’d come in and would walk past the living room of hot-water-bottle-hugging girls all dressing gowns and smudged mascara and I felt like I needed to join them.

‘How are you feeling, Kate?’ they’d croak.

‘My pee is orange and my head hurts’. I’d answer, irritably.

They’d crack a smile. I struggled too.

Now, to confess, that was just withdrawal from coffee. I was still drinking tea (which I’ve never really liked as much as coffee) but the withdrawal was still pretty painful. More recently, however, it’s been both.

This time I’m off to Zambia to film an amazing Scot called Donald MacDonald who moved to Zambia to lead a comfortable expat life… only to end up fostering 30 street kids in his own home – a farm known locally as Old MacDonald’s Farm.

Last time I was there researching the story I was bogged down by the malaria tablets clouding my head. This, coupled with the restricted access to caffeine, made my head spin. So this time I’ve decided I’m going to go without such a dependency and get used to it before I leave. The irony being that there’s still a tin of Zambia’s finest ground coffee right next to my redundant percolator. Grrr.

And so I have stopped, dead. ‘Dead’ being the operative word.

Urgggchhh. That’s all I can say about how I’ve been feeling this past week. I’ve not had the pangs of desire that I thought I might have, no kettle switching twitch, nothing like that… but the back pain, oh the agony! You may think this weird but as I lay awake at 3am, not knowing where on earth this pain had come from, I googled the only reason I could think of: ‘Coffee withdrawal and back pain’. And lo and behold, apparently the two are connected.  I just couldn’t lie down, couldn’t sleep for the pain. It really was a test of the will. I now have some understanding of cold turkey and wouldn’t want to go there. Ever.

The pain has since eased and a refreshing energy has replaced my permanent state of being wired to the hilt. I can honestly say it’s been worth it. I’m not sure when or whether I’ll start drinking it again. The dependency doesn’t half creep into your blood again. Something tells me it won’t be a permanent departure from coffee but perhaps I need to develop a more healthy respect for its potency.

Now here’s an odd twist and I never thought I’d say this in my lifetime but I am married to a man whose family own a coffee plantation. Not as Kenco-glamorous or Nescafe bean-rattling rah as you may think, though. It’s now sitting idle and unreachable after the change of regime and devastation in the Democratic Republic of Congo… I thought perhaps one day we could go out there and turn it all around. But guerillas and danger aside, I was very disappointed to learn that they didn’t grow Arabica beans there but the other sorts used more in medicines etc. Robusta beans, I think. Not likely I’ll ever be the Mrs Del Monte of coffee. But perhaps… you never know, maybe this can be the start of my new relationship with coffee: the stuff you can’t drink!

We come in peas

I’ve been sent this from a few trusted sources which makes me think this has got to be good.

And as I’m currently making a WW2 film,  Crew 713 , I’m always looking for interesting pieces from a similar time period. You know, work that is thoughtful, inspiring, aiming to bring a new and deeper resonance and emotional connection from our generation to a dark period of modern history.

Red Tails for example. A film set in 1944, based on the heroics of a small band of men, a marker in US aviation history and with a new story for our generation. Not unlike Crew 713.

But, then there is this! This is something else. Evil Nazis from the moon coming to take over the earth? Scary. But Sarah Palin as president. That is too horrific for words.

See what you think…This is Iron Sky…

(the title is for my father – he loves a good pun)

Seven lessons from a bounce house

Our son is nothing if not a bouncer. Both in the sense that he is built like a tank and on one of his off days (today) he could stop anyone getting in or out of a nightclub, but also, in his exuberant joy at the simple act of bouncing.

So, I knew we would be up for some fun, when today we went to play at a bounce house (bouncy castle for the Brits), or rather, a bland space with lots of inflatables that are just pure joy to a child.

After being initially cautious, Wee Man jumped in with his usual enthusiasm. The greatest of all of these inflatables was a huge slide – at least 12 feet high. I could see that the veteran mothers knew this was the place to be, as most were sitting on the floor in front of this big beast, as they chatted, worked on their phones and read e-books.

After a flurry of excitement, Wee Man made his first attempt at climbing the steep inflatable steps of the slide. I was hoping he might have had a quick go, and seeing that it was too steep, he would go back to the smaller obstacles. Although there were one or two smaller kids, the majority were much bigger, faster and more impatient than my boy, and I knew that once he got away from the edge, I wouldn’t be able to reach in to help him, being a waddling whale of an expectant mum. And so a lesson in parenting began.

I encouraged him to go back to the other, smaller things, which of course he refused. Lesson one – why listen to your mummy when there are mountains to climb?

With eyes fixed, I watched him bounce along to the stairs, aware of the many other children also starting to gather in the small space at the foot of the stairs. Lesson two – sometimes all you can do is watch, then let them do it.

He starts to climb. VERY SLOWLY. The row of impatient, bigger kids is getting bigger. The mothers of the other kids don’t need to watch as their kids are older and don’t need so much supervision, so this means its just me, watching anxiously as the assault up the  stairs begins for my boy. Lesson three – my son will have mountains to climb that as much as I want to, I can’t do for him.

It’s seeming to take ages – although I’m sure it’s seconds – but my boy has created a long tailback and is still only half way up. One boy is getting inpatient and clambers up over him. I want to punch him. But my Wee Man is hanging on and keeps going. Lesson four – other people are going to hurt my boy. I will want to punch them but I can’t.

I know that he only has a few more steps now, but he’s never made it this high before, and may turn back and get fearful. I am willing him on with an intense stare. If he could hear me over the ridiculous rave music, he would know I was saying come on, come on you can do it. Lesson five – if a mother’s encouragement was enough, a child could do anything.

The queue to climb  is now down to the bottom the stairs and he has one step to go. My heart is beating, he can do it, he can do it. And, he does! As soon as he gets to the top, the big kids push past and whoosh down the slide, but I’m so proud of my boy that I could burst. Lesson six – My child is capable of many things without me. And more often than not, he will never know what I was going through as he does them. Even the most simple thing like climbing the stairs of an inflatable slide.

For a second, I worry that it is too high, and he might be frightened (he’s done that before), but no. In a second he is down with a huge grin on his face. He has achieved greatness today, in his own small way. I’m so proud of his perseverance and courage.

After that he goes up many times, and is more confident every time, although there is always a long line of kids behind him. I’m grateful that in many of these cases, an older girl has come up behind him and although she wanted to get past, didn’t push and let him do it in his own time. Lesson seven – I will have to rely on the kindness of others when I can’t be of help to him.

Like countless others before me, I knew from the moment he was born, that my Wee Man would bring some of the greatest challenges of my life. The conflicting desire to protect at all costs but to allow him to grow and discover is a painful but rewarding one, that I will of course have many more experiences to encounter. Today he did me proud. Today he made it. Next time, he might not be so successful. But my willing him to succeed will never go away.

On the way down. This is after many attempts...when I felt ok to get the camera out

Oh, and he also managed to get the first black eye of his life today. Bashing into a boy coming down the slide on maybe the twentieth attempt. But I guess you can’t win them all.

 

I would like to thank the Academy…

So, the Oscar nominations are in and already the press is filled with a slew of ‘Tin Tin snubbed’ comments. I, however, would like to thank The Academy for not bowing to popular pressure and public expectation.

The basic fact is, last year The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences pinned their colors firmly to the pole when it comes to animation. If you read my last post, on this subject, you will already understand. For those of you who missed it, take a quick pause and head over there just now.

In that last post I cited the official Oscars® ruling on animated films which, to cut a long story short, rules out motion (or performance) capture from qualifying as animation. The Adventures of Tin Tin is almost entirely performance capture and so, quite rightly, cannot qualify for the Best Animated Film category.

This year’s nominations are; . A fairly large group this year compared to the 3 from last year, which included our very own (as in, the film both my wife and I worked on) The Illusionist.

I am slightly ashamed to confess that I have not seen a single one of these. However, I am to rectify that over the next couple of weeks and I will return to give you my thoughts on how these measure up and which I think should get the little golden fella for their mantlepiece.

The Adventures of Tin Tin: Best ‘Animated’ Film…But is it?

As many will no doubt have heard, Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson’s The Adventures of Tin Tin walked away from the Golden Globes this week with the Best Animated Film award. Commonly, though not exclusively, this has meant that the film would be a shoe-in for the Oscar® of the same category. And, unsurprisingly, The Adventures of Tin Tin is currently campaigning for such consideration. However, I would like to protest this.

Now, I’m not making a comment on the film itself or whether or not it is good enough to win such awards. In fact, I have not even had the opportunity to watch it. I have been well-informed that it is a good movie and from what I have seen of it, it looks pretty good to me. No, I am actually commenting on whether or not the film should even be put up for consideration at all.

Last year, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (the awarders of the coveted, aforementioned Oscars®) published new rules governing the eligibility for consideration to the Best Animated Feature Film Award. These are unchanged for this year’s looming Awards and an extract can be read below:

Rule Seven: Special Rules for the Best Animated Feature Film Award

1. DEFINITION: An animated feature film is defined as a motion picture with a running time of more than 40 minutes, in which movement and characters’ performances are created using a frame-by-frame technique.  Motion capture by itself is not an animation technique.  In addition, a significant number of the major characters must be animated, and animation must figure in no less than 75 percent of the picture’s running time

The full rule can be read HERE

From what I understand, ‘ Tin Tin, in regard to the major characters at least, is performance (or motion) capture and, therefore, should not be eligible for consideration in the Best Animated Film category of the Oscars®.

However, from my research, it would appear that other major awards are not so specific on their requirements or definitions. The Golden Globes, as far as I can see, do not have any special rules or requirements covering animated films. The Annies, presented by The International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood are specifically for animation yet do not seem to have available a definition of animation but each award is given “in recognition of creative excellence in the art of animation.” Somewhat ambiguous but I would suggest that using the term art would suggest something more hand-crafted. The BAFTAs (British Academy of Film and Television Awards) state in their rule book, “17. ANIMATED FILM: A film will be classed as an animated feature film if it is primarily animated throughout the majority of the length of the film and has a significant number of animated major characters;”. More specific but, again, does not define the term animated, however, there is a heavy insinuation in the wording.

Tin Tin is scooping up Best Animated Film awards left, right and centre and, for the majority it would seem that, due to imprecise or lacking definitions and unspecific eligibility rules, its receipt of these cannot be contested beyond personal opinion. In the case of the Oscars®, though, I think the rules and definition are clear. The Adventures of Tin Tin is not eligible for consideration to the category of Best Animated Film, it quite clearly does not meet the requirements. Of course, the nominations are not out yet and it may prove that The Academy do not allow it, we will have to wait and see.

Finally, as something of a disclaimer, I am not against motion/performance capture as a tool and I have even worked with it in production. It has a wealth of value and any number of valid uses, including filmmaking. As an animator, however, I do feel that the two – animation and motion capture – ought to be separated. Animation is an art and a craft, whether it is 2D, 3D, stop-motion, traditional or digital. Motion-capture is a tool, a technology. Like I say, it has its place and value but it is not animation.