Counting Blessings

I've been a bit quieter than usual on Facebook (HERE) and Twitter (HERE) this week.  Any time I have had between 'A2-B-C' screenings (listed on the 'A2-B-C' FB page HERE) and interviews about the film has found me back in the editing suite completing a new documentary.

I say "new" documentary, but it is actually a film I have been working on in the background for the past six years (!).  It's called '-1287', pronounced "minus 1287", (WEBSITE), and I first posted the trailer for it two years ago after completing 'In the Grey Zone' (WEBSITE), my first film about children living in Fukushima.  

At the time, I believed '-1287' would be my first "post-Fukushima" work (which I wrote about HERE).  But then before I realized what was happening, '-1287' was pushed to the back-burner as I suddenly produced 'A2-B-C' (WEBSITE), a film that temporarily took over my life. 

Promoting a film is part of being a filmmaker, and I am so honoured for the opportunity to have been on the film festival circuit for the past year bringing 'A2-B-C' to Germany (HERE), Guam (HERE), Ukraine (HERE), India (HERE), Taiwan (HERE), Brazil (HERE) and beyond.  While I am so grateful for the experiences that I have had traveling with the film abroad (and continue to have while traveling with the film domestically), I am, at heart, a film-MAKER, and I have had a yearning to be back either beyond the camera or in the edit suite.

This month a dear friend who is away for the summer has graciously allowed me to stay in their gorgeous flat with a soothing cool breeze that blows through the halls day and night.  The timing could not have been more perfect, and I have used this space of solitude and peace to finish the editing of '-1287'.  I will be "locking picture" this coming week, and then the sound mix, colour grade and subtitle translation will begin.  I look forward to introducing the international team behind '-1287' soon, as well as about the World Premier of the film this autumn, details of which are extremely exciting (!) but under press embargo until August.

Thank you all so very much for your continued support while I continue pursuing my life work sharing stories that will never be commercial successes.  As the saying goes, I may not "have two nickles to rub together", but the Grace I have received has been life-changing.  Someone recently told me to stop "playing around making films that don't make money".  I suppose the suggestion was that Grace can't fill an empty stomach.  But can money fill an empty heart?