For assignment one of 20: Shot. Produce a short film that presents a place. Conduct extensive research in the location. Look for various camera angles and meaningful details. Pay attention to the foreground, middle-ground, and background. Be sure to use a long shot, a medium shot and closeup.

I came up with this story riding my bike through downtown Manhattan one cloudy day, scrambling for ideas to write my first of twenty films about. I was lost—I had just gone to my professor, Alrick Brown about an idea involving the Twin Towers and the visual of them standing tall in the middle of a modern-day New York City untouched, and we worked out together that I needed to do something different.

I looked into myself for my pain, my specific story. What did I have to say about myself that I could universalize via this visual medium?
I was in the West Village by the afternoon. 7 Av South has a clear shot of One World Trade Center from Varick and Houston all the way to 7 Av and 14 St.
I’m gay. My mother has never taken that well. I was by the Stonewall Inn. Okay. The technical itch could be scratched here. Got it. Maybe I had a story to tell about this.

I get to tell a story about being gay in what feels like the nexus of all gay culture. I was living in Dallas, TX, trying to tell these same stories in a place with practically nothing to do with any of that. Of course, the stories are universal and can happen anywhere really, but they say “location, location, location” for a reason. It feels more important here. More relevant.
In doing a period piece I know that the production design and art direction have to be clear. I also know that I need to find a place in New York that has been relatively untouched by the slow, ever-forward march of time. I need to select my shots carefully so that no anachronism can take a viewer out of the reality of the short.

One of the clearest influences I projected on this story is the documentary Paris is Burning. I want to evoke that specific time period, of the height of ball culture in the late 80s and early 90s. A year before this, I was watching the film as source material for a documentary I edited for my freshman year production class.

And as for the experience—I just wanted to transmit my pain and my overcoming it in a way that was clear and effective. I workshopped the script around my friend group in a tizzy, asking them how it felt, how the story elements laid…one thing I got back was that the character of the mother never resolved, to which I fired back every time: “My mother still isn’t over it either. I don’t think she ever will be.” And despite this, I’m fine. I’ve learned to find validation from outside my family, and more importantly from within myself. I hope that people see that Lola goes through the same self-affirmation, that even though her mother never really resolves by the end, she has, which is far more important.

​

              

Crew
 

Director of Photography
Rhea Dudani

Assistant Director
Dylan Lenze

Assistant Camera
Hal Schulman

​

                                                               

Technical specifications

​

All NYU Tisch Sight and Sound projects shot Fall 2018 make use of the Canon C200, as well as a kit of Zeiss Distagon prime lenses (21mm f/2.8, 35mm f/2, 85mm f/2).

This project was cut and delivered using Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2018 and After Effects CC 2018.