The
Background
Hi,
this is Behzad Sedghi, the writer, producer and director of Mel. My
career profile is on LinkedIn and you can look at it later. In 2008, I received
a grant from the Ontario Arts Council just enough to shoot my short film, an
adaptation of The
Awful Fate of Melpomenus Jones by Stephen Leacock, the great Canadian
humourist. The film is about 25 minutes which is perfect for a half-hour
television broadcast, and it only needs a little bit of your help to wrap
up the postproduction.
The Plot
Mel is a dark comedy
about a young kindergarten assistant who drops by a family to return their
little son's pair of shoes at the beginning of his six-week summer
vacation. He is invited in by the mother and spends the remainder of the day
having one Popsicle after another with her and the children. Then he is invited
to stay for dinner followed by a chat with the father of the family under his
beloved weeping willow. A monologue by the father extends well into the
night and results in a stay over. Mel is so shy and polite that he is incapable
of saying goodbye and leaving the house even though no one is holding him back.
Days pass and Mel goes through a nervous breakdown while his hair and beard
keep growing and his calm and polite demeanour becomes loud and obnoxious.
Finally, unable to bear or bring to an end the long overstayed visit, he dies
on the last day of his vacation.
The Idea
For
me the underlying idea in this story is the importance of asserting our will.
Our will to take action, both on a personal as well as a social level, is an
essential part of our existence and we need a basic level of it in order to
define our individuality as well as maintain any sense of freedom. Mel is a
character completely void of any power of self-assertion and to demonstrate how
simply this character flaw could take over his existence, he is put in a simple
and casual circumstance: a visit to friends. Even in such a familiar and safe
situation, lack of self-assertion becomes the death of the self.
The Impact
At
this point, Mel happens to be a pivotal project for many of us who are
involved in the making of it. Like myself, after many years of making short
films, the cast and crew are ready to make their leaps onto larger
productions. With your help we can finish the work, bring our film to the
big screens of international film festivals, broadcast it on TV and distribute
it online and on DVD. Your help will make all this happen and give us the leg
up we need in our film careers.
What
We Need
$11,000. You
can give it to us in the form of donations through the campaign site. Click on CONTRIBUTE NOW
button and follow the instructions. Please kindly ask your friends, family and
other contacts to donate too. This can only be achieved through a collective
effort.
The
Right Approach
I have about 600
e-mail contacts. If everyone contributes about $18, the project will be
fully financed. Add your contacts and the donation amount will be even less. Small
donations will complete the project. Believe in the collective effort.
What
You Get
For your generous
contributions, I have thought of a few ways to thank you: from autographed
publicity postcards to Associate Producer credit and more. Please look at the Perks section on the right
side of the screen. Also please note that the numbers represent the minimum
amounts that you may contribute in each category e.g. in the $10 group you may
donate up to $19. Regardless of the amount, the highest perk I can offer,
is my eternal gratitude and a good feeling for having a part in the creation of
a very worthy project.
Other Ways You Can Help
If you know any producers,
distributors, broadcasters and postproduction talent/facilities who might
be able to support this project, please introduce them to me. Most importantly
and easily though, you can help by letting others know about Mel. Please
send this link http://igg.me/p/39756?a=232629 to your contacts
through e-mail and post it on your social media sites. You can also click
on SHARE THIS CAMPAIGN under the video image and paste the link onto your e-mails
or postings. Furthermore, please drop a line in the Comments section after visiting the
campaign. INDIE GOGO monitors all the campaign activities: visits, sharing,
comments and of course contributions. The more activity a campaign shows, the
closer it gets to be displayed on the main page of the site which means that
our project could be viewed by tens if not hundreds of thousands of visitors
worldwide who visit the site daily. Once Mel makes it to the Favourites
and Successes on the first page, we will have a very good shot at reaching our
financial goal. Get the word out and I am positive that a good many people will
support the project. Thank you so much for your help.
So Far
The $14,000 budget that
I had received from the Ontario Arts Council has all been spent on a four-day
marathon shoot of 24 pages of script including production expenses and paying
the 25-member cast and crew. However, I have managed to push the project way
beyond the means at my disposal; I have now a fine rough cut that is only
a few sessions away from the picture lock. Then I will need music, colour
correction, voice over recording and sound mix to finish the picture. There are
also other costs to cover masters, screener DVDs, festival submissions and
publicity. A simple breakdown looks like this:
Final
Cut, EDL and Transfer
Preparation $1000
Music
(Composition and
Recording) $1500
Colour
Correction and
Titles
$3000
Sound
Design
and Mix $1500
HD
Mastering, Clones, DVDs, Packaging $1500
Festivals,
Publicity, Posters, Postcards.... $1500
Applicable
Taxes
(13%)
$1000
Total: $11,000
This
is the remaining budget that we need in order to finish the project and
release the movie.
