Another film crew is coming to our neighborhood next week. We signed the permission for the production to shoot exteriors of our property and we cashed the unexpected check from Warner Brothers. We met several of the people on the location team and we had a crew member tell us what to expect from an explosion scene down the street. (Explosion scene?!) So of course, I have now slipped back into my inner Spielberg/Chaplin/Hitchcock/Welles/Capra... and suddenly every place I see looks like a shot for a scene in a movie.
So humor me...
In reality, this is simply a little white house near Busters and the train station. But it could be a great setting for any number of stories. If this were a movie setting... what do you think would happen here?
21 comments:
This is where the bad guys are holed up and the sun is setting on them too.
I'd have preferred a splashy musical number but my budget is really tight on this one. Every Tom, Dick and Harry expects to be paid for having their house in a shot.
Correction.
Make that Tom, Dick and Laurie.
hmmmm....
teenage angst drama?
family where father hates daughter dating the head of the college football team... kinda like that movie 'Fear' with reese witherspoon and mark wahlberg.
but with the setting sun (cf. to the post title?) i think the movie should actually have a happier tone to it.
maybe a SoCal version of Stepmom???
golly, i really need to start looking past mediocre hollywood blockbusters (i did love Stepmom, though)...
I am not good at this movie thing Laurie. Maybe it's because I never go to the movies anymore. I do like this little cottage. The color is nice and warm. Maybe I would put a big pot of flowers on the porch, a few shrubs.......
Pasadena Adjacent
Your white house should visit the previous post of Barrister's Garden Center. Frank Capra's a local boy (Sierra Madre and Cal Tech)
Oh, I like this idea. I think the lighting makes it seem a little sinister -- some kidnap scenario. Did you know Howard Hawks was a local boy as well? tim showed us his house in little Switzerland. (found your great Nicole's post. I'm hungry.)
Angela Lansbury would bake cookies in this house and give them to children returning home from school each day... but the cookies include a secret ingredient that makes the children think for themselves. Soon, they picket the Whole Foods Market for its ties to corporate interests, insist on having a curriculum choice in school, and refuse to wear anything ordered from the LL Bean catalog. When parents storm Angela's house to charge her with witchcraft, the children distract them with a yard sale. Several new child stars emerge from the film, and become known as the savvy pack.
In this house, a mother and father are struggling to raise 5 children, the youngest of whom is a special needs baby. The oldest daughter, who takes care of the younger kids while trying to attend the local high school, finds out she is pregnant. The parents are never home because the mother is involved in small-town politics and the father is obsessed with drag racing. And then, out of the blue ...
...out of the blue, aliens come and teach them all about peace, love and understanding!
Wasn't that it, mister earl? No? Oh.
Well I really like yours, mister earl, you made me laugh.
Pretty, moody pic Laurie.
That's interesting, Laurie!
So you all (the neighborhood) get paid for hosting a film set? What film is it? I'll the watch the movie if it's screened ... then I can tell my family, "Hey, that's my blogging friend Laurie's neighborhood there ..." ;)
Btw, thanks for your genereous comment on my Alun-alun post. I'm honored.
The owner is a loner who only comes out at night. Inside the walls are covered with stories of murder cut from newspapers and magazines.
Patrea: Out of the blue, aliens come to teach them about birth control, but they will have none of it and a war breaks out! You may think this an unusual plot, but I say "It's more of the same." :)
Laurie: I responded to you about Allied Model Trains and other tidbits at The Sky is Big's photo of the Whistle Stop sign.
Hey! This is a nice place. I can see several scenes...one is a murder mystery (a body discovered in this house), and one completely different: a family movie - the family lives here. I like the warm sunlight.
About the dollhouses on my blog, no the cottage look doesn't really continue inside. They are very contemporary looking. Very nice, and very small, but very modern.
I see it as a "Queer Eye" project house. They'll love the Bird of Paradise plant there in front, and go with that motif throughout - color blocks of deep violet and hot orange and earthy green; lush up the grounds with more of the same. Ted prepares kiwifruit daquiries and tobiko nibbles on toast points. Carson can't decide on the right Hawaiian shirt. Candle boxes line the walkway.
Like Virginia, I don't go the movies. Still, I'm sure this would be a TV commercial for a bank. Someone would be sitting outside enjoying the sun with a drink in hand, a smooth voice informing us that if we just start saving properly today and let Bank XYZ take care of our capital this is the kind of comfortable future we can look forward to.
You people are too much fun. Thanks for playing my game with me!
Wayne, just wait until I walk outside during the production and insist I'm ready for my close-up...
Burd zel krai, welcome! I'm a big fan of your work. (Everyone really should check out his blog -- some of the most dreamlike, ethereal, evocative and just plain gorgeous shots of San Francisco you'll ever see. Beautiful stuff.) I agree, Burd. Stepmom is a guilty pleasure of mine, too. :-)
VIrginia, I hear you. I always want to put a pot of flowers on the porch.
Altadena -- Hawkes was local, too? Wow, he and Capra are two of my faves. No wonder I think cinematically around here.
Yak Pate, I'd like to introduce you to Mister Earl. Mister Earl, Yak Pate. Now, will the two of you please go and get an art grant or other funding to produce a film together? Petrea, you exec produce to make sure it gets that ending...
Eki, this is the first time I've gotten paid for any production filming in my neighborhood. If it ends up that my house is prominent, I'll let everyone know!
Becky and Sharon... scary! Now I'm really going to try to peek in the windows next time I pass by...
Elaine -- like I have said before, I think we must be related. What always gets me about this place is that one, single, defiant plant out front in an otherwise barren yard. I would LOVE to see that makeover.
You are all so much fun. I have the best blog contributors in all of cyberspace. Thanks everyone!
Per, I just saw your post. You are too funny! :-)
I'm with Elaine. Is Queer Eye still on? It was one of my favorites but I've lost track. All the scenarios were great Laurie. Next time I will try and be more creative.
I do sort of see the barrel of Bonnie or Clyde's gun poking through those curtains in the widow though....
Oh, and I forgot to mention Mister Earl's super scenario. Funny or scary? I can't decide.
Before I read others' take on it, I will think of mine. It would be the late 30's, and a woman in a faded shirt dress is about to walk out onto the porch, light up a cigarette and think of the man who is "supposed to return" but hasn't. Her beautiful children sleep peacefully near the open windows with a cool breeze blowing over their faces. She's thin with dirty blonde hair, curly. Another neighbor is on her porch - they wave and then the neighbor walks back into her house, leaving her again with her thoughts. I guess I see a "scene" more than an entire movie. That's fun that they will be filming. Is that the guy I met that day???
I'm lost in a vat of old movies. This house looks like several I used to know. I see a rather plumpish woman in a house dress, sitting in a rocking chair and "snapping beans" on the porch. For you who are not Southerners, that's what women used to do while sitting on their porches. They also talked to passersby and waved to those they didn't know. The beans are for "supper" and there is fried chicken and apple pie for dessert. It's a happy little house.
Hello Jude and Mom!
Judy, yes, it is the production the guy you met was discussing. It ended up being pretty extensive with at least 100 cast and crew.
Mom, I love it. Now I want apple pie...
Post a Comment