I’ve had my TiVo now for about four months. I was psyched from the day I got it setup, but wanted to wait to write a review until I made sure my love of this technology wasn’t because it was the newest gadget in my arsenal. Well, four months later, it’s still being used daily and makes me wonder how I ever watched television without one.
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Sept. 9 was really hyped, with the date being 9-9-99 and with two big events in the entertainment industry — the release of Sega’s new video game system, Dreamcast, and the 1999 MTV Music Awards. I have yet to see the Dreamcast system, except in commercials, but if it’s anything like the MTV Music Awards or the uneventful date of 9s, it will be a huge disappointment and a complete waste of time.

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Theatrical trailers are supposed to entice viewers to want to see an upcoming film, but lately, they’ve become a little annoying.

It seems that a few problems plague these promo pieces – not only do they show the viewer most of the film, but they also show scenes that end up on the cutting room floor or, most annoyingly, dialogue out of context.

I understand how these problems can happen. A lot of times, promotional materials such as trailers have to be ready long before the movie itself is, meaning that sometimes stuff slips in that isn’t actually in the movie.

But even though I understand why, I still find it annoying. Today, trailers aren’t just on the big screen; they’re also on videotape and
now Digital Video Discs (which almost always have them as an extra feature).

Recently, I watched “Varsity Blues” on DVD. The disc, like most, had the trailer included. Several times, it showed a scene where James Van Der Beek and his girlfriend (Amy Smart) are talking about football in what looks to be in a forest on top of a parked car. It really looked interesting and made me wish briefly that there was a “Varsity Blues” director’s cut or something similar.

In a different “Varsity Blues” trailer, shown on television mainly, a high school girl asks for an autograph on her body during a pep rally. This didn’t end up in the film, either, although the pep rally was present. If the film was running a little long, it’s disappointing that the filmmakers considered this a place to make up some time.

The first time I noticed this phenomenon of seeing things not in the movie was when “Hot Shots!” came out in 1991. There was a part where Cary Elwes is shooting pool, and he does a trick shot where the cue ball ends up landing in his front pants pocket. Later, there’s the cliched line about, “Is that a (fill in the appropriate object here) in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?”

The scene in which this happens is still in the movie, but this actual part never made it to the theater, just like the “Varsity Blues” autograph scene.

Another problem that plagues trailers is that they exploit every good scene and/or joke in the movie. But now that I think about it, maybe that’s saying less about the film than the trailer. Regardless of the quality of the movie, I feel cheated when I come out of a movie, realizing that I had already seen the movie through a combination of theater and television promotional spots.

The third and most annoying problem with trailers is one that can be avoided. It really doesn’t matter how bad a film is or what ends up in the final cut of the movie. I despise previews that take dialogue or action out of context. Often, I’ve seen where one actor’s reaction or dialogue is spliced after another’s, yet the scenes are spliced from scenes that are 40 minutes apart. Usually, the only damage is a puzzled look on my face when I see the movie and realize that things were taken out of context, but sometimes these splices can really misrepresent a film and its premise.

None of these problems are the end of the world, but they are annoying and it seems that a lot of the incidents could be avoided easily with a little planning and a just a bit of common sense.

Originally posted at NandoNext.

Summers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill would seem pretty dull: Most students are at home, or if they’re around, they’re working hard on crash-course summer school courses or on some money-making summer job. But a visit by Hollywood has turned the campus upside down and given Carolina a glimpse at the movie-making industry.

UNC-CH turned down offers a few years ago to film the movie "Kiss the Girls" because of the negative impression it might give people about safety on campus. Instead, the campus shots in that film are of our rival campus down the road, Duke University.

This time, Carolina accepted to allow a comedy about the life of a physician named Patch Adams (also the tentative name for the film). Hollywood has dominated the campus ever since.

I had heard that the film crew had made some alterations to the campus, but I had no idea how much they had taken over until I stayed on campus recently, working for the North Carolina Scholastic Media Institute. Signs have popped up that aren’t normally there, and I’m not talking about construction signs. For example, the future home of the UNC-CH School of Journalism and Mass Communication has temporarily been transformed into the fictional "Virginia Medical University," complete with a free-standing sign with a plaque, noting that the university was established in 1801, though in reality, the fictional school came to be in mid-May.

The biggest alteration though was across the quad from Carroll Hall at Murphey Hall, temporarily renamed Stanton Hall. The first day I was on campus, I noticed among all the lights, carts and cords were two extremities that jutted out from Murphey Hall’s north-side door. At the time, they were covered in big black tarps. But my girlfriend and I decided they looked like a pair of spread legs. Later that evening, this was confirmed by an extra staying in the same dorm as I was.

The next day, I got a firsthand look as well. They were actually a pair of legs spread, with its feet in stirrups like those used in a cervical exam. A hand-painted sign above the door also was added that read, “WELCOME GYNOS – AT YOUR CERVIX” As it turns out, the scene being filmed had to do with a bunch of gynecologists coming to Virginia Medical University for a conference. The crew was very edgy about the bystanders during the shooting of the scene, asking that people not take pictures. The crew feared that the set might have been taken out of context and create bad publicity for the film.

As it turned out, the major papers in the area ran photos and yes, there were objections to it. But I’m guessing there won’t be any mass boycotts when the film reaches theaters later this year.

I got to see a couple of scenes filmed, and one of the production assistants was nice enough to give some insight into production and their schedule. He told us the best times and places to try to meet Robin Williams and get his autograph. He said that pr ior to coming to Carolina, the crew also had filmed in North Carolina at the Biltmore Estate in Asheville. He said they used the area for a lot of establishing shots and exteriors. He said they liked the area so much that they ended up building a small si te that eventually became the movie’s hospital.

All the scenes done on campus are outside. I assumed that this was because Carolina has a great atmosphere and is a completely beautiful campus, but our buildings are so old and the classrooms aren’t half as impressive as the campus outside. The productio n assistant said that wasn’t the case at all, rather that interiors are easier to do on sound stages for control purposes. He said that on a sound stage, noise levels could be controlled more easily, and that if a room wasn’t working for a scene, the crew could knock out a wall or at a light without much trouble. The university probably wouldn’t appreciate such alterations.

Besides the area around Murphey and Carroll halls, scenes were filmed on the main quad and near the fountain at Bynum Hall.

All this excitement wasn’t without its problems for those of us on campus for other reasons. To keep people out of scenes, the crew roped off entire areas of campus, which already was difficult enough to maneuver due to construction to the dining hall and the surrounding area. My girlfriend was already having a bad day and was even more ticked when she had to detour around the outer perimeter of campus to get where she was going on that hot, hot afternoon.

On a larger scale, the driving of heavy equipment around campus has torn up sidewalks and uprooted bricks. The crew also has removed some of the light posts and emergency call boxes in the immediate vicinity of filming that would screw up shots. But hone stly, we’re talking about only a couple of lights, and its effect was likely minimal.

The biggest detriment the filming had on the university was on parking. The cast and crew were basically given free rein to park wherever. Parking is already at a premium, so their presence made things much worse. Again, I’ll use my girlfriend as an examp le: Her parking area was completely full. She said she drove around for 20 minutes, waiting for a space to become free, but to no avail. The UNC Department of Transportation isn’t the most sympathetic group. She ended up getting her mom to come and get th e car and take it away.

Problems aside, I’m not really sure what to expect of the movie itself, but I’m really looking forward to seeing it in the theater and being able to say, "Hey, I stood around for an hour and watched them film that five-second scene." It’ll be really neat to see campus on the big screen and know that Stanton Hall is really Murphey, where I had a freshman English class.

It’s also really cool to see the behind the scenes stuff you’d miss otherwise: little things like above the trees and buildings, huge cargo nets were put up to filter out sunlight and to cast shadows on the ground. I also got to see how much equipment goe s into shooting just a few weeks.

The production assistant I talked to said that the scenes at Carolina would wrap up the shooting for the film and that everyone was going home when they finished at UNC, except for the post-production crew whose job is just beginning. "Patch Adams" is sch eduled to appear in theaters in December.

Originally posted at NandoNext.