director goes to montreal to colour grade her film, you won’t believe what happens next…

​…she ends up with a film that looks awesome.

The End. 

That's right. The film is finished.
 
I just spent two weeks at Rev 13 Films with our rather amazing colourist Tony Manolikakis, throwing in my two cents as he created the last piece of the beautiful puzzle that’s consumed my life for three years.  We screened the final version last Friday, and I’m over-the-moon happy. 

The colour enhances everything. It takes us on the emotional journey through the film. It defines the story in all its stages. It is integral and stunning. It isn’t just about Tony’s technical skill, it’s about his understanding of the film, his creativity and his collaboration with me and our DOP, Michal Wisniowksi. 

​I’m so pleased with the whole experience, I made a dorky little journal of what my those lazy crazy colour-grading days in Montreal looked like:

                   MY DORKY JOURNAL​
•    Wake up every morning in home of childhood friend, who has seemingly endless supply of rosé
•    Pat the sweet, goofy dog who lives there
•    Get on the Metro. Marvel at how clean it is, compared to Toronto’s subway system.
•    Arrive at giant old building housing Rev 13 Films.

Sweet goofy dog gazes at stuff

•    Walk up many many many many flights of stairs. Probably a hundred.
•    Pause to appreciate the beauty of the heritage building I’m in. Also to catch my breath. 
•    Walk up more stairs. 
•    Arrive at Rev 13 Films, setting off the door alert. 

• Tony emerges from his dark and mysterious edit suite, exudes equal parts creativity and technical genius. He has something new and cool to show me and to discuss.
• One of us says something about how stinking hot it is.
• Drink coffee. No milk. Doesn’t matter.
• Eat broken pieces of biscotti from a jar. Reflect on how it’s all fun and games till somebody gets fat.
• Trip on imaginary step in very dark edit suite.
• Much discussion, about tones and moods and colours and what we’re trying to achieve, and how to highlight this bit without highlighting that bit and how we want to use colour to define the three different states within the story. And so on…

•    DOP weighs in. He’s in Poland, but his ideas carry weight all the way across the wide Sargasso Sea.   
•    VFX guy Nick Fodor does a cool thing for a scene with Sophie and Liam that makes us want to stand up and cheer. 
•    DOP says “hey, about the final scene! Do this!” 
•    We do. It is good. No, great. 
•    Screen final version. High five Tony.
•    Take exactly four seconds to think “wow, we did it!”
•    Go back to House of Rosé and sprawl on the couch, too overwhelmingly exhausted from this journey to move, speak or comprehend the enormity of what we’ve done, let alone drink wine.
•    Get over it. Drink wine.