First, I have to admit that had I known more about video editing (and had the software) to crop this better, I would have done that. If I had known I would make this movie at all, I might have zoomed differently with the digital camera I was using at the time, but I took the footage because I was interested in what this bird was doing with this random piece of tree garbage and that was all.
Later, I thought that it looked like a story, and I put the clips together with some rudimentary video software to see if I could tell that story. It seemed perfect for a silent film that had the words on a black screen in between footage of the actors, which I now know are called intertitles (I just looked that up).
Rather than use the intertitles like they are in the silent films where they are cut in between the action footage, I used the dark sidebars to place the words. I don’t know if this has a name or if they would still be called intertitles. Maybe they are intratitles, who knows?
Here’s where we go down memory lane.
Noble Roman’s used to play silent films in their dining room from multiple screens at the same time. I absolutely loved to watch them. I went regularly – even when I was young and had to use the step-up to see the pizza making, because they had a big window where the pizzas were assembled and we could go stand there and watch them being made, very clever, Noble Romans, very clever.
As I grew older, I didn’t find that so fascinating and would watch the movie instead, also very clever.
If you’re wondering if there wasn’t someone to talk to during this time, no, no for me there was not.
At the house where I was raised, I was supposed to listen, and not ask too many questions and definitely not have any opinions, which I was informed were like armpits: everyone has them and they stink. When I got older, the news came on at the same time as dinner and I had my back to it, the only person at the table with a back to the tv which everyone else was watching. I was not allowed to turn around even if something interesting was going on or I would get into trouble.
Hum to myself=trouble. Stare off into space=trouble. Not say anything to anyone=trouble. Eat too fast=trouble. Eat too slow=trouble. Eat too much=too expensive. Eat too little=ungrateful. There ended up being no right speed or amount, whatever I did except be invisible unless requested for something else=trouble. And this is just boring, I mean, the house were I grew up had terrible things happen there, and this is just how dinners were, just inconvenient and isolating, but the dinner table was usually one of the safer places and safer times to be in the house.
So, whenever I could maneuver it , and by that I mean I had to act like I didn’t care too much, but had a slight preference for it, (and didn’t family member one say their breadsticks were better than the other place?) we would go there and I would be in movie heaven. And didn’t family member 2 prefer Coke to Pepsi? And wasn’t family member 3 fond of the olives there?
I didn’t have to hear the movie because the words were on the screen! Sure as the day is long, if I were listening to something intently and caught at it, I would be redirected or sabotaged. So, Noble Romans had multiple screens which meant I could be looking first this way and then that way and keep up the appearance of not being too interested in anything, as long as I didn’t move too much and draw attention to myself that way, I could watch almost a whole movie over pizza. And the pizza is delicious.
So here I had this footage of a little robin trying to move this trash that is not wanting to cooperate, and I film it. I think about the struggle he’s facing and wonder if he’ll move along – he keeps at it. During one of the cuts, which those are really bad but I couldn’t move too much and risk scaring the bird, a whole bunch of time actually goes by because he got frightened by something – a garbage truck or loud noise, and I sat out on my balcony watching and waiting to see if he’d go back to get it or give up.
And at this point in time, I think it was after my dog died there in Wisconsin, my guitar playing skills were still pretty rusty. The whole guitar for this short is improvised in a single take. The movie was just for fun, and even though it has the “A Wendy Kheiry Music Production” card at the beginning, that was just me sort of mocking myself. I’m in on the joke, there’s a big wink there, you feel me?
The robin does not give up. The robin keeps going back to this treasure, this nest making miracle and takes it into the bushes, where I assume their nest is. So, I just looked this up: the female makes the nest, and the male sometimes brings the material. So, he’s dragging this miracle back to his nest-mate. Wow. He worked so hard to get it there! Someone even made a movie about it! 😉
Even when the circumstances are ridiculous and difficult, there are pay offs eventually. I love that I made this movie. It satisfies young me to no end to pay homage to those wonderful films that were such good company to a lonely kid, and to the robin that kept going back to bring his mate what she needed to make their home. So sweet.
Here’s a list of 10 silent comedies.
Here’s a list of 10 silent romances.
The action is overstated, the movements exaggerated, and the music invaluable to creating the atmosphere and providing the context and meaning for these films. I’ve seen most of these. A lot of them over pizza with a coke.