Just Outside Of Amsterdam

She was just a girl falling off a bike in a street somewhere near Amsterdam. I was only in town for a week. I only met her because I got lost looking for a way back to town.

She rode hard and fast into a wall which refused to move. She smashed into it and her bike flew up into the air as she dived into the wall, before smacking down on the pavement.

I asked if she needed help and hoped she spoke English and that she didn't need help. She did speak English and she did need help and when I should have been worrying about her leg that was bent all weird backwards I was instead falling in love with her eyes which were the most truthful things I'd ever seen.

The night rolled on by in some Dutch hospital full of sad people with her by my side. It's messed up but I didn't want to leave. Didn't want to face the fact that she would go back to her real life and her boyfriend and I'd go back to England and my Xbox. I didn't know for sure that she had a boyfriend except I did know for sure because sometimes you just know.

I turned to her and said "So I guess you need to--" and she jumped in before I said "go home" and said the sweetest words ever: "let me buy you dinner."

She bought me dinner and her beautiful blonde hair and truthful eyes danced in front of me for hours. I was at my best on this night. My jokes worked and my heart jumped high and my words pleased her.

Her leg healed up quick but I still insisted on carrying her home like some crazy fool all buzzed up on the Amsterdam breeze. We cracked on through the backstreets of somewhere, and I told her how excited I was by her. She kissed me and life hit its peak immediately.

Isn't life great when it's like that? You figure it's all set and steady and then one night you're in the wrong town and you find everything you ever needed. Her eyes continued to kill me in the best way but I knew she had a boyfriend and then I asked the question and wished I could take it back.

She looked down at the floor and both our hearts fell a little. "It's not what you think", she said, "and anyway, you live in a whole other country".

We kissed again but it was imbued with a sadness and then she enquired about my flight home. It went all funny and weird moments after it was great and then before I knew it I was headed home with only an email address scribbled on a napkin.

And I lost the fucking napkin.

Her name was Katya.

The above was a piece of fiction written in twenty minutes. I'm on a trip with friends and they're playing some board game that bores me like crazy so I tried cook up some fiction. Let me know what you think.

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Facebook Stories -- A trilogy by famous authors but not really

The Facebook Login
By Jack Kerouac

I rushed forward like I always do and made my way to Facebook in the hope of catching up with old souls from the west who made my heart go boom like big diamonds that cut through the Denver sky.

I was waiting on some girl who said she'd wait for me if I posted on her wall. My heart flew the distance of everything as I raced on towards the big login screen ready to be with everyone at the very least.

My password failed like a cold winter rain and I longed for MySpace where the girls stayed online until the sun went out all wild and screaming like those sad gone girls from New York.

The Friend Count
By Woody Allen

Ike Krimolewitz was as liked as he was tall, which is to say, not at all. His friend list was the same as his height -- in minus digits.

Ike had done everything to make friends, which included poking every member of the group 'Poke Me And We'll Definitely Be Friends'. Unfortunately nobody had time to add him as they were all too busy deciding whether to maybe attend an event, not attend an event, or maybe not attend an event that they were definitely attending.

Despite having -12 friends, Ike was determinded to find a new acquaintance, which is why he created a fake profile under the name of Mary La Bon. Mary was a beautiful woman with an abundant chest, but unfortunately she was a hateful lesbian who refused to have male friends. This frustrated Ike greatly, because not only was Mary his own creation, but she had also convinced him to email over his private bank details.

The Facebook Poke
By Roald Dahl

Michael thought the Facebook Poke was the most fantastic invention in the history of the world. The magical chance had arrived to poke somebody else with only one click of a button.

The thing you have to know, about Michael; is that he cared very deeply about his first Facebook poke. Should he poke Jenny, the prettiest girl he'd ever seen? Or should he poke old Mrs. Friggit and knock the old witch off her feet?

Michael knew the wisest thing was to poke Jenny, but bubbling in his mischievous head was the fantasy of knocking old Friggit off her feet.

Many people have moments of greatness. This was Michael's chance. He logged onto Facebook and looked excitedly at two profiles. Jenny and Mrs Friggit. But who was it to be?

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ALLY MCBEAL & Me

"The truth is, I probably don't want to be too happy or content, 'cause then what? I actually like the quest, the search. That's the fun. The more lost you are, the more you have to look forward to. What do you know? I'm having a great time and I don't even know it."

-Ally McBeal

This show is in my heart. Completely and utterly. I loved every moment of it. I still watch it regularly.

I think it happens for most people, they get a core group of TV shows that stick with them for life. You start out thinking you're being entertained but soon realise it's something more -- you're finding something that resonates with who you are and what your life is about.

The characters in Ally McBeal prioritized their relationships. And they navigated through them by following their instincts, their dreams and their inner lives. Decisions were made from the heart, with the warm support of close friends. I responded to that.

I feel marginalized from so many of my directing peers and fellow bloggers, because most people are so exact about what makes a show good. They could provide data and statistics which explain why one TV show is better than the other. I can't do that, I don't have that skill.

I've been wanting to write an article about my love for 'Ally Mcbeal' ever since I started the blog. But I could never find the words, or the justification. But it's not about justification, it's about being yourself and trusting what is meaningful to you.

Throw on an old episode of Ally McBeal and I'll be instantly satisfied and happy, in a complete flow state, fully engaged in the world David E. Kelley created. I think that John Cage (Peter MacNicol) and Richard Fish (Greg Germann) are the funniest television characters ever created. You can say "don't be ridiculous" and name 100 funnier characters and you'd be right. But not to me. Cage and Fish still have me in hysterics all these years later.

That's what reviewers and critics never get, how personal our tastes are. My favourite films, TV shows and characters are shaped by my life; my upbringing, my friends, the media I was exposed to as a kid, the things I found funny, the books I've read, the places I've been. Who cares who wins the official prizes? It means nothing if the heart doesn't agree.

My heart is fully in love with 'Ally McBeal'. The Romanticism. The outrageously crazy humour. The relationships. They all speak to me. I talk about the dialogue of Billy Wilder and Aaron Sorkin almost daily -- but David E. Kelley has probably been an even bigger influence on me.

I love the music. I love the idea that after work everyone goes downstairs to the bar, where there's a woman playing fabulous music every night. I want that. The music was a key part of the show. Vonda Shepard singing beautiful renditions of Motown classics. John Cage listening to Barry White, and BECOMING Barry White so that he could be confident around women. Or the heartbreaking moment when Larry Paul (Robert Downey Jr) sings Joni Mitchell's 'River', without realising Ally is listening.

At first glance, the title character, Ally, is just annoying and narcissistic. That's how so many of the great characters are at first glance (Alvy Singer, David Brent, etc). Ally went much deeper. She was written masterfully and portrayed perfectly by Calista Flockhart. Here's a character who is a top lawyer at a Boston law form, but she spends most of her time daydreaming about love while fighting off imaginary dancing babies while hallucinating about Al Green. How many actors could pull that off? This was Calista's masterpiece.

As I watch the show now I am increasingly aware of how intelligent it was. I just watched an episode where John Cage is defending a woman accused of sexual harassment. At the end of the episode Cage gives a rousing speech about how the laws were made to help women and not men, because they have been oppressed by men for hundreds of years, not the other way around. It's a poignant moment, full of awareness about male privilege and its role in shaping society. Elsewhere in the same episode, a transsexual client is in court fighting her employer for her right to not disclose information about herself.

When I was younger, I'd just enjoy the entertainment. Now I can see the extra layers. For example in that episode, like so many of them, it brought gender and our experience of it in society to the centre. The show was braver than people realised.

The humour undoubtedly seeped into me, as did the style of dialogue, but now I can see everything else did too. I care about the things the characters cared about. This show did have an impact on who I became.

If you haven't seen 'Ally McBeal' I'm not going to insist you see it. The years have flown by and we're all so different. Just know that if you like my writing, it's probably, in some hard to explain way, greatly influenced by Ally McBeal.

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Fuel In The Tank

The general wisdom is: watch as many movies as you can in as many genres as you can. I understand that and agree with it in principle, although it has never worked for me.

I mostly focus on what I love. On what makes my soul stir. If I die tomorrow I don't want to have wasted my time watching Japanese films I don't understand, or Hollywood films that I've figured out after nine minutes.

I chase greatness. I wanna find the artists. I crave that feeling I got when I first saw "Adventureland" or "Once" or "The West Wing". Those of you who are regulars here will know what I mean. Because my blogging isn't diverse, I cover the same ground often. I go after the things I love, the things that speak to me. I'm not here to review every new release. I watch them, but mostly have nothing to say about them.

The films I love have a big impact on me. After watching Woody Allen films I feel monumentally inspired. I can't wait to sit down with my laptop and storm through some dialogue.

When I watch Cameron Crowe movies I feel so alert to the little intricacies of life. The shared moments. It opens up a part of me, a part that loves to meet people on the road, that likes to stand up for an ideal in a crowded office, or likes to sing along to Elton John. It opens it all up.

It's fuel.

I've been re-watching 'Ally McBeal' and 'One Foot In The Grave'. Those shows reignite something inside of me, because they're who I am.

I'm not the guy they hire to write the new comic book movie, nor can I write the film where Leo dives through alternate realities and shoots the bad guy and takes down the FBI. Someone else focused on that as a kid and they fill the tank up on something different.

I'm optimised for the narrow field I'm most interested in.

All my life; through fascination, awe, and careful study, I've seen these traits in all my heroes. They zone in on what they're passionate about, what fuels their art.

It's all too easy to marginalize and oppress the very things that, in all actuality, are at the core of your creativity. The things that influence us the most we often tuck into a corner and assume we've outgrown or already stripped for parts.

But everyone has to refuel. Top yourself up on what you love, because that stuff is a drug that will have you leaping into the skies as an artist.

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Studios V Independents

Fans of the indies often see the studio flicks as dumb. Fans of studio pictures see the indies as snorefests.

Both perspectives miss the point.

You get great movies in both systems. It's just the odds are different.

Woody Allen is an independent. His films are mostly (but not always) funded outside of Hollywood. His content is very independent, he has full control and doesn't ask for opinions from the investors or producers.

The good: Sometimes he makes 'Annie Hall' and 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona'.

The bad: Sometimes he makes 'Scoop'.

And 'Scoop' was atrocious.

Here's the thing -- nobody can sustain genius every time. If you have a true artist on your hands, they'll push the boundaries of a) what's expected and, b) what they're capable of.

Which means they'll sometimes fail, no matter how good they are.

The studios are scared of failure. Especially as they like to spend money. Imagine if Woody Allen directed 'Friends With Benefits' and had final cut privilege. What would happen?  Maybe it'd be awful because he doesn't know the lifestyles of the characters, and because he'd rework the script to make the ending less predictable... by doing that he'd alienate all the viewers who just want to see Kunis and Timberlake flirt and kiss.

Or maybe he'd create a masterpiece because he's one of the all time great writer/director's of the New York rom-com. With the studio cash, schedule, and talent; he could achieve great things.

But the risk is too big. (And Woody is a bad example, because he wouldn't ever take that job)

So instead we get a studio made flick which is filtered through producers and studio heads and focus groups.

And sure, the film is likable and many people will like it. It does its job and makes money.

People might enjoy 'Friends With Benefits' but underneath the sweet dialogue and quirky characters is standard formula. The film doesn't transcend. It doesn't change your life. And it never will, because of how it's made.

When you make 'Annie Hall' it might end up being 'Manhattan' or it might end up being 'Scoop'. You just don't know. But when you make 'Friends With Benefits' you make 'Friends With Benefits'. The potential for greatness is blocked, impossible.

The exceptions: Spielberg, Abrams, Eastwood, Tarantino.

These guys rose to the top by being blessed with a touch of genius. Hard work, too, but mostly genius.

They may do work within the studios but they have the attitude of an independent, and the power. Spielberg is like an excited Kid, Eastwood has exquisite instincts, and Tarantino is an obsessive maniac.

They stand out as unique and independent spirits.

That's what you need. If you make independently funded films based on things you're passionate about, the door is open for greatness. But it's also open for disaster.

Working in the studio system safeguards against disaster as best as it can. But you only get to make art if you rise to the top by being marked with creative genius and an ability to pull in giant audiences.

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