Necar

Necar Zadegan is hot, and those of you who’ve been lucky enough to see her in Elena Undone have only witnessed the tip of the iceberg. What is really required to understand the absolute power and sensuality of this woman is to be in her presence for a while. I swear, there are very few people on this planet I would like to trade places with for a few hours, and she’s one of them. When Necar walks into a room, people NOTICE, and considering we live in la la movie land, that’s something. She is so fucking confident that sometimes I want to give her a little slap – I just can’t help myself. She’s got that “thing”, that “thing” you can’t buy or learn, and it’s really annoying sometimes. But we love her, and that’s the other thing about Necar, she’s like your best friend once you sit down and talk with her. And she’s funny – hysterical, actually. She’ll be sitting there looking like this sexy regal being and the next thing you know she’s channeling a bit of Kathy Griffin. She’s unexpected, which is refreshing, and she’s real, which is why we want to be her friend, and she’s on her way to becoming a huge star, which is why we’re so blessed to have her in our movie!

Times Like These

This post is a bit on the personal side, and speaks to self-discovery.  Nicole and I, I being Marina, met Ned Farr and Dreya Weber last week, and I will admit I was more than a little intimidated at first.  These guys are so good at what they do – all you have to do is watch “A Marine Story” or “The Gymnast“, or one of the brilliant shorts “Dream a Little Dream For Me” or “The Catcher” to find that out.  They’ve been doing this a long time – me, not so much – so I was nervous.  Long story short – they were lovely and I did not sound like an idiot, which made me insanely happy  because I have a deep admiration for both of them.  What I did sound like was an independent filmmaker, and you could have knocked me over with a feather when I came to that realization.  I had stories to tell and I actually understood their stories – I took advice and gave it too – everyone throwing out details of what went right and what went wrong, and we all lamented together about the people who royally screwed us over.  When you come to the truth of what you love and what you were meant to do it’s a very odd moment.  Everyone else in the room is going about business as usual, and on the inside you’re jumping up and down and screaming “Woohoo”.   I’m still surprised they didn’t hear me.  Elena Undone has been many things to many people:   a little glimmer of hope that it’s not too late,  more quality lesbian content for future date nights curled up in bed, a confirmation of soul mates, the return of Nicole Conn, joy for another female driven project in this male dominated business of making movies, or simply the visual feast of Necar and Traci.  For me, it was simply the beginning…

All Together Now

We had our big LA screening last night at Outfest – All Girl Friday – sold out over a week in advance – fantastic audience – our beautiful cast and much of our film family and friends in attendance – we could not have asked for more. It was such a success, and let me tell you that I was not surprised when two of the biggest heartfelt congratulations came from Jill Bennett and Cathy DeBuono, fellow filmmakers with sell-out crowds of their own. These women are a class act, and they feel as we do – mutual support is critical – we need to lift each other up, not worry about who the hell is selling more tickets. Making any film is a challenge, on so many levels, but making a lesbian film has some added potholes of a special nature. The way Elena Undone began was me asking Nicole a question – “why aren’t there more lesbian films out there?” As a female in love with a woman for the first time, where ya gonna go to learn what it’s all about? I was shocked at how few choices I had. Luckily, I found some product that was marvelous and taught me a thing or two! Now here’s the deal – this population is growing and being more heard and seen than ever before, and in my mind there is no apparent reason why we can’t get busy and increase the size of Wolfe Video’s catalog in short order. That has become one of my personal goals – I would actually love to see a women’s movie open Outfest or Frameline one of these years!

Our Philly Audience – God Bless Em!

On Thursday we had the pleasure of screening “Elena Undone” at opening night of the 16th annual Philly QFest – they brilliantly have both boys and girls opening nights – complete with speech by the mayor, who is pretty fabulous! One thing we really noticed was the commitment of the audience – how they got completely into the characters and traveled on their journey through the film with them. There was one woman in particular seated directly behind Nicole and I who had some kind of comment every few minutes – “kids are so smart – he knows what’s going on”, “she’s gonna get caught”, “oh no – is that the holy roller coming?”, “she can’t get them out the door fast enough” to all sorts of interesting sounds – “mmmmm”, “uh huh” and “ohhhh” to name just a few, and she laughed a lot – happily in the right places. As a filmmaker this was a joyous experience – to hear one voice respond in real time to what was happening in the story, because usually the audience merges together for the laughter and the silence and the breath holding. Whoever this anonymous woman was, we would like to thank her from the bottom of our hearts for committing to the journey of Elena and Peyton, known in the real world as Marina and Nicole.

The Kiss that launched a thousand opinions…

“Elena Undone” now holds the record for the longest on-screen kiss in film history – and it’s between two women – imagine the controversy! We posted a taste of it – the exclusive dropped on afterellen.com last week – and is now out in the world for all to see. It’s made it to boy geek and sports sites (didn’t see that one coming), and various fab lesbian sites (shewired picked it up today), among many others. It’s also been re-scored by a few folks as well – we like it best, though, scored to perfection by the talented and super-hot Jennifer Corday! We’ve seen everything FROM “OMG, the sexiest kiss I’ve ever seen”, “Can’t wait to see the movie”, “I’m wet now”, and “I’ve never kissed a woman, but now I’m curious”, TO “Not hot”, “I don’t feel comfortable watching someone kiss that long – it feels intrusive”, “Looked like two straight girls trying to turn on lesbians”, and “It felt semi-porn”. What will really interest us is what you all have to say about it after you’ve seen the movie, know the characters and witness the whole kiss, beginning to end. A gimmick – it may seem so at first glance. What we were trying to convey with “The Kiss” really was impossible – we set ourselves up for it. How do you truly capture that moment – that complete immersion into someone else for the first time…the waiting…the wanting…the passion…the first taste of those soft sweet lips…and do it in three single takes (so behind schedule that day) while still getting the camera angle! All I can say (I, being Marina) is that Nicole, Necar and Traci put their all into making a bit of cinema history – in a lesbian film – and that’s a hell of a day’s work!