Life truly is amazing.
Lexus and The Weinstein Company have once again come together in the spirit of innovation to produce two new short films, Market Hours and Operation Barn Owl, for their second annual “Life is Amazing” Lexus Short Films series. Two rising filmmakers (Jon Goldman and Satsuki Okawa with script writer Ken Ochiai) have been mentored through the creative process of interpreting “Life is Amazing,” by acclaimed members of the film community including actress Katie Holmes (The Giver, Wonder Boys) and directors Justin Chadwick (Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, upcoming Tulip Fever), Simon Curtis (My Week With Marilyn, upcoming Woman in Gold), Antoine Fuqua (Brooklyn’s Finest, Training Day, upcoming Southpaw), and Phillip Noyce (The Giver, The Quiet American).
Director Jon Goldman
Q: Tell me about the film you directed.
A: My film is “Market Hours” and it’s a short film about a shy, insecure security guard who has a rich, imaginative life and he gets to be a hero in an unexpected way.
Q: Did you write it as well?
A: Yes, I wrote it.
Q: What inspired the story?
A: I was inspired by a lot of Asian cinema, the films of Wong Kar-Wai. They are very romantic and kind of take a simple love story and infuse it with this lush romanticism. So I wanted to make a mundane place, well it’s not all that mundane, but I wanted to make this market into a real romantic environment.
Q: Who were some of the mentors that you collaborated with in the film?
A: Some of the Lexus mentors who I met with were Antoine Fuqua, Phillip Noyce, and Katie Holmes, and they all had different viewpoints and we had great conversations about the film.
Q: What advice did Antoine give you?
A: I asked him a little bit about directing action because he is such a visceral action director and does that so well, and I had some action in my film, nothing extreme but like collisions and people jumping over things. It was a challenge for me because I didn’t realize how much time it takes so I asked him about any general advice in terms of directing action. He said it was like a ballet.
Q: Tell me about what advice Katie gave you.
A: She came with an actor’s perspective and like the actors I’ve worked with, she likes to have an ongoing dialogue with the director about the script, the character, and the story. So I asked her if she had any advice for working with actors who wanted to have a more private process, but she’s not that kind of actor, so she didn’t necessarily say ‘this is what you need to do.’ But I think more actors than not do want to have that kind of dialogue.
Actor Leonard Earl Howze
Q: So tell me about what film you’re in and what role you play.
A: The film I am in is entitled “Market Hours.” I play the security guard that’s on duty, Randall, and he works the overnight shifts so when the workers come in the early morning, he is there with them and the way he gets through his night is taking part in what he believes their lives outside of this place may be. And there is someone who has caught his eye, and he is a little shy about approaching her, but he has hope, and stills clings to hope for love.
Q: And which director did you collaborate with?
A: My good friend Jon Goldman and he was awesome, a great director and I’m really excited for the promise for the future.
Q: And what do you have coming up that you would like to share?
A: Some of my friends and I are working on an adaptation of “27 Wagons Full of Cotton,” and we want to bring it to the stage in a new format and I’m really really happy because not only do film and television excite me, but I am bred in the theatre and so I love being able to get back on the stage.
Writing/Actor Danny Strong came out to support the event and gave us some “Empire” scoop.
Q: Tell me about reuniting with Lee Daniels for your new TV show, and tell us a little about it.
Danny Strong: I’m so excited. Lee Daniels and I created an “Empire” together, and it’s a hip hop empire. It’s King Lear in a hip hop empire, or hip hop dynasty as we like to call it. So it’s basically a character, like a hip hop Mogul, sort of in the mold of Jay Z or Puffy, but older than those guys. He has three sons and he is dying, so he has to figure out which one of his sons is going to take over his empire. Timbaland is writing all our songs so we have original songs by Timberland, and Terrence Howard stars in it. It’s a killer cast.
The Weinstein Company and Lexus present 2 Annual Lexus Short Films Series ‘Life Is Amazing’ at SVA Theater on August 6, 2014 in New York, NY.
Photo Gredit: Getty Images For The Weinstein Company
