The Academy Awards are just a few days away, so speculation about who’s winning an Oscar is running rampant. We aren’t in contention this year, but look out 2011 Academy Awards! In the meantime, we are far more interested in a different Oscar discussion.
Dr. David Dosa, who introduced the world to Oscar the death-predicting cat in his essay for The New England Journal of Medicine in 2007, has now written a book called “Making Rounds with Oscar: The Extraordinary Gift of an Ordinary Cat.” With the release of the book, the media is fascinated with Oscar all over again, and he’s been showing up everywhere: morning shows, Reader’s Digest, People Magazine, USA Today, and Seth Meyers even mentioned “the death cat” on SNL's Weekend Update.
When we first read the articles about Oscar, his streak was around 26, but now he is at over 50 accurate predictions. The best part of reading these articles is seeing all the comments left by people who have similar stories about other cats and even dogs that are sensitive to when a person is near the end of life. Animals truly are amazing.
With the second cut of “Saying Goodbye” burned to a DVD, it was time to put it in front of a real audience. That’s right, the dreaded focus group.
We entered the room with butterflies in our stomachs and nervous smiles plastered across our faces. After a quick prayer to the film gods that the audience would not become an unruly “Saying Goodbye” hating mob, we pushed the play button.
Things were going great until about five minutes in when the film pixilated and froze cold. After many failed attempts to get past the digital hang-up, we decided to bust out Cliff’s laptop and play the movie directly from the edited file… luckily it worked! We hope that will be our first and last screening glitch - better now than at Sundance, right?
When the movie was over, an eerie silence filled the room… no clapping, no excited chatter, not even a sob or a sniffle! Where was the standing ovation, the throwing of flowers, the request for an encore?
…And then applause. Phew!
The open and honest discussion that followed was extremely helpful, and it solidified our concerns about some of the rough patches we’d already identified. All in all, the focus group really liked the movie, and they had some great suggestions for making it better. We really appreciate the feedback and thank everyone who participated.
Today we met with the students who are in the second semester class for our project. We have three students from last semester: welcome back Amanda, Fred, and Kasey! We also have another familiar face joining the class: Dick White one of our brave, brave poker players. And then we have three new students: Cassie, Karmen, and Matt – we’re happy to have you aboard the team!
The focus of this semester will be on editing and marketing. These aspects might not be as “glamorous” as the actual filming, but are vital to the success of any movie. As part of that, we’re running a contest for the students from both this semester and last semester to see who can build the most buzz for our film. Good luck, y’all!
It is with great sadness that we relay the news of Ms. Carrie M. Reeder’s passing.
Ms. Reeder was a resident at Agape Senior and lived on the hall where we did the majority of our filming. We’ve mentioned before how generous the Agape residents and staff were to us, but none were kinder than Ms. Reeder. Her perpetual smile and cheery attitude made her a joy to be around. She was always eager to show off her own modeling photos from earlier in her life, and the cast and crew enjoyed her stories of a life well lived.
The last time we spoke with Ms. Reeder, she was proudly sporting her SC Film Commission t-shirt.
Ms. Reeder passed away on December 29. She was 89. Our condolences go out to the Reeder family.
As you may know, highly anticipated movies are often delivered to theaters with false names to maintain secrecy. Since Saying Goodbye is such a highly anticipated flick, Cliff delivered the rough cut to us with the label, “Death Cat 2: Putty Gone Bad.” With great eagerness, nervousness, excitement, and even a touch of nausea, we popped the DVD into the player to watch it.
It was a surreal experience watching our movie for the first time.
There’s the complete shock of “Holy crap, that’s our movie on the TV!”
There’s the slight feeling of panic that it doesn’t 100% match the movie we’ve been carrying in our heads since day one…
… followed by the feeling of relief when we realize it doesn’t matter because this version is just as good.
There’s the utter joy of “Oh my God, we actually did it!”
And then many other emotions swirling around our buzzing brains. It’s hard to image how it’s going to feel watching it in a movie theater up on the big screen.
Here's a special holiday surprise from Death Cat Entertainment. May 2010 be a great year for us all.
Don't be fooled by this super-cool animation, Saying Goodbye is actually a live-action drama.
Set for release in early 2010, Saying Goodbye chronicles an elderly woman's last year of life in a southern nursing home, while a cat with mysterious powers accurately predicts the deaths of her fellow residents.
This short was funded by the SC Film Commission's Production Fund, a program designed to pair students with professionals in the film industry.
With a small break between the end of filming and the start of editing, we decided it was time to meet with the man who will be scoring our film. So we grabbed Cliff for a road trip up to Charlotte to meet with Fred Story and his team at Concentrix. Walking in the door of Concentrix was eerily similar to walking into Genesis. Both Fred and Cliff love what they do and have built offices and studios to reflect their passion and creativity. Both buildings have vibrant, beautiful rooms and other clever touches that make them ideal places to work.
During our meeting with Fred and sound designer Anthony, we could tell we were in good hands. Fred seemed very excited about the project and had lots of thoughts on how to use music to enhance the viewing experience. He even had an idea on how to make Gabriel’s presence felt in places where we weren’t able to get our ideal cat footage - give Gabriel his own theme like Darth Vader or Friday the 13th's Jason. We vote for using the Jaws theme when Gabriel enters a room - that would certainly change the flavor of the movie.
Our behind-the-scenes photographers Ashley Johnson and Preston Evans captured so many great pictures from our week of shooting. We have posted them on flickr - you can browse through them and actually feel like you were on set!
Now it’s time to celebrate! We had our wrap party at Jillian’s, a huge space in downtown Columbia that has pool tables, a game room, a dance floor, and giant TVs everywhere. We reserved a section just for us with two pool tables – Jillian’s even decorated our area with balloons. We stuffed ourselves with pizza and attempted to play pool. Each game took a really long time because most of us are pretty bad players. It was great to have a chance to relax and talk to everyone about things other than light placements or ornery cats. We hope everyone had fun!
It’s hard to believe today was the last day of filming. The schedule was light, with all the scenes being filmed in Alma’s room. We did have one tricky shot that involved taking the sliding glass door down and setting up the camera rig on the balcony. It’s the first scene with Alma and Kathy together, and Cliff wanted it to be all one shot with no cuts or alternate camera angles. It took a number of takes to get every single nuance right, but it will be a nice change of pace from all the quick cuts and fast scenes of the opening when Gabriel is stalking the halls.
After finishing those scenes, it was just a matter of filming some transition shots of life around the nursing home. Cliff brought in his wife, kids, and parents to have a “Grandma! Grandpa!” scene. We also had several of our standard extras help us capture a few more transitions.
And then it was time for the very last shot. Agapé has a hair salon on site, so we had a couple of our favorite ladies sit in the chairs pretending to get their hair done. We even had Susan Hogue, our executive producer, playing one of the hairdressers. What a fun shot to be the very last one! And what mixed feelings… relief at finally being finished, excitement to see how it’s all going to cut together, and sadness that everyone will now scatter in their separate directions.
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The Academy Awards are just a few days away, so speculation about who’s winning an Oscar is running rampant. We aren’t in contention this year, but look out 2011 Academy Awards! In the meantime, we are far more interested in a different Oscar discussion. 
Today we met with the students who are in the second semester class for our project. We have three students from 
It is with great sadness that we relay the news of Ms. Carrie M. Reeder’s passing.
With a small break between the end of filming and the start of editing, we decided it was time to meet with the man who will be scoring our film. So we grabbed 
Our behind-the-scenes photographers Ashley Johnson and Preston Evans captured so many great pictures from our week of shooting. We have posted them on flickr - you can 
Now it’s time to celebrate! We had our wrap party at Jillian’s, a huge space in downtown Columbia that has pool tables, a game room, a dance floor, and giant TVs everywhere. We reserved a section just for us with two pool tables – Jillian’s even decorated our area with balloons. We stuffed ourselves with pizza and attempted to play pool. Each game took a really long time because most of us are pretty bad players. It was great to have a chance to relax and talk to everyone about things other than light placements or ornery cats. We hope everyone had fun!
It’s hard to believe today was the last day of filming. The schedule was light, with all the scenes being filmed in Alma’s room. We did have one tricky shot that involved taking the sliding glass door down and setting up the camera rig on the balcony. It’s the first scene with Alma and Kathy together, and Cliff wanted it to be all one shot with no cuts or alternate camera angles. It took a number of takes to get every single nuance right, but it will be a nice change of pace from all the quick cuts and fast scenes of the opening when Gabriel is stalking the halls.