Portfolio: Film Production
"Pistolero!" Production Notes

Website Design || Graphic Design || Image Restoration || Film Production

Have you ever been driving in your car, heard a song, and ideas just flow into your head? Well, that's how I came up with the idea for "Pistolero!". I had recently purchased the "Once Upon A Time In Mexico" soundtrack and there is a song on there called "Pistolero" that was just too much fun. The idea worked in my head as the deadline for the student project approached.

The desire to film hit Cassie and I unexpectedly one Monday morning as we were heading off to class. We both sat in the car having discussed the film idea minutes earlier. We both looked over at each other and knew that today was the day to film. Clouds were in the sky, no sun, not too cold. It was perfect. So we skipped our class.

We headed out to the same park where we shot "nil admirari" because we knew the parking lot would be empty and no one would really notice if someone was jumping over the hood of their car and filming it. It's a very quiet location, which in the end didn't matter because no on-location sound was used.

I starred as the Pistolero in the film. The first scene we shot was the stunt where I ran and rolled over the hood of my car. We taped the first take (which didn't make the cut) just in case I messed up or hurt myself and we couldn't re-shoot. As was predicted, on the first shot I hurt myself. I had a nasty bruise on my knee for over a week and a half. We did another take where I didn't get up and say "ow" and that roll over was much more successful. After the first scene Cassie and I stood there not knowing what to film next. We had no script and just the idea of this character rolling over the hood of the car to go with.

The location became our script. We were right outside of a swimming pool and it had an entry that was easy to hide behind. That's how we got the idea for the beginning of the story.

You'll notice in the film that my "gun" isn't a gun at all. I don't have props and I'm rather poor, so a black glove on the right hand became a suitable weapon. "Pistolero!" became a film about the use of your own imagination.

In post-production, I changed the film to black and white, and upped the contrast to give it a more artistic look. Since we didn't have any substance for "blood" when I get shot at the end of the film, I had a little fun turning the frames red to symbolize being shot. Very fun, especially since I was using three of the greatest colors: black, white and red.

"Pistolero!" has been the most fun, probably because there was no script to stick by and the ideas were free to come while on location. I think it has a great polish to it, and all that is credited to Cassie (director of photography/camera operator) for framing the shots and shooting to edit (a very important concept to grasp early on).

Like "nil admirari", "Pistolero!" has gone through another change two years after the original production and is for the first time pesented in widescreen.

I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I have!

-Kristi Bobilya
(director/editor)