Eternal Punishment – Production Wrap

We finished shooting 27 days ago, and I finally have my computer running fast enough to edit 1080i HD footage.  I am also devoting a significant amount of time to waiting tables at the local Diamond Dave’s.   You can’t be an indie filmmaker without paying your debts as a waiter…

Three years ago I graduated from high school and left for the University of Iowa.  I had a year of college already finished with a 3.9 gpa.  I had studied for less than a week and not only passed but got a good score on the AP Macroeconomics exam.  I was studying at the 8th best Economics program in the country and literally the best Entrepreneurial program in the country.  Three years later I was a college drop-out who was racking up $7,000 of debt.

I had been excited to go to college.  I loved the idea of philosophical debates and the legitimate intellectual discussion I didn’t find throughout most of high school.  My first semester at Iowa, I took Philosophy and the Just Society.  When the professor told us we had to write a term paper where our only instructions were to “philosophize”, I immediately wrote a 5 page paper called The Cyclical Nature of Humanity as it Relates to Emotion, Perspective, and Action.  I hadn’t read a philosophy book since Thus Spake Zarathustra in 8th grade.  I didn’t know who John Stuart Mill was and I had certainly never heard of felicific calculus, but my professor accused me of plagiarism for trying to pass John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarianism and the felicific branch of calculus off as my own.  I got a C. I failed

I thought I could learn a lot from a class called Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.  I had spent a few months as a Muslim when I was a sophomore in High School, and I wanted to learn more about the interrelation of the three religions.  Unfortunately the separation of church and state reigned in this case, and it was a strictly historical class of memorizing a bunch of pointless names from the past thousand years.  My chance to truly learn something finally came in a term paper comparing any topic between two of the religions.  I wrote a five page paper called The Role of Christ in Christianity and Islam.  Every statement I made was backed up by a citation from either the Bible or the Qu’ran.  My only sources were each religion’s only true source.  My Teacher’s Assistant, notice the lack of professor, said it was the best paper in my class and he hadn’t seen anyone cite religious texts like that in their paper; however, the professor apparently required us to cite our lecture notes from his classes to prove we attended.  A college kid’s notes of a professor speaking are deemed more important than the holiest of books.  I got a C-. I failed

The entire time I worked in high school, I saved 50% of every paycheck and invested it in mutual funds.  The original intent was paying for college, but I deemed the $3,500 Panasonic AG-DVX100b video camera to be of greater importance.  Someone had recently won Best Cinematography at Sundance shooting on this exact model.  I was constantly rewriting my first feature script, Eternal Punishment, and I devoted a large amount of time to planning and setting up everything I needed for the film.

The summer after my 1st year of college, 2006, I saw an opportunity to make money doing what I loved.  A couple buddies and I started our own house painting business, Morrison Painting.  We painted a few houses and made some great cash.  The next summer I tried to get more painting jobs, but a steep decline in market prices and the failure of newspaper advertising led to me being out of work most of the summer. My business failed

In the fall of my 2nd year of college, I saw another opportunity to make money doing what I loved.  My buddy Ben Pohl was a high school football player who was being recruited by the University of Iowa.  I envisioned this grandiose behind the scenes look at the college recruiting process.  Every week I shot footage of every one if his plays throughout the season.  Ben overcame injuries and position changes to go to the playoffs and make the all-conference team.  He was even homecoming king.  The University of Iowa called to offer a scholarship, but he turned it down to focus on academics.  Due to restrictions by the NCAA and missing key moments, I didn’t have enough footage to make the documentary I had imagined.  I devoted hours upon hours to this project, and I failed

I was scheduled to shoot Eternal Punishment the following spring, in 2007.  I had finally found the right opportunity to make money doing what I loved.  Emmy-nominated Director of Photography John Houghton was attached to the project.  A screenwriter from LA was going to fly in to play Sean in his acting debut.  We had even shot a trailer to show investors.  Financing and Generalized Anxiety Disorder led to me announcing the indefinite postponement of production.  John Houghton left for the east coast and dropped out of the project.  My dream was set up for me, but I failed

I continued to line things up for my movie while still attending college.  I may have been spoiled when it comes to High School counselors, but barely any students in college even know what they need to do to graduate.  Students rely on their counselors to make them graduate in four years, but they don’t take the right classes and they don’t know all their options.  I had written an excel spreadsheet that kept track of every class I needed for my degree and compared it to my three year plan to see if I would graduate on time.  I had used it since my senior year of High School.  My friend Brady Manriquez, who had ran the painting business with me, had spent two years studying Secondary Education and wanted to switch to business.  No one could tell him how many extra years it would take if he switched.  I put his past schedule into my excel spreadsheet, and showed him how in just two years, he could earn his business degree and also get a minor.  His schedule was mapped out for him.

We saw an opportunity to do what I loved, and I dropped out of school to write the software that would enable all students to make decisions based on their best career path, 4 Year Plan.  I spent hours upon hours writing a draft of the software and we got a meeting with the heads of the counselors at the University of Iowa.  We pitched our project to them with complete confidence our software would better society.  Unfortunately, you can’t copyright this kind of software code.  I had taught myself the programming language.  It wasn’t anything that a professional programmer couldn’t see and rip off as his own.  They took our ideas to their meetings, and we never heard from them again. I failed

I returned to my high school counselor to show her what I had tried.  It turned out the state had just passed an unfunded mandate that required students to have four year plans signed by their parents every semester.  Counselors were forced to carry over 400 sheets of paper that would be changed in pencil throughout the student’s high school career.  If anything happened to them, they would have to start from scratch.  I spent the following months rewriting my program for Muscatine High School.  Society looked at me as a college dropout that wasn’t making any money.  The pressure to abandon the project overwhelmed me, so I quit.  I abandoned 103 pages of code, plus numerous pages of visual design. I failed

During the summer, I saw another opportunity to do what I loved.  I spent two weeks in the inner city of Chicago filming a youth group and their ministry.  I envisioned a feature length documentary that could inspire youth groups around the country to go on mission trips there.  In less than 2 weeks, over a 100 people became Christians, hundreds were fed, a free carnival a city block long was held, and kids who couldn’t afford summer programs experienced a weeklong Vacation Bible School.  Relationships were formed, lives were changed, and I found hope.  You can check out a short music video from the trip here.  I felt success, but even with all the good that was done, I still hadn’t made a feature length documentary.  I failed

I finished off the summer working post-frame steel construction.  I completely humbled myself by working harder than I ever had for a mere $8 an hour.  In the fall, I went back to school.  After a few months of boredom and frustration, I started working as a farmhand.  I still made $8 an hour, but I dropped out of school anyway.  I worked outside and began the final steps of pre-production on my dream, Eternal Punishment.  A few months later I was having an anxiety attack outside a local bank the morning of the first day of shooting on my first feature film.  I had a new highly recommended Director of Photography and a professional Sound Mixer on their way to Muscatine.  We weren’t even using my camera, we had the Sony HVR-Z1U shooting in High Definition 1080i.  But I was in charge of everything, and I couldn’t handle it.  I was the Producer, the Writer, the Director, the Production Manager, the Assistant Director, the Key Grip, the Craft Services, and the supporting actor.  If I didn’t tell every single person involved what to do, my dream would fail.

As I listened to “Gravity” by John Mayer, I wept.  The night before, my mom had left a note on my pillow, and I had it on my dash.  It said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”  Phillipians 4:13.  The only strength I had ever found in my life was being lifted up by my relationships.  What I cannot do alone, can certainly be done by or with God.  I let go by putting my faith in Him lifting me up to accomplish something I couldn’t accomplish alone.  And guess what, everything worked out.  I saw purpose in everything, whether society deemed it a success or a failure.

Every one of my failures had a positive impact not only on me, but on others.  My philosophy paper validated my belief that my thoughts have meaning; it gave me the confidence I needed to take my own path.  My religion paper helped me work out issues I had and was a key step in discovering my current beliefs.  I met my film’s composer in a class at Iowa, and we have since co-directed A Silent Concert Film.  I may have not painted as many houses as I would have liked, but the houses I finished still look beautiful and bring their homeowner’s joy and pride.  Reliving the highlights of Ben’s football season with him and his family was one of the coolest moments in my life.  It turned out delaying the movie for another year was the best choice, because I have grown more intellectually and spiritually in the last year than in any other year of my life.  Plus, Bruce brought a completely different tone to the set that enabled everyone to shine.  A little effort and my software could still help a lot of people.  The Chicago project was the most spiritual experience of my life, and change truly occurred.  My construction job humbled me and showed me what it would physically take to fulfill my dream.  Every anxiety attack I have ever had has brought me closer to God and made this movie what it needed to be.  Because of them, I have lived more, felt more, and loved more.

Every time I have followed my search for joy I have grown closer to my goals. Very rarely was this growth considered successful in our society. Let your passion and happiness guide you, and you will find your own path. You won’t always be right and you will certainly fail, but in every failure there is purpose.

Written by Jimmy Morrison