Sound Mix and Music

The picture of the film has been locked off in the editing rooms at Cutting Edge and delivered over to Soundfirm next door for the sound mix.

We've brought back some of the actors to record ADR (Additional Dialogue Recording) - a process in which the actors re-record dropped dialogue or lines affected by sound issues on set,  as well as recording voice-overs.

 Jeremy Sims (our Director) believes the Music to be one of his favourite parts of film making.  In his first feature film (Last Train to Freo), he selected and pieced together all the music himself, but wanted to create a more 'epic' feel for Beneath Hill 60, using Music on a larger scale, with an original orchestral score.  He feels the music will play an integral part in creating drama and wants it to  have a massive presence in the film. We are thrilled to have reknowned composer, Cezary Skubiszewski on board to write the original score, to be recorded by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. Cezary will work closely with our Sound Designer, Liam Egan - combining sound Design with the Sound Effects recorded on set (by Sound Recordist Mark Cornish), to create a rich sound palette. 

Cezary has composed and arranged many well known works - you will probably recognise some

 of them!

Check them out on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D21EHpWVKXQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mv5U0W8FDDk&feature=related

Also, we have begun drafting the poster art. The poster will go up around the place from Australia Day (January 26th), ready for the anticipated release of the film on ANZAC Day 2010.

Historian Will Davies, has finished writing the book of the Film, to be released in conjunction with the movie release. Here's the draft of the cover Art.

Synopsis

Our final cut of the Beneath Hill 60 was locked off today! 

Now our editor, Dany Cooper and our First Assistant Editor, Luke Byrne  will hand the cut over to the Sound and Visual Effects Departments of Post Production for the final mix, grading, music and visual effects that will bring all the elements of the film vividly to life.

David has re-written this new synopsis to match the final plot:

1916. Two massive armies facing each other along the Western Front have fought themselves to a standstill. The count down to the Battle of Messines Ridge has begun. The allies' audacious plan to break the deadlock depends on a small company of Australian miners led by Captain Oliver Woodward.

These ordinary men from mining towns across Australia were given just two weeks military training before being thrust into the war. Poorly equipped, with scant regard for military etiquette, the miners' task is to defend a leaking, labyrinthine tunnel system snaking beneath the Messines Ridge. The tunnels hide a deadly secret; a series of massive mines. If the plan succeeds it will produce the biggest explosions the world has ever known and could change the course of the war.

But no one seems to know when the order will be given to blow the mines. With constant inundation of mud and water and endless vibrations from heavy artillery, the tunnels are in imminent danger of collapse. Disaster looms as the Germans discover the Australians' underground activity. A deadly cat-and-mouse game is played out thirty metres below the fields of Flanders and, as zero hour approaches, the whole allied strategy could be in jeopardy.

Beneath Hill 60, based on an extraordinary true story.

Random House: The Book of the Film by Will Davies

Random House publishers will be launching the book of the film early in 2010, written by Will Davies (author of 'Somme Mud' and 'In The Footsteps of Private Lynch'). Here is the first promo material:

Post Production

So we've said our fond farewells to the city of Townsville. We've filled in the trenches and dismantled the set and packed up the costumes.
Now, if you came across an empty field on Shane Poole's Kelso property, you'd never suspect it was once excavated into a trench system so large it could be seen from outer space! Luckily, Google Earth captured the moment...

Image from Google Earth

Post Production is going full steam ahead at Cutting Edge Post in the Fox Studios Entertainment Quarter. It's very exciting hearing the screams and explosions through the wall of the editing suite where Dany Cooper our Editor and Luke Byrne, First Assistant Editor, are cutting the film.

Our very talented Editor, Dany Cooper

These two are working tirelessly and Dany is deliberating closely with Jeremy Sims - who often seems to disappear into the dark edit suite for days at a time.

Our Post Production office is a few doors down the corridor in Cutting Edge. Sadly most of our Production team have moved on to new projects. We said our goodbyes were to Michelle Russell our Line Producer, Kelly Vincent our Production Coordinator, Katrina Lubans our Production Secretary, Lucy Vorst our Film Accountant, and Sandy Stevens our Production Manager - who is now working on a Bollywood film being shot in Sydney. (Couldn't get much further from a WWI drama!)

These ladies have had a huge job of settling all accounts and signing off and filing away any loose ends of Production, before packing everything up ready for Post.

Saying our goodbyes to Sandy (far left) and Lucy (2nd left). 
Colleen Clarke (far right) and Producer's Assistant Georgie Scott (2nd right) are staying on through Post.

Some new crew members have come on board to guide the project through the final hurdles in Post Production and ensure the film meets all delivery requirements and doesn't exceed the Budget. We are now in the capable hands of Colleen Clarke our Post Production Supervisor, from a company called Post and Deliver. She has a similar task to what our Production Manager, Sandy had during Production.

Another very important role is that of Visual Effects Supervisor. Ron Roberts makes sure the film is as visually precise (and exciting) as possible, using CGI (Computer Graphic Imaging) and other techniques. He deliberates closely with Luke, who provides Ron with a list of each scene that needs Visual Effect enhancement. For example, due to continuity reasons, the addition or enhancement of smoke and rain effects may need to be added to a shot, or a shot may need to be resized or blurred. On the odd occasion, something may need to be painted out of the picture - for example a glimpse of red underwear on a WWI soldier...

Ron also has the fun job of creating and enhancing explosions and flares, which were originally created by the Special Effects team during the Shoot.

And of course, the 'Big Bang'...

We are getting the film ready for test screenings. Audience members are selected to represent a range of ages, likes and dislikes,  genders etc to complete a questionnaire about the film. This gives the Director new insights into scenes that work particularly well, or those that are superfluous. Not only are we on a tight Budget and deadline, but also the running time can't be too long!

Armistice! - Production in Townsville is finished for Beneath Hill 60.

We have now sadly finished Production of Beneath Hill 60 in Townsville - after 40 days and 40 nights of shooting in the mud, in the dark, in the heat, in the wet, in the moonlight, in the tunnels and in the trenches.

Our Art and Construction Departments had the tough job of deconstructing the set, filling in the trenches, bunkers and shell holes out at Shane and Kylie Poole's Kelso property, as well as  dismantling the tunnel system and packing away the props. 

Seems like only yesterday we were standing on this exact spot, marking out the land with spray paint ready to beginning excavating the trenches. Here is Shane Poole (owner of the property) with Art Director, Sam Hobbs, out at Kelso, now all cleared out and filled in.  It's hard to believe it was a war zone only a week ago!   Gavin Markwell supplied the Excavator that was firstly used to dig the trenches and lastly to fill them in again.

Soon our labyrinth of tunnels will be all packed away and the shed on Brad Webb Drive will be empty again....

As for the left over explosives, why not have a bit of fun and let them off for an impressive atmosphere out in No Man's Land, strategically timed to coincide with a visit from Ray Martin and the 60 Minutes team for their story - at a safe distance of course! Ray looked very heroic marching across the battlefield with explosives erupting behind him and smoke trailing across his path. It's certain to be a fantastic piece which will be screened on Channel 9 in a few months. Here's Ray with Gyton Grantley after their terrific interview.

Everyone has been packing away their equipment - the lighting rigs, the moonbox, the cables, the cameras, the scrims, the Unit trucks, the Special Effects gear, the Sound Equipment, the Costumes, the Makeup truck, the props - slowly and carefully as everything is covered in a fine bulldust. The cars and trucks all had to be given more than one hose down and everyone's boots are well and truly caked in mud. There was a lot of cleaning and washing to be done!

One thing's for certain - everyone's going to miss Cookie and Louise's delicious catered lunches everyday!

Everyone was sad to leave Townsville, the friendly and hospitable locals, the perfect weather and saying goodbye to newly made friends from within the Beneath Hill 60 family. 

And so this was the 'Armistice' of Beneath Hill 60 in Townsville, celebrated with a Wrap Party at Greg Rains' Exchange Hotel. A wonderful time was had as cast and crew got together one last time for some food and beers, dancing and music and to say goodbyes to comrades from the 'Western Front'.

Armistice celebrations on the Western Front in 1918 - their brass marching band sounded a little different to the music at our Wrap Party...

... performed by Alien 8 (below) - these guys got everyone up and dancing and tapping their feet!

But it doesn't stop here...

We are now embarking on 15 weeks of Post Production, during which our editor, Dany Cooper, and a fantastic team of editors, graders, Sound mixers, Visual Effects supervisors at Cutting Edge Post in Sydney will turn the rushes of Production into the finished product: a 100 minute feature film.

Caroline Baum talks to Gillian Huxley, Australia’s only female Best Boy.

Gillian setting up a scrim with Gaffer, Miles Jones.

It’s taken me weeks to speak to Gillian Huxley. She’s always on the move around the set with too much of a sense of purpose to be interrupted.  Her flicking long black plait and formidable tool belt all add to a slightly intimidating  ‘don’t get in my way, I’m busy’ attitude. When she’s still, you can’t help but notice her ramrod straight posture and the fact that her feet are always in what ballerinas recognise as first position.  Her journey to the film set is unconventional, to put it mildly.

The daughter of an Australian jackaroo and a Chinese nurse who emigrated from Beijing, Gillian has her father’s nomadic spirit and work ethic. Harbouring dreams of becoming a dancer, she found herself accepted into class at the prestigious UK Royal Ballet School in London, despite her considerable height (She’s nearly 6 ft tall.) When  a career as a ballerina did not materialise, Gillian formulated Plan B for how to work in the theatre, though she took a roundabout way, switching from the feminine world of the tutu to the other extreme. 

In order to get work as a rigger in the theatre, at 23, she went to work on an oil rig in Bass Strait to build up her experience and her hours. There were three women in the crew with forty men. Gillian’s job saw her high up on a platform above the sea, pulling hoses out as part of an operation to remove drills from the seabed.  ‘It gave me the tenacity you need to see a job through to completion’ she says. 

‘In ballet,  the endpoint is perfection, which is unattainable and ultimately futile, so the oil rig was curiously satisfying. I’m pretty fearless by nature, so I didn’t find the height or the conditions scary.’

Once she had her qualifications as a rigger, Gillian moved into the world of theatre and rock and roll tours, becoming part of the crew for everyone from Andre Rieu to Michael Jackson on his History tour (‘He had bouncers the size of heavy oak doors’) and Robbie Williams, a personal favourite ‘ because he came downstairs and shouted us all drinks at his hotel one night’.

From stage shows to film was just one easy step. Her first film was Mission Impossible 2 in Sydney and she was soon established as the only female Best Boy in the country, working on Moulin Rouge and Wolverine  and fulfilling a personal ambition to work at the UK’s hallowed Pinewood Studios on one of the Star Wars movies.

Her favourite  experience on BH60 has been rigging the so-called Moonbox, creating the moonlight effect  by which many of the night time trench sequences were shot. ‘Eighty feet up in that cage of light,  you get so elated by the view, you are the eye in the sky.’

And the most indispensable item in that tool belt ?  ‘My Leatherman ‘ she says, without hesitation, ‘although I call it my Leatherwoman.’

Sporting a tattoo of a gecko on her leg, Gillian explains him as her climbing companion and talisman. Even when she’s relaxing, it’s with a sense of risk and height. She’s currently taking flying lessons, having mastered skydiving. Rock climbing is another pursuit. ‘Being in control of where you are heading matters to me. I like fighting gravity.’ The feminine side of her nature is apparent below the surface. ‘My toenails are always painted and my underwear always matches, that’s all you need to know!’

Gillian's gecko tattoo

After Hill 60, Gillian’s projects include work on another independent film, The Tree, in Queensland before building an eighty foot Christmas tree at Darling Harbour.  Next year, her plans are to crack the Chinese film industry as a fluent Mandarin speaker, while working on World Expo in Shanghai. Crouching tigers,  hidden dragons, watch out.

CREW PROFILE: Caroline Baum talks to Head of Makeup, Shane Thomas

There’s a reason that Shane and his team are known on set as The Beauty Department.

They always look good. Since the shoot has turned from the early civilian family and love scenes to the tunnels and trenches, everyone who goes into the make up truck comes out covered in mud and blood. But Shane and his team? Not a hair out of place.

Blessed with curls a Renaissance angel would envy, Shane fell in love with the movies as a kid. Growing up, his heroes were the Star Wars characters and The Wizard of Oz. ‘I also love Esther Wlliams movies’ he says.

After graduating from make up school in Sydney he got a lucky break into the business when he was taken on by seasonned make up artist Les van der Wal to work on Babe 2- an epic  shoot that lasted twelve months. ‘Because it was so long it was like an extra  year’s course, I learned so much’ says Shane, remembering that one of his jobs was ‘ to put wiglets on piglets. We had to glue these hand-

tufted hair pieces on to baby pigs while they were being bottle fed.’ 

Shane graduated from animals to children on Peter Pan - another unusually long shoot that lasted eleven months. ‘The huge luxury on that film was that we had a full time wig-maker on the team. She was old-school, London-trained and taught me how to set wigs. You wet them and then you bake them in the oven, which is great for period dos and finger waves.’

Working on Star Wars-  Revenge of the Syth was a career highlight,  given his childhood love of the characters. ‘It was pretty awesome to find myself turning Anakin into Darth Vader! We didn’t use any prosthetics for that transformation, just a lot of  subtle work on the eyes, shading them  as he crossed over to the dark side.’

Hill 60  is Shane’s first experience of a war movie. ‘There are two sorts of mud in the film: the blue clay type which the Germans dug through and the brown that the Australians dig.  We have to match the facial mud to the mud on the ground for the Aussies, but I like the blue stuff because it looks good when you add the contrast of blood from cuts and wounds.’

Like all make up artists, Shane has preferred  products but they are not the ones  in a traditional beauty kit. He uses a favourite brand of blood he imports from the UK. ‘ It’s from a company called Animated Extras and they offer different textures and colours’ he says, with the enthusiasm of a vampire. ‘I like it because it does not stain skin, hair or clothes and that’s really important from a practical point of view when you are having to do a quick touch up.’ He imports his wounds from a US company called Watermelon. ‘It’s latex painted into moulds   and it is particularly  skin friendly and effective,’ says Shane, who has to keep up with ever-changing techniques and technologies from suppliers as well as increasingly varied demands from directors.

‘Hill 60 has been challenging because the budget is tight  but the  film requires everything

 from the fresh faced beauty of a young girl to slit throats and stomach wounds that require pump rigs. Then there’s the fact that we are working under very difficult conditions, squeezing in and out of very tight, unfriendly spaces to get to the actors . There’s just no room for all of us to be doing touch ups in the tunnels at the same time so that’s an added pressure. We’ve had to become like a rapid response team, and work in quite an organic way’ says Shane, who starts a new job on the adaptation of John Marsden’s children’s classic Tomorrow When The War Began just one day after  wrapping Hill 60.

He’s in demand as much for his manner as his technique. The make up artist sees actors first thing in the morning, no matter what state they are in. Sometimes the truck is a confessional, sometimes it’s a therapist’s couch ‘In this job, you really have to love actors, make them feel safe and that you are there to help them on their journey. I often ask them how they want the atmosphere to be, whether they’d like music or not, to make them as comfortable as possible. Sometimes I am the last person they see before the camera rolls and I need  them to feel they can trust me completely.’ says Shane.

Asked who he’d most like to make up he replies Angelica Huston, Jake Gyllenhal (‘ he’s hot’) , Philip 

Seymour Hoffman and George Clooney.

And his favourite beauty product that everyone should have? 

Nothing fancy, not a luxury brand name. Just a jar of Paw Paw Ointment. 

Photo by Wendy McDougall