Hello everyone, It has been a while since Azhur and I wrote on the blog. As our previous post mentioned, we haven't forgotten about the project or our amazing fans. We have been working very hard on the feature script for The Marionette Unit. Azhur, Paul and myself cannot wait to tell the story and make the film, so look forward to lots of exciting news very soon.... In the meantime, we have some exciting news to tell now. The Marionette Unit is going to be appearing at two festivals in Sept! On the 4th of Sept, The Marionette Unit will be appearing at the Festival Des Arts Visuels De Vevey – Images 10 in Switzerland These were the guys who supported the film during the very early stages. We will be screening the trailer along with brand new concept artwork that hasn’t been revealed online. We will also get a chance to talk on stage to the festival goers about the film. www.images.ch/2010/ Then on the 11th Sept, we will be at The Asylum, the Premier UK Steampunk gathering run by the Victorian Steampunk Society in the historic city of Lincoln. We will have a specific booth there to promote the film and to talk to people ...

A little update to let you all know the latest on The Marionette Unit. You'll have noticed we've been a bit quiet on the blogging front and rest assured, it means we're hard at work on the feature script. We've had some great feedback on the trailer, from the public, Steampunk enthusiasts and industry members alike. It may be quiet on the site a little while longer as we put the finishing touches on our draft and we'll get some news out to everyone as soon as we start sending the script out to our contacts here in London and LA. In the meantime, keep spreading the word of the film to as many people as you can! Thanks

It’s been a while since I’ve written on here about the film and it’s because we’ve been busy writing away on the idea. As an update, Paul and I are forging through the script and it’s shaping up nicely. The process has been amazing though. It’s important to us to try and get as much of the idea nailed before we sit down at our laptops on Final Draft and start putting it together. The reason for this is just to get the overall idea organised in our heads – and it’s MUCH easier to change things at this stage. You don’t want to get to page 90 and realise there’s a logic problem making you have to go back to page 1. Also, working on index cards, where each card represents a turning point or scene, means you don’t worry about the details or dialogue, even characterisation. You just work out the structure of the film. A lot of time was spent discussing the idea, what kind of film we wanted to make and what we wanted to say as filmmakers. All of this is changeable, so it’s a case of moving around and slowly narrowing down our choices till we’ve ...

James, Paul and I are heading off to LA this week to promote The Marionette Unit and help secure funding for the short film. We're aiming to meet a lot of industry people who could be interested in helping on the film. It'll also be the first time in almost a year that we'll all be in the same room together, as myself and James are in London and Paul is in Vancouver. The long-distance writing has created its own set of challenges, but we've managed to soldier through with emails and late night/early morning video chats. Now to have the chance to talk across a table is going to be great. It'll give us the much-needed time to nail down the feature script. It's exciting and pretty nerve-wracking at the same time as we're going to be road-testing the trailer with a lot of people who do this purely for a living! Keep up with all the news as it happens either on this blog. Hopefully there'll be some pretty good news coming out of the next two weeks here!

Hey everyone, Azhur recently was interviewed by the website www.behindballet.com.au. They are based in Melbourne, Australia and it is the blog of The Australian Ballet. Looking at dance through the prism of fashion, music, art and literature, they unravel the stories behind their productions and mine ballet’s juicy past to find the new in the old and the old in the new. They took an interest in The Marionette Unit because of our central character Georgette being a ballet dancer. It is a great interview. Azhur talks about how the original idea came about with myself. He also mentions his inspirations for the dance scene in the movie as well as some of his film inspirations. Read it at : http://www.behindballet.com/making-the-marionette-unit/

Had a really interesting conversation with Paul the co-writer today during a story conference meeting we were having. We're in the process of really nailing the structure and tone of the film in treatment form before moving onto the actual screenplay draft. It's constantly evolving, characters are changing and morphing into others and levels of importance are constantly in flux. This is the fun part, but also pretty tough. It's easy to get lost - but it helps to work in a team. We both can keep each other in check. With an idea like this it's easy to let your imagination totally wander and you start getting an idea that would require a budget of $100m or something. Our aim with this film isn't to make a blockbuster type affair but more something like a dark thriller, a film that deals with the characters' lives and situations in a fantastical and visually interesting setting. We're having to strike the balance between taking the story to the limits and writing a script that can be produced on a reasonable budget. Normally you just worry about the story you want to tell - which is pretty much how we approached the short script version ...

Hey everyone, So 2010 continues to be great for The Marionette Unit. Azhur and I have loads of great things to tell you very soon. In the meantime, to help celebrate the new year, we are launching the redesigned home page for the official website. Call it v2.0 if you will. To see the new page click HERE During the coming weeks and months, we will be updating it with all your wonderful comments about the trailer (some of you may see yours already there). We will also be announcing events that you fantastic people can get involved with. Another new feature is a link to Azhur's Filmmaking blog on his official website. Azhur has a lot to say about his job and film in general, which is always a fantastic read. I urge you all to subscribe and keep up to date with his thoughts and ideas. Also if you would like to get in contact with Azhur and I, we have a new contact page HERE as well. Until next time, happy filmmaking James

Happy New Year everyone. Azhur and I hope you had a great holiday break So we have come to a new year and already it is looking good for The Marionette Unit. As most of you know 2009 was a great year of development for our film. Launching the website and film making blog in April, gaining fans over the summer, shooting then releasing the Inception Trailer in Sept and a very successful trip to LA in Oct. Some of our recent highlights: Azhur posted this yesterday, but it is worth mentioning again. The Marionette Unit on IMDB News: Brit Steampunk The Marionette Unit Impresses. http://www.imdb.com/news/ni1355497/ Promising teaser for Victorian steam-punk drama The Marionette Unit http://www.imdb.com/news/ni1355607/ Inception Trailer viewer figures: YouTube : 5376 Vimeo : 4490 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDn9TDz6D3Y http://www.vimeo.com/6792930 Some comments from YouTube "Beautiful Cinematography. Was it shot in HD or film?? Looking forward to it." "Looks very interesting - please get more footage up! Nice period feel." "What a tease!!! Awesome work here! What camera did you use?" "This looks sick!!!" The thought that our trailer has been watched almost 10,000 times is very exciting and makes us very happy, and its only a teaser as well! The Marionette Unit : Internet response. Over the holiday and new year period amazingly and to our excitement The Marionette Unit started to spread ...