We produced the trailer as a way to raise funding for the short film. The finance for the trailer was helped by the Images Festival Award and they have been hugely supportive of the project from its very small, yet ambitious beginnings. We also had great support from friends, family and fans from across the world that donated their hard-earned cash to help fund the trailer, the website and allow us to keep building this world. So thank you again everyone for your faith in us!

Since then the trailer has generated a HUGE amount of interest. So much so that our direction shifted away from making this into a short film but expanded to a feature film. Our trip out to LA in early 2010 was the final vindication that the world of The Marionette Unit belonged on the big screen. We met with lots of people from different parts of the industry, wether they were managers, agents, producers, executives at studios or the odd hungry shark — they all had one thing in common to say to us: Make this into a feature film.

So that’s what we’ve been doing since March 2010, slowly building this fantasy world. It took us the better part of 9 months to finally figure out how we could tell this story and specifically what story to tell. That’s the toughest part, generating strong, believable characters, creating an entertaining and intelligent story and placing that in a fantasy world that functions as if it were real. That involves working out all aspect of the society, the people, the country, the world and how machines fit into all of that. I hope that helps to illuminate why we have been so off-the-radar since making the trailer.

One of our challenges was to try and make this world grand enough to create the right level of spectacle and awe that was needed for the story - but also small enough so that this would serve as a debut feature. That balancing act was tough to achieve and ultimately we had to let the story lead itself to wherever it wanted to go.

A first complete draft of the script has been done and it’s strong. It’s also big. Which is exactly how it should be. We tell people it’s an “alternative Victorian London” and it would be a crime to not show that. This is going to be a dark, moody picture - imagine Bladerunner in Victorian London and you’re on the right path.

So to where we are now. Because of the size of this film and the fact it would need a large budget - we thought it would be best to put it on the back burner for a while and concentrate on another science-fiction idea that would serve as a much more feasible debut feature.

I want to say this now: we are under no circumstances closing the door on The Marionette Unit. We aim to come back to this film and the world we’ve created once we can realistically afford to do so.

Updates will still keep coming for The Marionette Unit here on the blog and on Facebook and Twitter. We’re still speaking to industry contacts about it and as is totally common with this wonderful industry of film - THIS ALL MIGHT CHANGE.

Therefore, all we ask is that you have a little more patience and still support us and spread the word to help get this film to the screen. We know it will happen and we know that a lot of that comes from the support of everyone reading this blog.

2011 is still young and we might find ourselves on a different page in a few months time! We hope that it won’t be much longer that we can show the vision of this world to everyone out there!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone that has supported us so far in the project, whether it’s with your time or the many people who donated money through the website’s first iteration last year.

All your help and support has meant that we’ve got to where we are now, giving us the ability to keep working on this project with as much time as we would want.

It’s been a hard slog but we feel we’re drawing nearer to the end of the development and writing stage. There’s still some more to go and in due course we’ll post some details about the whole writing experience so far.

In the meantime we wish everyone a Happy Holidays and wish you a fantastic New Year.

We look forward to updating you more regularly in 2011 as we hopefully start to pick up more steam with the project!

- The Marionette Unit team -

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 who are interested in finding out more.

http://steampunk.synthasite.com/

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

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 refined our idea. At times though it did feel like we were circling this concept and trying to find the right way in. We must’ve come up with five different versions of the film; some were too huge and over-blown, some were too plot-driven, another idea had amazing antagonists but a weak protagonist who we had no idea how to write. Little things like changing what characters did for a living suddenly coloured the rest of the script – in a good or bad way.

Basically at the end of it this idea is one mercurial beast and pinning it down is based purely on gut-instinct and if this film is something that we would like to see. It’s so destructive to try and imagine what executive producers, or managers or financiers want to see out of it as you’ll water down the story. Another thing I’ve also had to remind myself is that it’s a work-in-progress. At university I always thought the first draft should be perfect and if it wasn’t there was something wrong with the idea and/or my writing. But you have to force your way through it and FIND the idea that serves the concept best.

When we couldn’t see the wood for the trees we always went back to our log-line (which even itself could change). It was more of a philosophical statement which would then inform us on our decisions. We debated each choice, making sure there were no plot or logic holes. If it didn’t make sense, we tried to make it make sense. Sometimes that worked, sometimes not. Other times you’d get towards the end of the film and realise the set up for the finale just didn’t work. That’s when you realise there aren’t any sacred cows. Even if we loved the first act and it was ‘perfect’ it would have to go if the ending wasn’t working. The setup has to be right and feel natural and believable.

Once we had the structure sorted on the index cards we wrote up the treatment, which was a little more detailed version of the cards and then onto writing the script. As using the index cards was for structure, when it gets to the script stage, we can concentrate on the little details and not worry about where the film is going. That’s already been worked out. In fact it makes the scriptwriting quite fun, you get to the meat of the scene.

I can’t wait for people to start reading it. I think there’s moments in the film that are really interesting and quite dark, set-pieces that visually reflect the philosophical statement at the heart of the film and really what I can’t wait for is to put on my directing hat and start visualising the film and designing all the elements!

I’ll try and update once we’re done and wrap up my experience on writing the first draft, then after that it’s brand new territory!

So there have been some changes in the world of The Marionette Unit. Firstly you may have noticed the website has changed… a lot! In fact it has been slimmed down. There are numerous reasons for this, but the main reason is because The Marionette Unit is now going to be a Feature Film. Yes our Victorian Sci Fi film is now being made into a full length film coming to a cinema near you.

As we mentioned a few weeks ago, the director Azhur Saleem and I went to Los Angeles for meetings and promotion of our film. We also went ideally to secure funding for the short film. What turned out to be one type of trip, quickly changed into another. Everyone we showed the trailer to, industry members as well, told us this would make a great feature film. So after some discussion between Azhur, Paul and I, we decided to forgot about making a short film and go straight to making it into a feature!

We are now busy writing the feature script in London and organising our next steps in regards to the feature film. One of those steps is related to the website. While we work on the expanded and new story, we decided best to remove all elements which relate to the short film version. The website will return, and it will be better than ever.

If you would like any more information about The Marionette Unit, please feel free to contact me on info@funsizestudios.com

Till next time

Happy Filmmaking

This is fantastic exposure for us within the growing Steampunk community and will hopefully generate even more fans for our film!

Executive Producer Jett Dunlap will be in attendance to present the trailer and talk about the film.

Last night at the O-Bar in Hollywood starting at 8 pm, a real buzz started to arise. People from all over the world were coming to see a trailer for a film that had not even been made.

What right did these young filmmakers have to make a film backwards, and why by 9:30 were over a hundred people fixated on a 200 inch projection screen to watch a 2 min trailer, which many had already seen?

My name is Jett Dunlap and I am an Executive Producer on this film. I saw this same little teaser trailer in October. My girlfriend had gotten home late and asked me to look at a preview to a film. She tells the story better, but needless to say I was not excited to see another “help me make my movie” pitch, though I watched it anyway to humor her. Then I saw IT. IT is something I looked for in movies, in women, and in products I represented. IT is the indescribable quality which separates greatness from oblivion that we too rarely see. This little glimpse, presented through the eyes of James Boyle and Azhur Saleem, hooked me.

I was born with severe dyslexia, and didn’t read my first full book until I was 28 years old. Perhaps that is why, like famously dyslexic Richard Branson, I like projects that are not made linearly. It’s one of the many reasons that I was so attracted to the concept for this film project.

Last night I stood in the wings of the screening room, listening to the chatter of our guests as they talked about this glimpse of a film. Through the general hum of excitement, I heard plenty of “wow”, “what happens next?”, “when do we get to see more?”, “that was cool”, and “I’ve never seen anything like that before”.

While it was exciting to hear such overwhelmingly sincere praise and interest, I feel it is important to realize what the future will bring. There will be a day when you the fans (whether you have seen this humble little preview from your own computer or at the O-Bar in Hollywood last night) will encounter an experience similar to this: While seeing a movie at your local theater, perhaps with the family or your friends or a partner, the room will fade to black, a familiar production symbol will come up, and then you’ll see some words flash across the screen, something like: “In a world where steam instruments power and control our lives…” An odd sense of Deja Vu may rumble in your soul, or a regretful realization may be felt in the pit of your stomach, before the title comes up: “The Marionette Unit”… “Coming this Christmas”. And you can’t eat your popcorn anymore, because you had your chance. You met James and Az a year and a half before, and you did not jump on their vision.

Now is the time, this is the place, you are the one; let’s see if you qualify to be a a part of a movie-making revolution.

Find me on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jett-M-Dunlap/625755080

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!