The Making of A Gangsters Xmas

 

This was my families 2011 holiday production, and boy we had a great time making it!  This was inspired by a photo shoot I did with my kids about 4 months back.  The pictures came out amazing and it sparked interest in an upcoming film.  I wasn't sure if my boy was ready for any acting yet...but he blew me away!  he stole the show as knuckles.  I just had to keep rolling with it. 

This movie was completely filmed on green screen so this was a big challenge for me.  I wanted to make this look good...make my family proud.  I knew i was going to make it a black and white flick...but I wanted just a splash of color in it.  I tried to create as much movement in the background as I could without distracting from the film.  My boy and I worked on the gangster accent for a few weeks.  He did a great job and working out an accent for his age.  We decided to use helium for Jackie and Jas because we thought it would be funny.  This was Jas's first time playing with helium and she had a great time!  (Gavin never really got the idea to suck in on the balloon!) 

The driving scene was actually done in my garage.  Originally our dog was supposed to be in it...but he started getting annoying so he got kicked out of the film.  Gavin loved the idea that he was going to drive, so he couldn't wait to get into the drivers seat.  I think he really thought we were going to go somewhere.  We ended it off with a scene with Jackie's parents and I couldn't be more happy about that.  I love envolving the entire family in on a film!

The ending credits are probably what make the film.  The song choice was by Jackie from a recent video of my friend Shane and his son tearing up some carpet on facebook.  To be honest...I never heard the song before that day.  Maybe I'm getting old, but now I've heard it 3000 times between editing and watching the video with my son.  It's a song by LMFAO.  (really??!!)  That song just seems to be infectious so we used it for the outtakes.  I think the camera caught some very real moments in our life, and how much fun we really like to have!  The poker scene was sweet!  I realized as we started filming that Gavin had no idea what poker was.  I know...a shocker coming from a guy that works in casinos!  But he's a natural and gave all the great poker looks.  And what really cracks me up at the end is Jackie sucking in on the helium balloon.  lol.  enough said!

Thanks for enjoying the film!