video podcast: Idiocracy

I realize that at this point, Idiocracy may be playing at exactly one theater in the country (Alamo on South Lamar)*. So why I am posting a video podcast about the movie now?
The podcast you are about to watch was meant as an experiment. My husband is learning about video production and needed some footage to edit for a Final Cut Pro class. So last weekend, we shot the following video, which he then edited and fancied up. We did not intend this to be professional, which is why you can see a blanket on my lap, and the cat’s tail is visible near the end of the episode, and … well, you’ll see. It’s only three minutes long, and you get to watch me and The Beau exchanging not-quite-witty repartee.

If you can’t get the embedded video to work, try watching directly from YouTube.
We learned a number of important lessons from the experience. First of all, we need to set up the chairs differently so I’m not in profile the whole time. Second of all, I think the camera should have been closer or zoomed in more, although part of that was due to a tripod issue (we didn’t have one). Third, maybe we should have actually thought about what we were going to say beforehand — at one point, I mention something about Idiocracy doing fairly well in theaters considering it had no publicity, and that’s not actually true. The box-office take last week was lousy, although it was somewhat better after the first week. I think that if we’d picked a movie with more stills and even a trailer available, so The Beau could intercut those images, the video would have been better.
On the other hand, we’re both having a lot of fun and it shows in the video. I’ve seen too many video podcasts where the people on-camera seem afraid to move or to converse normally. We don’t care, I keep prattling on, and so at least it’s lively.
I’m sure we’ll do this again sometime because it was so much fun — well, for me, anyway. I didn’t have to do any of the editing, I just had to sit there and talk about movies. Let me know what you think.
And if you haven’t had quite enough of me and The Beau chitchatting about Idiocracy, the clip of us with the Movie Musketeers from Austin Movie Show is now available on YouTube, too. I hadn’t ever been interviewed by a robot before. Enjoy!
*Actually, I checked and it seems Idiocracy is playing at four theaters in Austin, one in Houston, one in Chicago, and five in the Los Angeles area. So it’s not dead yet! Go see it if you’re in the mood to laugh at goofy gags this weekend.