Drawn by a Star

My story is back to being all about Shifra. How she recovers from the abduction of her baby. How she recovers her will to live though drawing her feelings and thoughts in her extraordinary sketchbooks, just like her mother and grandmother did in different circumstances in Auschwitz. Shifra's recovery starts when she decides to accept the clairvoyants prediction that she won't find Samira in Paris, but Samira will find her in South America when she's 18. Vanessa Paradis. Could she be Shifra?

As arranged, I meet my artist friend at the bar in a village called Torvizcon. It's a twenty minute drive from my own village here in southern Andalucia. Jeanette is a textile artist. We share the same sense of awe of Nature. Her work is inspired by the landscape around here, its subtle colours, its amazing marks on rocks and hillsides. Of all the landscape poets I've ever read, Thomas Hardy's words have stuck in my heart for decades. Of a certain landscape he says: 'The crows... like inky spots on the nut brown soil...' Here, we don't have crows, and the soil isn't nut brown. It's parched and ochre coloured. But Jeanette and I both notice scratches, veins on rocks by the roadside. They look like prehistoric drawings of winged, beaked, creatures. Jeannette photographs them. I feel I could have painted them, they are strangely so very familiar. I feel anew the excitement to start painting again. It's been too long a sabbatical. Fiv...

Hana needs to soften the heart knots. She needs to become curious not furious. She needs to learn how to let herself off the hook. She needs to learn 'every decision I make is a choice between a grievance and a miracle.' Deepak Chopra. “True forgiveness is not an action after the fact, it is an attitude with which you enter each moment.” -David Ridge. This is the challenge and the quest Hana's needs to embark on. With clarity, she will learn to see the bigger picture of her fear, her guilt, her chronic low self esteem. Then she'll be ready to walk though a new door into a new life. When this happens, she'll have experienced miracles.

Hana needs a friend. I thought it was going to be her housekeeper Hildegard. But today, finding this beauitful drawing by Jim di Bartolo, I'm feeling the need to go back to the original idea that her friend is Joel. He's the loyal, elderly family manservant. So is Hana's back-story really believable? Aged ten, Hana walks out of Auschwitz with her grandmothers sketchbook sewn inside of her little blue coat. She does not recover from the trauma of losing all her family in the camp, and as a result, as an adult, becomes deeply troubled and reclusive. She's an insomniac and has an obsession for locking doors. She is incapable of sexual intimacy, doesn't know how to give love to her daughter, is widowed and becomes bitter young, all of which lead her to lose self respect. She has only one friend in her life, Joel. Because of this inner chaos, Hana desperately tries to compensate by seeking approval and acclaim through her art. At the end of the fil...

More ideas for the title of the movie: Drawing lessons. (Drawing by William T Ayton) Shifra's Mother. Rough Copy. Chalk talk. Hymn to Hana. Photo of Sonia Delaunay. "Cannes must be open to new ideas, while remaining faithful to its past, of course. Diversity can only enrich it. That´s what makes the Festival de Cannes our festival.” Thierry Frémaux I wish !

Today I found a possible new title for my screenplay. UPROOTED. By chance (?), in renaming Anabel Hana, I've been reminded of one of my guardians Hannah Margaret Stewart. An unsuccessful missionary turned atheist doctor, this clever little woman felt life had been bitterly unfair to her. Hana in the film needs a friend, good or bad, and in remembering Hannah Margaret, I've found a motive for Hana's most evil of act's: her collusion in the abduction of her granddaughter Samira. Jealously. This is what Hannah Margaret gave me in large dollops every day of my childhood. Non acceptance. Long story! Hannah Margaret was not evil. She was damaged beyond repair. Hana,it will transpire, is not damaged beyond repair. Hana's now seriously estranged daughter Shirfa will have preferred, in her childhood, the warm love of housekeeper Hildegarde. Must rename Hildegarde. This large, kind, loving, religious Bolivian servant unconditionally adored the youn...

Дорогі українські читачі, Є багато з вас! Так от оновлення мого screenpklay в Yoru мову, завдяки Google Translate! Мій фільм це все про зцілення неймовірні втрати ... зцілення втрати дитини до трьох поколінь єврейських жінок: бабусі Хани, дочки Шифра, а внучка Саміра. Але Саміра зламається візерунок. Це те, що я вирішив сьогодні. Це, як фільм буде запущений. Збільшити на студії Хана, перш ніж вона виходить для станції. Там у велику картину на її мольберт, її альбомах лежать в купі на її брудний стіл фарбою. Збільшити в живопису. Це історія про викрадення Саміра в Парижі, 18 років тому. Тепер те, що стиль буде її картина може бути? Я відразу ж думати про Шагала. Я перевіряю його. Я схвильований, щоб знайти я підозрюю, пляма на. Деякі з його картин майже сцени з фільму. Я перевіряю його більше, і знайти ми народилися в один день. 7 липня. Єврейські Шагала відбулася непохитну віру в існування чудес і в нескінченній мудрості Творця. Його життя було описана як Ода до радості ". ...

This is my work/play table. I'm procrastinating again. I do it very well. The problem with storyboarding my screenplay is there are just so many possibilities, and each possibility opens up a treasure trove of new ideas. It's very challenging to filter the ideas. The big question today is: will an audience really believe in synchronicity? How will Hana actually get to/find the shaman? The shaman tells Hana she has to find her granddaughter. The recovery of her health depends on this. I have many very different ideas about this, involving synchronicity, but which will be the most interesting? I think I need a sounding block. Am trying to weave in sounds, silence, atmosphere, character sketches, leading up to the 'inciting incident' which is when the challenge for the main character is laid out graphically for the audience. I love the trick that the audience knows something the films characters have yet to find out. Dear Universe. I know you are ...

My film is all about healing unimaginable loss... healing the loss of a child to three generations of Jewish women: to grandmother Hana, daughter Shifra, and granddaughter Samira. But Samira will break the pattern. Riddled with osteoarthritis, Hana ( the artist grandmother) can barely hold a pencil now. Bi-Ploar, a holocaust survivor, she's hit rock bottom. Desperately damaged by the 'loss' of her daughter Shifra to Bolivia ( though misunderstandings, furious rows, and prolonged projections) she also carries the guilt of collusion in the abduction of her granddaughter Samira. Unknown to Hana, in the next month, she will experience two life changing events: meeting the Shaman, and finding her long lost granddaughter Samira. The interconnectedness of all things...

Anabel, now re named Hana, the grandmother ( when young) in my screen play. “I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; so I love you because I know no other way.” Pablo Neruda This is how I feel about my screen play characters.