Boardwalk Empire

Boardwalk Empire is an HBO show created by Terence Winter. It is an American period style show based around the prohibition era of the U.S.A. It follows a group of characters that are involved in the illegal sale of alcohol throughout the New York/New Jersey area.

The show aired from September 19, 2010 to  October 26, 2014 having five seasons. I have not completed the series as of now, but am in the middle of the second season. I personally love the show. It is unique and the writers have done a good job crafting creative characters for the audience to interact with. My favorite character is Jimmy, played by Michael Pitt. Jimmy is a Young man that does what needs to be done, and also has an interesting past that is unknown to him in the first season. 

The show also incorporates real characters from history such as Al Capone played by Stephan Graham. 

The show expands on american history to help tell a fictional story that keeps its audience on the edge of their seat and wanting more with each episode.


HBO invested a lot into this show. The pilot episode alone cost around 18 million dollars according to wikipedia, and in my opinion it payed off. The series ended up winning 2 Golden Globes and 4 Emmy's.

Boardwalk Empire Season 2 Finale

Last night I re-watched one of the best season finale's I have ever seen, the season finale of season two of Boardwalk Empire. The show itself is one of the best on television. Combining great authenticity from the time period and a great story with great characters. The realism in the show is what makes it great to me. Many of the characters in the show are real people (although many are also made up) such as Al Capone and the main character Nucky Thompson. However what made the season finale so great was the shocking sequence at the end of the episode.

Jimmy Darmody was a World War One veteran returning to Atlantic City to work for his uncle, Nucky Thompson. Quickly Darmody started to neglect Nucky and work against him instead of with him, with the help from his dying father. By the end of the season two Nucky and Jimmy were enemies, and the two threatened to kill each other multiple times. It was Nucky who finally got the last laugh.

The entire episode it appeared that Nucky was the one that would be getting killed. As his life was threatened by more than just Jimmy. Instead it was Nucky that killed Jimmy. Killing off one of the shows main characters in shocking fashion. Other than Nucky Thompson, Jimmy was the biggest character in the show till his demise. Killing him off seemed to kill off one of the main story lines of the show as well. A very risky and shocking decision by the writer of the show (Terrence Winter).

Boardwalk Empire will begin its fourth season this summer. The third season was just as good as the second one, so losing Jimmy's character didn't really ruin the show at all.

HBOGO

     The ability to re-watch any show on television new or old is a technology of a generation.  Since Netflix started in 1999 they have been the leader in changing the game of how we watch television on our computers.  The technology spread fast and soon enough every television station will have some type of internet access for live viewing or re-programming.  In 2010 HBO launched its internet streaming syndicator, HBOGO.  This allowed HBO to maintain its credibility as a high powered premium channel with great respect for the quality of programming.

     HBO has been reaching out to service providers to make deals so more people have access to HBO as long as they are paying the premium through the service provider.  Once HBO made a deal with Optimum I immediately created an account with HBO GO.  Since then I have been catching up on my favorite HBO shows like Entourage, Boardwalk Empire, The Sopranos and I can't wait till Game of Thrones season 3 comes out.  What is nice about HBO that differs from companies like Netflix and Hulu Plus is that because HBO has its own programming they can put their shows up on their site immediately after they air giving the viewer the ability to access them anytime.  Netflix has recently taking the role of studio with the release of their first original series House of Cards.  I can't wait to view great television shows on my computer at home on my own time.

Boardwalk Empire

Most of you have probably heard of HBO's hit television show Boardwalk Empire. Last week I posted the call sheets for the show. I was watching it tonight and I remembered thinking how amazing the actual boardwalk set is. The set built nearby NYC is a miniature version of the Atlantic City boardwalk in 1920. Where the ocean would be is a huge blue screen. By being able to use this huge blue screen the show is able to spend more money elsewhere and pull of shots that were improbable before (like a shot of the ocean behind a fake boardwalk). It reminded me how far technology has come, even in the last few years, and I think that more filmmakers need to consider it an option. Although there are many examples of its abuse, I think CGI can be a great thing.

Call Sheets

Today we are shooting and I thought it would be a good idea to do a post about call sheets. Call sheets are super important, especially the larger and more complicated your production is. In its most basic form, call sheets have the time and location where each member of your shoot needs to be. In addition to this, call sheets typically have contact information, scenes and script pages that are being shot. Large productions have very detailed call sheets that include information like weather, sunset/sunrise times, nearest hospitals, and restaurants. Call sheets could also include transportation arrangements. I know so far those of you reading this are probably only doing fairly small productions but I would recommend trying to use call sheets on your next shoot. You will probably find out how useful and time saving they really are. Below is a copy of a actual call sheet from boardwalk empire that I got from one of their crew members last year.

(note: there are two copies of the second page to show the bottom that was being cut off)