Marketing Science, Sex and the Ladies - Press Kits, DVDs, and Festivals, Oh My!

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May I just take a moment and give you all out there a little bit of an overview about what is going on here in SSL land. I figure this blog is partially about the experiences and so forth of making this independent movie, so maybe I should catch you up on the background work from time to time.

This is AnC...posed for the camera (on a timer). This was for our 2012 AnC Holiday Card

I would put our current state of affairs squarely in the 'press kit hell' zone...well kinda. I actually like the press kit part. I mean it is time consuming as hell and tedious and it feels like I am never going to get things finished and out in the time frame I was hoping for. That's all true for sure, but I could say that for every single part of the movie making process - it always takes forever, consumes my life, and involves an annoyingly large amount of attention to detail...and I feel like I'm on the brink of failing at every step. It's all terrible, but you know, not really that bad. The whole movie making process is also one where I feel creative and excited, where there's constant fun bullshitting with people I like. I laugh a lot and make new friends and feel like I'm doing something that I want to do. It's very satisfying actually, and the press kit part of the process is really no different. I would say, though, that it has a slight advantage in that at this stage, I know that we've succeeded in making a movie that we are proud of (otherwise we wouldn't be promoting it). So, maybe I should say we're in press kit heaven...or maybe purgatory is a better description...yeah, cause it does feel like I'll be pushing this damn movie for the next quadrillion years. It's gonna be slow process. I'm in for the long game. The way I see it, endurance is the key when promoting a movie by nobodies from nowhere with no one famous in it and about a subject that is not for discussion in polite company.

So, point being we're doing press kits. We had to get some out to Louisville and Minneapolis for the festivals pretty quickly since the turnaround time between finding out you're in and the festival dates are often closer than you think. We didn't get elaborate for this one. We just went with a basic package containing a DVD and a simple color printing on paper - mostly leading people to our more detailed online press kit. We always do snail mailers though for press kits, but have clear direction to easy online content also. We assume people pay more attention to a package, but want their info easily accessible online.

For our Indy premiere in November (details soon btw), however, and for future press kits, we are creating something more elaborate. It's how we do. We like them to be unique, handmade-ish things that almost feel like a weird little piece of art (with clear and pertinent information, of course). These that we're conjuring up now will involve lots of strangely designed business cards, a lovely box (not that kind...although it may be pink...), ribbon, and lots of other surprises. The brainstorming and research that went into this is kinda stupid, although the three of us at AnC are pretty damn good at this kind of shit. In an odd way, we are like a well oiled machine for these things. We price shop, shoot down each other's ideas, make new ones, go through scenarios, and it's long and involved and kinda hard, but we always have a blast doing these. I'll put up some pics when we're done with them.

So, just for some nuts and bolts of our lives here. Here's the stuff that's been on our to-do list the past few weeks.


Pre-work for press kits

• update online press kit (add festival laurels, ad events, add press quotes and links to reviews)
• update SSL movie site
• burn lots of DVDs (we use blank DVDs pre-printed with the SSL logo)
• create DCP and Blue Ray exhibition copies of SSL
• investigate possible places to send press kits
• assemble contact names, email, and mailing addresses

Paper press kits for Minneapolis and Louisville

• design work for quick paper press kit
• write copy 
• investigate possible places to send press kits
• go to post office and mail them
• follow up through email with individualized letter a week later

Indianapolis premiere 

• investigate possible venues / visit venues
• negotiate details of event with venue
• create online ticket purchasing site to sell tickets through
• Send ticket and movie info to venue for their site

Indianapolis Press Kits

• Investigate pricing for boxes, cards, etc and create budget
• order all pieces
• write copy for all pieces of press kit
• design work for all cards, stickers, etc
• create individual cover letters for each press kit
• assembly line for press kits
• go to post office and mail them
• follow up through email with individualized letter a week later

Miscellaneous

• enter 3 festivals (these bitches can get expensive, so we just try to enter a few at a time, but consistently do so)
• investigate blogs, etc that may have an interest in reviewing SSL and query them (this takes a lot of searching and a lot of writing personalized emails to people you don't know)
• communication with people hosting small group showings (sending DVDs, following-up, etc)
• dealing with needs for more data space (cause we made this huge, space eating movie)
• discuss next script (ya gotta keep moving forward, right?)

Smart Bitches, Trashy Books Reviews Science, Sex and The Ladies

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Science, Sex and the Ladies got its first real review - not an interview with us movie makers or anything like that, but a real review. I've been waiting for one of these, and I'm super excited with the outcome. I'm particularly excited because of the site we were reviewed on - Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, which mostly deals with Romance Novels (all of the romance, none of the bullshit).

Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

I don't read romance novels, or really anything much except non-fiction books about sex, but a friend and SSL guest blogger Kat Van Sass, an avid romance reader, got me on the SBTB train when she SSL Reviewed a book SBTB recommended that totally had some realistic ladygasming. She also led me to a funny orgasms-in-romance-novels thread on SBTB that I blogged about. Anyway, these SBTB ladies pull no punches, and that, my friends, makes a good review. 

When I saw they sometimes review movies, I looked through their bloggers and found the one who's reviewing interests most matched the movie and sent her the info (she also writes the blog Geek Girl In Love). She, surprisingly, wrote back and said she'd do it. (Seriously the amount on non-responsiveness I get is astronomical, and I will ever appreciate this woman for taking time out of her life to randomly review this weirdly styled, controversial, somewhat explicit movie by nobody, with nobody famous in it). I told her going in that I understood a review didn't mean a good review... I mean I read their FAQ on the subject. They pointed out that most of the grades are in the C range and gave some C, D and F reviews to read.

Read those reviews. Now imagine we were saying those things about your book. Imagine Candy nitpicking on stupid details ("Morphine wasn't isolated until the 1800s!" "Why are people in 18th-century England saying 'Okay?'") and Sarah tearing your character a new one for being incredibly stupid. Imagine us calling the hero a fucking asshat, and the heroine Tonya Harding on crack — MORE crack than she normally smokes, even. Does the thought make you want to puke? Enrage you? Make your stomach twist? You might want to think twice about sending your book to us. If you've read those reviews, and you're SURE you can tolerate the level of bitchiness and snark we're going to level on it if we decide it's bad, or even if it's just mediocre, then go right ahead.

So, I went ahead. Feel free to read it HERE. We got a B+ which is better than Maleficent (B) but worse than HER (A) - (which was also SSL reviewed BTW). What I really appreciate about this review was that she got that "The main premise of SS&L is that no one has ever scientifically documented a vaginal orgasm – that is, an orgasm that does not involve stimulation of the clitoris." She got that the movie was about how this obsession our culture has with vag-gasms has an affect on us all. 

Granted she let us know that she got it because we rather annoyingly said the whole vag-gasms-haven't-been-recorded-scientifically thing a million times, but strangely we get feedback way too often that sort of completely ignores this major point from the movie. More often than I'd like, the focus for people seems to shine on the idea that kids should be taught more comprehensively about sex or that we should all be more sex positive -  but the whole vaginal-orgasms-don't-really-exist thing seems to get swept under the rug. 

Like, I've said before, there is a whole lot of stuff in SSL, and it's always surprising to me what different people tend to focus on, but I'd really like to have more focus on discussing if I am on the right track or way off base with this statement about vaginal orgasms. It's the controversial part. It's the part that is different from the status quo most-women-need-clitoral-stimulation-of-course-but-certainly-some-women-must-have-gSpot/vaginal/cervical-orgasms way of talking that dominates the discussion now. It's the part I want people to start thinking about, and I LOVE that this reviewer brought that up. I don't know if she fully agreed or not, but she got it and she talked about it. That's all I ask.

I don't mind if research comes along at some point that shows I'm off my rocker, but I think it is a HUGE idea to consider. What if...just for a second consider what if it really were true that the only way women orgasm is from stimulation of the clitoral glans-however that gets done (in the same way that men only orgasm from stimulation of the penis). Just...what if? What would that mean about our current sexual culture? How incredibly off-base would our understanding of female sexuality and females in general be? With our scientific understanding as it is now, it's something worth considering, and I just want that conversation to start happening.

Thanks again to Geek Girl In Love and Smart Bitches Trashy Books. Now, where's the next review...???

Butler University Magazine and Me

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One of my 2 friends from college (Sooory, it's just that I didn't live on campus, so it was hard to meet people - or at least that's what I tell myself.) texted me the other day with the following picture.

That's right, ya'll. Looks like I made it into Butler University Magazine! I had sent them a press kit before our cast preview screening, as I did with several media outlets around Indianapolis. However, they didn't respond at all (like every other place I sent it too except for 1 cool reporter at Nuvo), and it's been a couple months ago, so I hadn't thought about it. I guess they threw it into the "What are these graduates doing now" file and moved on with their lives. So I thought this was fun - and also probably the lamest of all possible pieces of media coverage one could have.

However, I thought I'd just mention ol' Butler University here because Science, Sex and the Ladies includes a strangely large amount of people who went to Butler but didn't meet there. That's why I actually sent the press kit to Butler University Magazine in the first place - because I thought this weird Butler grouping might interest them.

Here's the line-up. I have a Chemistry degree from there. Nathaniel Blume, our composer has a degree in music composition from Butler.Our choreographer, Heidi Keller Phillips, who also acted in the movie, was in the prestigious Butler Ballet program. (Unfortunately, the dance scene that was scored by Nathaniel, lyrics by us at AnC, and choreographed by Heidi didn't make the final cut. It was one of the first parts of the movie we created, and a part I most dearly loved. Sadly, in the end though, it didn't work with the feel of the rest of the movie. Plus we didn't have any experience with creating a musical number up to that point, and we made some mistakes in the shooting and planning that couldn't be overcome in a way we felt completely comfortable with. However, we loved the processes, our collaborators, and musical numbers in general, so there will be another musical number in an AnC movie. Mark my words.) Also, at least 5 of our actors graduated from the Butler performing arts college. Some of the actors definitely knew each other, but other than that, we all just ended up together, and we think it's real sweet.

Press Kit Response to the Most Controversial part of Science, Sex and the Ladies

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I have about 15 blog posts rolling around in my mind that I would like to write. However, I can't seem to find the time to do any of those right now (sorry about the almost week between this and last post by the way...). The day job and some other things are taking priority right now. So, I am posting something here, but it is actually something I recently wrote for our online press kit for the movie. We have a section in there called Q&A, where we answer some commonly asked questions about the movie.

Let me just say that the responses we have been getting from this movie have all been positive, I know that sounds ridiculous, but let me explain further. Some responses are super positive through and through, but others are mostly positive but with some concerns. The concerns always come from the most controversial part of the movie, so I get it. There is a lot of content in this movie and most are things that are hard not to get behind. It's that whole part about us saying that the stimulation of the vaginal walls has never been shown to cause orgasm that gets some people. However, it's the part I think is most important. We as a culture have ignored this issue for far too long, and I think that's part of the reason we're in the situation we are in now.

So, I figured we needed to talk more about this part of the movie in the press kit, because I know it really does strike nerves - sometimes hurtfully and sometimes refreshingly, and I think responses to it can be guttural and emotional, so I think it's important to clearly reiterate what exactly the movie is saying and to keep it in perspective. So here's that little section of our Press Kit Q&A.

still from Sciences, Sex and the Ladies

Do you really think that vaginal orgasms don’t exist?

 We knew that discussing the vaginal orgasm in the way we do would be controversial.  However, this discussion is a fundamental elements of SSL’s argument, and we believe it opens up important  conversations that our culture must engage in if there is to be any real change. 

What the movie actually states is that an orgasm caused by stimulation of the vaginal walls has never been documented. Given the media omnipresence and the cultural importance of women attaining orgasm merely through the penile/vaginal penetration, and given that there are women who clearly say that they do orgasm this way, this statement could seem overly bold and even harsh. Yet, it’s a true statement, at least as true as we can tell. Of course, one never knows what may pop up in the literature, but we do keep up pretty well on the research. 

There are some popularly cited studies used often to give credit to the idea of this vaginally activated orgasms (VAOs); studies involving the close proximity of the inner clitoral legs to the vagina, brain scans of women claiming (although not physically verified) to have experienced VAOs, instances in which arousal is recorded or pleasure is reported due to g-spot/vaginal/cervical stimulation. However, we have yet to find a study where there is a causal link between vaginal/ g-spot/cervical stimulation and a verified instance of orgasm (orgasm being the universally accepted description documented by Masters and Johnson). In fact the only physical sexual release related to vaginal stimulation that has been recorded is ejaculation, which is physically quite different from an orgasm. It may seem like VAOs should exist, but if they do, the scientific community has yet to document them.

13. So, are you calling women who say they have vaginal orgasms liars?  The movie speculates that most women who claim to orgasm from vaginal stimulation alone – actually may not be orgasming in this way.  Shaming  women by calling them liars is certainly not our intention, and we hope the movie reflects this. Name calling and blaming is of no use to such a nuanced and important topic, but clarity and honest discussion most certainly is. 

It is uncontroversial to say that the vast majority of women do not orgasm through vaginal stimulation. Most surveys would put that number at 70-85% of women. However, to speculate about the accuracy of the vaginal orgasm claims of the remaining 15-30% is quite controversial. Yet, the fact remains that there is a discrepancy. There has never been a recorded instance of orgasm caused by vaginal stimulation, yet some women claim these happen. Something has to give, and we argue that of those 15-30% of women, some may actually be ejaculating and calling that an orgasm, or having some kind of spiritual/emotional climax and calling that an orgasm, or attaining a high level of physical arousal and calling that an orgasm, or simply claiming on a survey that they orgasm this way when they do not. 

We understand that women have traditionally had explanations of their own experiences ignored far too often, and we know that second guessing a person’s answers may strike some as condescending. We get that, but we don’t think it does women or the scientific understanding or orgasm any good to blindly slide past this hard issue. 

We would argue that given the saturation of vaginally stimulated orgasm in our media,  given the cultural importance placed upon orgasm through penile vaginal stimulation,  given that our society often leaves women and girls ignorant about their orgasm functioning and genital structure in ways it does not for men, and given that even sexual advisers and researchers, when speaking about women, are known to use the word “orgasm” in relation to things other than the established definition of orgasm (such as ejaculation, emotional/spiritual climax, and high levels of arousal) - given all of that, we don’t see why it would be such a leap to wonder whether the last 15 to 30% of women might not actually be experiencing orgasm. 

As opposed to seeing this inquiry as a means to call women liars and creating a harsh  hierarchy of female orgasm, we see this as a means for giving women the accurate information they are craving and for creating a clear vocabulary for which women can speak about their sexual experiences. We believe women are fully capable of moving forward in this way without judging each other or themselves for the way all women have had to rather blindly negotiate their way around this confusing sexual landscape thus far. 

If you’d like to read further about these ideas, check out the following posts on the SSL blog. 

http://www.sciencesexandtheladies.blogspot.com/2012/10/yeah-you-heard-me-vaginal-stimulation.html 

http://sciencesexandtheladies.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-g-spotvaginal-orgasm-debate-is.html

Wanna Watch Science, Sex and the Ladies?!

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Hello all of you out there who may or may not read this blog somewhat regularly! I need some help. Well, I hope you will benefit too, but here's the deal. I have spent the last 10 years working on a movie about the female orgasm. It is finally finished, and frankly I'm damn proud of the thing. It says things that I think people need to hear, and it's a pretty fun ride too. Anyway, this whole getting people to hear/see the movie thing isn't just going to happen on it's own. That's where you come in.


We are doing all the normal entering festivals kinds of things, but we also have a different strategy. We have a crazy idea that if we send it out into the world for small groups of people to see, then it will spark conversation ,which will convince another group of people to see it, which will spark more conversation and so on. Point is, I'm hoping to create a little buzz about the movie, get some honest reviews, and ultimately get eyes on it, so below is what we're proposing. If anything sounds interesting, please, please, please make my day and email me at anc at ancmovies dott com. Seriously, you would make my day, week - month even. For real.

1 Host a get together to watch Science, Sex and the Ladies. Here's the things you need to know.

• It doesn't need to be fancy; just you, a few friends, some fun, and the movie
• We will provide you with the movie. We can send a DVD or you can access our online streaming version - your choice.
• You gotta take a picture of the group-movie-watching-festivities and send it back to us so that we can post it on the movie's site and show all those other folks out there what they're missing out on (if there is a problem with your party's comfort level in taking pictures, we can figure something more creative out to document it)
• If anyone at your party wants to use the movie and host another get together with some different people, we'd love it - just let us know and send a pic

2 Review this movie

• Good, bad, or ugly. We don't care what you say as long as you say something
• We don't care where you write about it as long as other people can see it...your blog, your college newspaper, a big huge famous magazine. It's all good by us.
• We'll provide you with an online screener and a press kit

3 Come at me with some other awesome creative idea, bro!

• Know someone else who'd be interested in 1 or 2 up there? By all means, send this post off to them.
• Wanna tweet this shit or post it on FB? Do it! (Those are the only social media sites I really know)
• Have a larger venue or larger group in some far away city (that means somewhere other than Indianapolis) that would like to screen this movie? We're all in - as long as no one has to pay to see it. We'll help, support, whatever is needed of us. 
• Anything else. Seriously. We're all ears. 

Well, that's that. Thanks for listening. Also, if you are new to the blog and don't know anything about this movie I speak of, check out one or both trailers on the right of this page. If you have been reading this blog, then you definitely have an idea about the tone of this movie. SSL Blog is very much related to and expanding on subjects in SSL the movie, so if you like the blog, I think you'll enjoy the movie.

Thanks all. (* update - I just want to put a reminder at the end of this blog too that you can just email me - my name is Trisha, BTW - at anc at ancmovies dott com if you're interested in any of this. I would be so excited to hear from you. Truly.)

A talking year book pic? Yeah, that's in SSL.

A nice 40's family...just at the start of the post WWII Sexual Revolution

Of course the movie talks a little about Romance Novels

SSL's got all kinds of surprises - including people holding cardboard ice cream cones!

A cave women might masturbate with rocks in this movie. I promise it makes sense in context.

Just a little scene about adolescent female desire

NUVO

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When you live in the Indianapolis area and you are in the arts. The go to paper to get coverage of your work is NUVO, the alternative paper for Indianapolis. AnC has been in it a few times over the years for our movie making, and we just graced their pages again for SSL. It's a super sweet spread over two pages in Their "Sex" edition. Pretty appropriate if you ask me and timely since we are having our cast and crew and friends screening tomorrow. This is just the start of getting this wild movie off the ground and we like to think a big move on the road to realign the cultural (mis)understandings around female orgasm.  If you want to see the article it's here. Page 18 and 19.

Thanks to Rebecca Berfanger, first, for wanting to write about our little movie, and, second, for writing it up so well.We were also pretty excited that we had more than one picture and in color even, that's a first for our NUVO appearances.

Assembly line Fun with AnC Movies

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Today was a good day. Some family birthday stuff for luch including good pizza and cherry pie. Then some old school AnC assembly line fun. You see, we here at AnC Movies have a long tradition of doing weird holiday cards for our mailing list that are ridiculously hands-on intensive. There's always been a lot of folding, cutting, hooking, signing - one year there was a putting on lipstick and kissing the envelope part of the assembly line. There's always a lot of fun, memories, farts, bitching. It's a good day. The thing is, we've kinda been busy with the movie the last couple years and have neglected our AnC holiday card duties.

We're still neglecting them (although we have one in the plans for the near future), but we are getting ready for our cast and crew screening of the movie this Thursday, so we were assembling goodie bags and also getting all the prizes ready to ship for Kickstarter backers, so it felt a lot like the ol' card makin' days.

We're watching the Olympics too, cause why not? Who doesn't love figure skating and snow boarding competition once a year? No one sane - that's who.

Anyway, enjoy some pics, and I'll be back tomorrow.

Me and B doin' the damn thing

Charlie showing off the pieces of a Kickstarter package

Barney's cat Yancy sleeping on things we need to use

Science, Sex and the Ladies Doesn't Fit IMDB's Idea of Docs, But Whatevs

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Okay, since this blog is about both ladygasms and making movies (particularly making Science, Sex and the Ladies, of course), I'd like to just take a minute and speak about a tiny something I've been dealing with in relation to the movie. It involves IMDB and how Science, Sex and the Ladies just doesn't fit quite right.

Here's the deal. I added SSL to IMDB (check it here) a while ago, and I go in and update it every now and then. Well, one time I was looking around and went to one of the 3 actors in our movie who have their own IMD pages, and found that they were listed under the category "Self" for their part in SSL - as if they were just talking heads giving the audience expert information or something. After more research than I really wanted to do, I learned from another person on the IMDB message/Q&A boards that if a movie is marked as a documentary, then the default is for all people in the cast to be categorized as if they are appearing in the movie as themselves, and the only way to change that is to add the keyword "Reenactment" to your movie. Long story short, I did it, and after about 2 weeks of waiting for approval, it worked. Ellie Church, Bryan Patrick McCulley, and Joshua Ramsey, are all properly listed as Ensemble Cast Members under the Actor section on their pages.

However, I just want to point out that although I added reenactment as a keyword, I only did it to get our actors categorized properly. There are no reenactments in this movie. Honestly, SSL is not like any documentary I've ever seen, and because of that, it doesn't fit into the mold that is created for docs in IMDB or really anywhere. There are no expert talking heads. There are instead citations to back up the things said in the movie, and there's a full bibliography in the credits. The whole movie is completely scripted and the arguments are made within a series of vignettes using on-screen narrators, voice over narrators and actors. We call this style a "Visual Essay." Barnaby's sister Kora came up with that phrase for a short we did in 2005 called "Ladies and Gentleman We Assume." It was a test short for this movie. We thought she was a genius, and we've been using it ever since. Anyway, the whole ordeal was slightly annoying for me, as is most interactions I have with IMDB. However, I thought you might be very slightly interested, and I'm not sure when I last talked about what Science, Sex, and the Ladies is actually like.

New Trailer for Science, Sex and the Ladies!

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That's right, we cut a new trailer! Science, Sex and the Ladies is almost a finished movie, and it was time for a newer, fresher one. What's also super awesome about this is that the music is from our score that was recently recorded out in L.A. The only thing left for SSL to be complete is the the final sound sweetening on the last 1/3 last third of the movie.

Ah, this has been a long, long road to get here, and we're so close now. So, please enjoy our trailer. Oh- and please share if it strikes your fancy....and if ya want, you can like our movie troupe on Facebook...or not, I'll still "like" you either way (oh yeah, I stand by that pun - if one could even call that a pun). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfQW9ozrdWo

SSL's First Test Screening!

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Hello out there! I'm rather excited to say that last night we showed the movie (Science, Sex and the Ladies - the one that this blog is a companion to) for the first time to a test audience. Now, given that I've been researching for this movie since about 2002, and we've been actively actively producing it since 2009, I'm pretty excited to finally be at this point - to say the least. These were literally the first people to see anything even remotely close to a finished movie besides the 3 of us that made it and our composer...so, I was quite curious to see what kind of response it got.

The fantastic volunteer test audience was a mix of people involved with a reproductive rights task force and members of a Universal Unitarian congregation. They provided us space and even some popcorn and drinks, and then they all took time to answer some questions on paper and then have a short discussion. I'm not gonna lie - I was more nervous than I thought I would be going into this, but they were great - honest, thoughtful, interesting.

We got some good insight that we'll take forward - particularly when it comes to marketing. There was definitely things mentioned that we were very much expecting to hear, and one thing that was a kinda surprising. Truth is - anything could have happened at this test screening, but I felt pretty relieved because many had strongly positive reactions to a variety of aspects of this movie. It's a little surreal, this whole thing, but it's truly exciting. We're working on creating some focus groups made up of a different demographic than what we had at this one. I think we'll do maybe 3 or 4 more and then we'll start really thinking about how to move forward.

I'll keep you up to up to date, but be assured, we're getting really close to a finished movie, people!

My BlogHer Cross-Post for Clitoris Awareness Week or I Don't Like Flower Pics Used to Represent Female Genitals

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Well, I just came out of a fairly exciting week - which is to be expected since it was International Clitoris Awareness Week, am I right...am I right? For real though, the personal and work life was particularly full. I also cranked out a blog per day, which is about 2 to 3 times more blogging than I usually do. Plus, I wrote an extra blog to cross-post onto BlogHer. Let me discuss that whole thing a bit.

I'd already registered as a member of the site a while back, which just means my blog is listed in their giant directory, but to actually get a post on the site one needs to actually create a new post just for BlogHer on their site. They promote it as a way to show off your blog's style, so that if people like it they can click through to your blog for more reading. That's good enough for me. Cross-posting had been on my to-do list for a while now, and it being Clit Week, it seemed like perfect timing.

My thoughts were that I should write something that clearly touched the critical Orgasm Equality Movement points I hold dear like;

• orgasms come from clits not vaginas although media and society in general insinuate the opposite for some god-awful reason  
• women can orgasm as quickly, easily, and reliably as men do...as long as the right parts are stimulated

You know, that sort of thing. However, I didn't want to be too in-your-face with it. I was hoping this would get me randoms just stopping by to check out the post. I didn't want to turn anyone off, but I also wanted to grab hold of the chance to put a progressive pro-clit bug in these random's ears. You can see how my little post eventually turned out HERE.

Let me just go back and point out that I was a little obsessed with creating this post. I put more time and effort into it than I should have. I was worried about what picture I should use in it, whether the grammar was checked thoroughly, and what title would best lead people to read. Also, I was trying to format the post so I could have a good little blurb that showed up in the preview post - which is the first thing people would see before they clicked in to read. For some damn reason though, the things that were supposed to let me do that weren't working. It made me want to punch the hell out of my computer screen, but eventually I said F*** it, and just uploaded it. The preview ended up just being my first few lines, and I moved on with my life.

It sat in the line of cross-posted blogs in the "All posts" category for about half a day, not getting much looks, and then I got an email from the Love&Sex editor saying she was going to feature it on the Love&Sex page and on the BlogHer home page - which I was totally cool with, as you might imagine. She also said they'd done some light editing to make it fit their format, which meant they changed the picture, the title, and the amount of text we saw in the preview. It went from the title, "A Little Activism for an Underutilized Body Part, Anyone?" with a balloon picture (seen in this post) I made where one balloon said "Clitoris Awareness Week" to the title "International Clitoris Awareness Week: How Aware Are You?" and a picture of a blossoming red rose. I guess I shouldn't have worried so much about the title or the picture or the formatting. I could probably have hours of my life back if I'd realized that. Anyway, I wasn't too worried about the changes, but I would like to point out that I think it's kinda creepy strange to always use pictures of flowers when speaking of women's genitals. It makes me think of weird, spiritual-based, old hippie love-ins that I might find featured on the 3rd segment of HBO's Real Sex. I don't like it, and I would never have chosen that pic, but what-evs.

So, anyway, the post got featured this past Thursday on the Love&Sex section, and then a few hours later I see it on the BlogHer Home Page, and then the next day it was highlighted as one of the 4 scrolling featured posts on the home page, so I was pretty pumped. A lot of people were seeing it - I mean a lot to me at least.  So far, I've had over 2000 reads (although that might mean someone just clicked on the page and then left before actually reading anything), almost 300 people shared the post on Facebook, about 40 people Tweeted it, and 1 person Sparkeld it. I have no idea what that means, but I like sparkles, so I feel like it must be good. Point is, I'm really excited that people were reading about this crazy orgasm activist stuff, and even more pleased that at least some people thought it was interesting enough to share with their friends. It gives me hope that people will actually be receptive to the contents of this upcoming movie and that some of these ideas actually have a fighting chance of catching on a bit.

So, that's my story. I'm probably gonna start trying these kinds of cross posting things more and more. I mean the whole point of all this is to get these ideas more into pop culture, so the more eyes I can get the better.

Posters for May First Friday!

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Well, tomorrow is First Friday again here in Indy. That means we're putting up some Science, Sex and the Ladies posters around the gallery areas where people will be walking. Charlie whipped these out yesterday. I really like them, and I think we'll stick with this concept for a while. The photos are a mixture of stills from the movie, portraits of actors in character, and behind the scenes stuff. It's just fun, kinda intriguing things that have to do with the movie. There are plenty, plenty more that can be made, and I'm looking forward to seeing what ol' CBruv comes up with.
So, if you're out and about, particularly in the Fountain Square area, keep an eye out for the posters - oh and please enjoy -I think it's going to be a super nice spring night for the Indianapolis May First Friday!

A Touch of SSL Promotion for First Friday

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Spotted: T, C and B in Fountain Square hanging  "coming soon" flyers for their SSL movie. Word on the street is the AnC crew had fun with all the taping and tacking...I just hope their little creations don't get lost in the crowd.

You know you love me. XOXO,
Gossip Girl

Have I mentioned that I am currently deep into the 5th season of a Gossip Girl addiction?

Anyway, Me Charlie and Barnaby were, in fact, putting up little coming soon pieces for Science Sex and the Ladies last night. Today, being the first Friday of April, is a First Friday here in Indy (and probably many other cities too) which means people will be out in this nice spring weather walking from gallery to gallery and in all the artist residences and so forth. We thought it would be a good time to gently dip our toe into the promotion waters.

So, we made a collection of 4x6 pics and hung them up around some of the main walking areas. They really just say the name of the movie and that it's coming soon - with the AnC Movies logo at the bottom. We just wanted to start getting the title somewhere in people's brains. We're still a few months out from actually promoting any event or product, so we're taking the time to just get on the radar - both locally and around the ol' interwebs.

So, if any of my Indy readers are out at First Friday tonight, keep an eye out for our handy work - particularly in the Murphy Building.

around a corner

mixed in with all this other stuff (find them if you can)

at the entrance by the Red Lion

A Scene and a Lot of Thanks!!!!!

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It actually happened. We made our $20,000 fundraising goal by 8pm EST on December 17, 2011. I'm telling you, our friends and family are stellar. People were giving us shout-outs left and right all day. We gained about 25% of our backers in the last 24 hours of the campaign: friends of friends, friends of friends of friends, even some random Kickstarter wanderers. We also had a lot of our backers upping their pledges at the end, and at the last 30 minutes, the pledges were coming in like crazy. People made sure we got there (if we didn't make the pledge goal, we wouldn't have gotten any money at all). Our friends were blowing up Facebook and Twitter, it was...really cool. I can't tell you how excited, and humbled, and everything else it makes me feel.Thanks.

Now the work begins. Our collaborating composer, Nathaniel Blume, will be busy in the next few months, and we'll be tweaking the final cut of the movie and thinking hard and long about publicity and festivals. It's pretty awesome to know we will be getting our score recorded the way we hoped we could. The sound will be getting finalized, and we'll have a finished movie in a few months. It's almost not believable. It's been so long in the making...

On another note, we promised we'd release another scene from the movie when we got to 150 backers which happened late on the 16th (then we got another 43 backers by the next evening). We did release it, and now, I'd like to share it here on my blog. Obviously there is no music, so just imagine what our awesome score will sound like over it!!

Final hours of Kickstarter.com Fundraising! Help this Movie Out!

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Okay, as I write this, our Kickstarter campaign is in its final 10 hours. If we don't make our $20,000 goal by tonight Saturday, December 17th at 8pm EST. We don't get any of the money at all. We are close, but not there yet. We still need help. Here's the link to pledge http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/204199111/science-sex-and-the-ladies

So, I have honestly have no idea who reads this blog, but if you do, I'd sure appreciate if you backed this movie. I don't care how much. It can be a dollar if that's what you can do at this moment. We've had such a lot of positive responses. Our Kickstarter project page has 800 likes on Facebook, and we have some amazingly generous friends, family and fans who are promoting the hell out of us. If we can get even another tiny fraction of that positive energy into pledges, we'll easily make our goal...and remember, you actually get something when you pledge - like a DVD of the movie.

It has been a real tough roller coaster at times going through this campaign, but overall, it's been really lovely to be a part of, and I want to thank everyone out there who has helped in some way so far...Now go get me some pledges!

Betty Dodson, You Are Awesome!

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Betty Dodson has backed Science Sex and the Ladies! I'm kinda stoked about it. I'm using this Kickstarter campaign not only to fund our music and sound, but also to let people know this movie exist. So, I've been writing people about it...people I imagine would never write me back. But, you know what? Sometimes they do, and sometimes it's famed author and female sexuality activist Betty Dodson. Sometimes, she's totally cool and pledges to your crazy movie.

She really is a neat woman. Here's the thing I love about her. She is one of the very few "sexperts" that I know of who doesn't bullshit when discussing the G spot. So many times sexperts give mixed messages...emphasizing the clitoris, but also singing praises about the g-spot and the g-spot orgasms that some women can get. As I've said before many a time in this blog, an orgasm caused by rubbing inside of the vagina alone has never been recorded. The only physical sexual release ever recorded that was caused by rubbing on the inside of the vagina is an ejaculation, and that's a different thing than an orgasm.

Betty's first response to my email was to ask me for more information about what I was really getting at in the movie. Actually, I'll back up and say I sent her a letter through her website "contact us" form, and it was a hot mess. The form kept telling me it sparked the spam filter and wouldn't send, so I kept messing with the links and stuff. It wasn't my best work. Anyway, I sent her a long ass email telling her some of the main points. I have a little problem with being long winded, but I think it was worth it because she told me my more "detailed message confirmed that we are on the same page." There's no one's page I'd rather be on.

I'll be the first to admit that you may look at Ms. Dodson's life and say, "that's an eccentric lady!" I think she'd take it as a compliment, and I'll tell ya - that eccentricity has done a lot of good for people. She is a masturbation proponent (love it), erotic artist (what's not to enjoy), no-bullshit sex educator (we need more of those), and she's got a cool website with Carlin Ross HERE. They're an inter generational dream team. Like I said, Betty's point of view is right on, so I highly recommend the "Ask Betty" section. There are also just fun things on the site. I might recommend checking this post HERE which, should you so choose, take you to a place where you can see a woman masturbating to orgasm on Norway Television. Maybe that's creeping you out a little, but frankly, too many women have no idea how that goes down. Seems silly but there are a lot of reasons why women aren't quite as equipped to understand how to do this as men are. We certainly go into those reasons in the movie, and none of them have to be that way. Ladies, let's just say it. If you don't know how to make yourself orgasm, things don't get much easier when you throw a partner in the mix. Betty Dodson would agree. Check out her site, and just wander around. It might be fun!

Thanksgiving and The Binner

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This is a short Thanksgiving video we made to compliment our Kickstarter campaign to fund the score for Science Sex and the Ladies. Check out all about that ol' fundraiser HERE. Anyway, I thought I'd post it for those of you who've already begun to miss Thanksgiving. Plus, you will learn a very special new word..."binner."

Our Kickstarter Campaign!

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T minus 40 minutes until we push the "Launch" button on our Kickstarter page. I'm eating Papa Johns and it's really good, but my stomach is still all jumbly about this. It's like Science Sex and the Ladie's coming out. We're all set to blast this news all over hell. The people I work with will finally know I'm a crazy person who spends years making movies about women's orgasms and masturbation and other such dirty thing. I always feel filthy asking friends and family to fund something of mine. What if they think it's ridiculous (or immoral), or don't give to this kind of stuff , or just don't have the cash at the moment, or they forgot? I understand that completely, but what if they don't understand that I understand? Also, we've never been great at getting funding - like a few hundred dollars is elusive to us. It just seems like there's no way we'll make $20,000 - and really, asking for $20,000, isn't that a little insane or greedy or something? Plus, after all these years of working on this, we've got to put up or shut up. It's scary and exciting and unreal.

Anyway, on top of all that, we've been trying to get all the sites updated and the press kits ready and all that crap that takes insanely longer than you'd think and way too much brain power. But it's about to happen. Now, I honestly have no idea who reads this blog. I know my friend Sherry (I just thought it's be fun to mention you in the blog) does most of the time, and some other friends and family from time to time. Chances are, if you are friend or family, you will also the information below on me, Barney, Charlie, and AnC's facebook page, plus get an email about it, so sorry for blowing you up so much. Anyone else - here's some info about our Kickstarter campaign.

At 8pm EST Thursday, November 17th, we begin a 30 day fundraising campaign through Kickstarter.com. Our goal is $20,000 by 8pm EST December 17, 2011. However, because Kickstarter only wants backer money to go to fully funded projects, our movie will not get any money (and backers will not be charged for their pledges) unless it meets the pledge goal. Check out our kickstarter page HERE.  You will find information about us and our project, pictures, and a 5 minute video that includes us telling our production story and the movie trailer. As you will see, we offer a variety of prizes for different levels of pledges including stills of the movie, signed pieces of our green screen, advanced DVDs of the movie, and hand crafted art pieces based on Science Sex and the Ladies among other cool gifts. Plus you can see how close we’re getting to our goal!

Real Job Vs. This Movie

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So, in my day job, I'm a corporate scientist. I honestly enjoy the job. I'm not saying that if I won 50 million dollars that I'd still be working, but the work is challenging. There's room to grow. I work beside a lot of really hard-working, interesting and fun people...and the benefits are fantastic. I have no interest in losing a job like this. This, my friends has been on my mind as we here at AnC are beginning to rile ourselves into a promotion fury for our upcoming Kickstarter campaign.

I mean this isn't a cute family movie I'm making here (well, actually there are some moments of cute). This is a movie about the American culture of female sexuality that quite bluntly discusses things like orgasm and masturbation. The word "clitoris" or "clit" is used more times than i could count. So, unsurprisingly, I only talk about this at work with people I've known for so long that they knew me at the beginning of my endeavors into this movie (or with select co-workers I've been drinking with). I rarely even talk about the fact that I make movies, because that leads to the inevitable question, "What are you working on?" I don't want to lie and I don't want to drop the CLIT bomb at work, so this movie has felt something like a secret life at times.

However, I'm pretty much super passionate about the message of this movie, and this subject has consumed my life for years, so now that we have a movie done enough to begin heavy promotion, I'm going to go full tilt. That, however, means that random people at work may hear tell about this movie, notice my name associated and ask me about it. This is all probably fine...unless it isn't.

I'm all about this movie, but I am very much not about making people at work uncomfortable or putting my job at risk in any way. So, just recently, I went to my supervisor and told her my predicament. She was totally cool and supportive, and encouraged me to keep the lines of communication open so that if anyone should feel uncomfortable or make me feel uncomfortable that we take care of it quickly and with the least pain possible. Like I said, it's a good job full of good people, and I'm lucky to have it. I really don't imagine there will be any problems. However, it's good to know things are in place to smooth anything out that may blindside me.

Trailer Posted Online!

The cast party was this past Friday, and we previewed 3 scenes from the movie and a trailer. The trailer is posted at vimeo.com. You can check it out below.
I'm not going to lie. We had a rather sleepless week putting together all the final details. Charlie didn't sleep overnight on Wednesday, but luckily everything was done in plenty of time, and we all got some sleep Thursday night so we could be fresh for the big shin-dig. It was really nice to see all the cast again. It was probably different for us to see them than it was for them to see us. They have been going about their lives for 9 months. We have too, but we've also been staring at images of them most days during that 9 months, so in maybe a creepy kind of way, they feel like super special friends that we've been chillin' and illin' with all year - yet they don't know about it.
Anyway, my point is that we loved talking to those crazy actors. We had a lovely time, and the clips we showed seemed to go over well. What more could we ask from this event?

Science Sex and the Ladies Trailer from Charles Borowicz on Vimeo.