The Vacation Planner is the type of movie I've always dreamed of making, but never thought I would create in film school: an international, action-adventure comedy shot across 4 countries with crazy stunts and even crazier humor—a true student blockbuster.
Coming hot off the heels of The Notice's post-production, my writer and "cinematic partner in crime," Yelisey Kazakevich, presented me with a film that had the narrative scale of a feature, was seemingly unproducible by college film standards, and simply considered insane by most. Approached with the scope of a university class project, The Vacation Planner would have never been accomplished. However, thanks to an exceptionally ambitious, dedicated, and talented core crew, this impossible movie evolved into a passion project that inspired us all.
Yelisey and I streamlined the story into an attainable short that still pushed the boundaries of everything we had experienced in filmmaking.
My cinematographer—Graham Hubner—and I, poured sleepless nights into choreographing the narrative arc of our elaborate fight scene, and outlining a cohesive shot list for our diverse and sprawling montage.
With my producers, Ryan Herh and Yelisey, I assembled a stellar cast and crew capable of tackling the film's immense scale both domestically and internationally, as well as devised a method for me to virtually direct Yelisey as he starred as the film's lead across the globe.
Last but certainly not least, I communicated with my production designer, Ryan O'Farrell, to build the world of "Dream Life Travel Agency" and nail the particular retro style of the movie.
One weekend of principal photography and four weeks of intermittent production in the U.S. and three other countries later, production on "The Vacation Planner" was complete.
After directing this ambitious film, my key takeaways from production were championing conviction and maintaining communication of a strong vision. As director, I needed to be the number one cheerleader for my movie–what I visualized—and its crew—the talented creatives I was indebted to for actualizing it. This idea was especially important to my set since such a large cast and crew was tackling a complex concept, there was a greater susceptibility for a chain reaction of discouragement to stem from a few team members' loss in translation with the vision. However, provided the tall demands of this intricate project with its tight timeline—particularly during principal production— the movie needed the harmonized efforts of the team to be accomplished. As such, consistent and confident dissemination of my vision through all levels of production was paramount to maintaining momentum and collectively seeing the movie to its intended fruition. As crews rotated and I witnessed spirits dwindle near the final weeks of production, this became even more important to ensure the quality and coherence of the movie did not suffer or fluctuate. This meticulous reiteration also applied to directing virtually where I had to invest a lot of trust in my international crews to execute my vision off the words of FaceTime.
In the end, the grey hairs from countless hours on set and all-nighters meticulously assembling the edit paid off in a film that never fails to make my jaw drop. However, I am forever grateful that The Vacation Planner did not just give me a movie to be immensely proud of, but proved to me that the impossible even at our scale is attainable with ample tenacity, indomitable spirit, and team of devoted filmmakers, those of which from this project I now consider some of my closest friends.
