Penny Ponders On Fizzy Days & Plastic Monkeys

Crewe to Malibu? You can do it the easy way or the hard way

Cover reproduced with permission from Fantastic Books Publishing

Fizzy Days & Plastic Monkeys by Mark Millicent charts a long journey — not just from Crewe to Malibu — but a journey over many years chasing a dream to make a film.

How NOT to…

When asked to describe his epic journey, Mark Millicent has called it the story of how NOT to make a film, so it seems appropriate that this is NOT a book review, it’s just a bit of a dive into aspects that particularly intrigued me when I read it. This indulgence on my part should be seen as a kind of side salad to the feast that is Fantastic Books Publishing’s

MASSIVE AUTUMN BOOK LAUNCH EVENT

If you want a proper review, I can recommend this one:

Mark Henderson's review of Fizzy Days and Plastic Monkeys from Crewe to Malibu

I was intrigued by the central concept of storyboarding

When I read this book, I was surprised to find storyboarding at the heart of the filmmaking business. I’ve heard about storyboarding. I knew someone who wrote comic strips years ago — she worked with storyboarders and had some hilarious stories to tell.

As an aside, Mark Millicent also has some hilarious stories to tell, and who better to ask about the role of storyboards in the film process. Here is the question I put to Mark:

Your account brings home how many more steps there are to bringing a film to fruition than a book. For some of the short films you’ve made you seem to have managed all processes along the way. Is it the case that storyboarding gets you to the heart of every technical step in the making of a film?

This is his reply:

We all watch movies, but not all of us know what a storyboard is or what it’s…