Unlike any other film within the festival, The Green Tie Affair is indeed unique. With its catchy upbeat tunes sung by Hawaii’s own Jordan Segundo, The Green Tie Affair is about blue puppet with a green tie named Hickey. When people begin to copy Hickey’s green tie, he becomes depressed since it is no longer his own identity. Behind this genius idea is Dane Neves, the director, producer and screenwriter of this short film.
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| Hickey Pine and Dane Neves |
I had the opportunity to learn more about the film through my interview with Dane. Aspiring to be an animator as a child, Dane became involved in video production in high school and college. As a graduate of the University of Hawaii’s Academy for Creative Media, Dane has also produced The Monkeyboy Fever, a short film that has been shown at HIFF. How does he feel about having The Green Tie Affair in this year’s HIFF? Dane says, “It feels so good to be part of the lineup of so many great international films. When you get your film selected in one of the top film festivals in the world, you know that you're doing something right.” The journey for The Green Tie Affair from the beginning, to where the film is today, began a year ago.
Dane began writing and planning in September 2009. In November and December he and his crew filmed and the completed the project in January 2010. I had to ask him what it was like creating The Green Tie Affair and he said, “It was surprisingly easy to plan, shoot, and edit this film because of the amazing team I had supporting me from Henry Mochida, my director of photography, to Lily Brennick, my puppeteer, to Shasta Yamada, my assistant director. You can't make a good movie without a good team.” Part of that team was also Jordan Segundo who Dane had the opportunity to work with. With Jordan’s inspiring morals and principals, together, they were able to cater to their target audience of children. What better way to cater to children than to also use a puppet.
Using a puppet not only appeals to children, but it also helps to support the uniqueness of the film. With the lesson of the film being that we should accept our unique identity, Hickey makes The Green Tie Affair distinctive. Being a fan of puppets in films like Gremlins and Muppets influenced Dane to make Hickey a puppet living in a human world. Hickey’s story provides many morality lessons, “…the biggest thing that audiences should "get" is that you should accept your identity no matter what.”
To wrap it up, as a local filmmaker, Dane wants people to be inspired by his film and its progress since few short films come out of Hawaii. The Green Tie Affair’s progress is immense as it is one of 200 films to be shown in the film festival. Another thing that he wants others to know is that, “mainstream films can be made in Hawaii by locals.”
Every time I watch the trailer for this film, I cannot help but smile because I am that excited to see the film on Friday October 15th at 5:30 p.m. So, I highly encourage you to watch The Green Tie Affair and vote for it Vote Green Tie Affair
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