FINISHED.

Well, the film is finished. We have come to the end of post production. There is nothing left for us to do now but to publicize the shit out of it. Which won't really start for a few months. Hopefully the trailer will be out in theaters by the end of July -- maybe even a teaser trailer in May or June. Posters. All of it, forthcoming.

Here's the final picture taken during post production. It's me and the music editing/sound effects/mixing/ADR crew at Pinewood. They were all awesome and I'd work with each of them again in a heart beat.

I PRESENT TO YOU... THE YEAR 1999

******UPDATE******: Thanks to the friendly nudging of a reader it has come to my attention that I completely left a Modern Classic of 1999 off of my list. That film is the epic documentary masterpiece "American Movie" By Chris Smith. I have updated the list accordingly.

Long before The Invention of Lying I ran a film blog where I would talk about whatever I wanted to in relation to my favorite art form: film. I like to talk about film. A lot. And that site was a great place to do that. This site will now serve that purpose.

Warning: The following has nothing to do with The Invention of Lying.

The year 1999 has been widely heralded as one of the greatest years in modern cinema. Some have even gone on to call it the greatest year in American film. But what does this mean? It doesn't meant that the best film(s) ever made came out that year. What it does mean is that there may have never been a year before where so many "classics" -- so many films that one could argue are masterpieces of their genre or near perfect films -- were released in the same year. That year was 1999.

1999 had, in my opinion, 14 films I would consider modern masterpieces. I wouldn't classify any of them as "my favorite film", but overall, it's just amazing how many truly great films came out in just this one little year. Put simply, I truly love all of these films. These are films that if you haven't seen (or don't have in your DVD collection) -- then you and I are very different people, indeed.

Was it something to do with the tension building up towards the new millenium? A fin-de-siecle explosion of brilliance? The end of an era? The beginning of a movement? Or just blind luck. It's like the studio heads looked the other way for one year.

On a funny note, it was also the year a slew of famously bad films were released. I'm looking at you Phantom Menace.

MODERN CLASSICS -- ALL RELEASED IN 1999 (in alphabetical order)

1. American Movie

2. Being John Malkovich

3. Election

4. Eyes Wide Shut

5. Fight Club

6. Galaxy Quest

7. The Insider

8. The Iron Giant

9. Magnolia

10. The Matrix

11. Office Space

12. The Sixth Sense

13. South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut

14. Toy Story 2

Truly amazing films, all of them. Defining moments of their genres. A few films that are still ahead of their time today. Michael Mann's greatest achievement. The greatest modern action film. The (true) arrival of Spike Jonze and Alexander Payne. The film PTA himself deemed the greatest film he will probably ever make. One of the best documentaries of the past twenty years that wasn't directed by Errol Morris. And some of the greatest comedies of all time. Plus the final classic by Kubrick.

A dizzying year in film.

Even the "decent" films of that year were pretty damn good: American Beauty, American Pie, The Blair Witch Project, Bowfinger, Boys Don't Cry, Ghost Dog, Man on the Moon, The Muse (I love you Albert Brooks), Payback, Run Lola Run, The Straight Story, The Talented Mr. Ripley, The Thomas Crown Affair, Three Kings, Titus, Varsity Blues, The Virgin Suicides.

And the bad films were sooooo bad: 8mm, Bicentenial Man, Deuce Bigelow, End of Days, Wild Wild West and... Phantom Menace.

What a year.

A FEW SHOTS I TOOK ON SET

Our table read. Ricky was the only cast. He read his part, I read every other part.

Scouting in Lowell, MA

Hair/Makeup Tests

Jimmi Simpson, Me, Ricky

My good friend Nick Towne and myself

An actual Lecture Films camera

Interview with a vampire?

John Hodgman and Ricky

A production meeting on motorcycle

Trailers and Farts

Watched the first trailer for the film today. The U.K trailer at least. We'll have separate trailers for the U.K and America as Ricky is a bigger deal in the U.K and they can sell the film on him a bit more. While in America they'll sell the cast and the concept a bit more. But either way, I thought the trailer was awesome. Can't wait to show it off.

But that wasn't the best part of my day. No, the highlight of my day was putting a burp and fart sound effect on Ricky over one of the sweetest and most serious points in the film and watching him react when he came in to review the reels with me. Doesn't matter how old you get. It's always funny. ALWAYS. In fact, I want to do an entire fart track for the DVD. That's the best way to ruin a nice classy comedy.

MPAA RATING

THIS JUST IN: Apparently we've gotten our MPAA rating from the board... and we're (drum roll please....)

PG-13.

But that's what we expected.

"Oh no! PG-13! That means this comedy will suck! PG-13 means they sold out! It means the movie will be studio bullshit!"

That's what I would probably think if I heard that the first film from Ricky Gervais (that he co-directed and co-wrote) was rated PG-13.

But the truth is that the original script was about 3 "fucks" and 2 "shits" away from being PG-13. We were faced with the option of having the cleanest R ever or the dirtiest PG-13 of all time.

Seemed like an easy decision. Our film would have been a waste of an R. In fact, I think you'll be surprised by what we got away with in a PG-13 film. I am. Wait till you see how we used our one "fuck"...

So that's why we're PG-13. My next film will be rated X to make up for it.

Pinewood

Been at Pinewood all week doing the final mix of the film. Will be here all next week as well. And then we're done! And I get to go home to L.A. I've spent about nine months of this year in London. Seriously. It will be nice to finally get out of here. Not that I don't like London. I'm just a bit sick of it. Probably because I enjoy SEEING THE SUN EVERY ONCE IN A FUCKING WHILE.

The final mix is basically where you take all the score, dialogue, sound effects, ADR and songs and put them all together so they sound like a real movie. It's not as boring as it sounds. Especially if it's your film. It's probably boring for everyone else working on the mix. But for me it's great because this stage is the biggest jump for the film in terms of it feeling like "a real movie".

Working at Pinewood has been a treat. It's the mecca of European film after all. So much history here. And most of the streets are named after James Bond films. And there's all these old great Carry On posters everywhere with cartoons of girls busting out of their shirts and everyone looking all British. They're also shooting a few exciting movies on the lot right now (I don't think I'm allowed to blow their top secret covers), but I'm going to try to sneak onto some cool sets later on today.

Star Trek

Went to the London Premiere of Star Trek last night with the goal of touching Leonard Nimoy. But alas he wasn't there. But I did brush shoulders with the new Spock. JJ was nice enough to give me Ricky's tickets (Ricky had a gig that night) and I was about as excited as I could be all weekend, counting the minutes and watching Wrath of Khan on loop.

The above is a pointless blown out photo of the entire cast speaking before the film. Simon Pegg wore a kilt.

I won't talk too much about the film because I don't want to spoil anything, but I was very much taken with it. I'm a newer Trek fan having been a Star Wars person my whole life. But lately, I've been expanding my sci-fi tastes to the more Star Trek side of things. Probably started when I got obsessed with Asimov's Foundation series. Doesn't hurt that I'm also writing two other sci-fi veined scripts at the moment.

I think some Trek fans will find the film bitter sweet as it does seem to divert from the pre-established Trek Universe and branch out into a whole new alternate Trek timeline. I assume someone will name it appropriately soon enough, like Trekiverse 2. Or Trek 2.0. Or some such so the nerds can talk about the Trek Universe and make sure they're talking about the right one.

Part of me wishes these films could exist within the pre-established Trek Universe. But part of me is also a bit thrilled and inspired by J.J's fearless decision to say fuck it and start his own Trek Universe, while respecting and paying tribute to what makes Trek great.

I wonder if Paramount will start a new Trek TV series within this Universe. That would be exciting. At least we know we'll be getting one more film. Probably (hopefully) many more.

I like to think of The Invention of Lying as sci-fi comedy. In fact Ricky and I have said often that we hope people see it as the funniest episode of the Twilight Zone ever. Especially since the concept of the film came to me after lying in bed for three days watching a Twilight Zone marathon and reading Harlan Ellison short stories.

In fact, I think people should keep the DVD of The Invention of Lying in the same section on their shelves as their Twilight Zone collection. That would be nice. I almost wish we could have the Twilight Zone logo on the box.

Up and Running

All right. Time to get this blog up and running. Now that we have an official title and an official release date and the film is nearly done I will have time to actually write here and keep you all up to date on the happenings of the film and, to a lesser extent (although as always happens I'm sure it will end up being to a fuller extent), myself.

First topic of business. Our new title. Now to those who have gotten used to "This Side of the Truth" and fear the title "The Invention of Lying" -- let me explain it simply.

It was the original title of the film. It was the original title of the script. From the very first draft of the script it was the title I had in mind. And when Ricky and I began working on the script together it was still the title.

It was the title on the script that Ricky and I sold to MRC, and they in turn sold to Warner Bros. and Universal.

The title fit within the world of the film. It's what the characters within the film would have called it. It's a more "classic" title, I think. A bit bolder. It's not scared to be what it is. To me, it was the right title.

But during the re-writing process Ricky and I got a bit bored of the title. It's just sort of what happens when you write all day for weeks and weeks. And we decided, let's start looking around at other titles.

Well, I had always liked this Dylan Thomas poem "This Side of the Truth". And Ricky and I agreed it was a good title. A strange, esoteric idiom and the title of a good poem that has nothing to do with the film. I think the poem is about a king. Or nature. Or being drunk. Also we enjoyed annoying the studio by naming our film after a Dylan Thomas poem. Take that you Harry Potter-making bastards. Stick some Dylan Thomas up your ass!

But as the film got on and we started feeling pressure from the studios to change the title back it donned on us... it really is the right title. And I won't lie, we might not have changed it back if the studios hadn't told us they really really really really missed the old title. We might not have questioned if it was the right title again without that nudging.

But we didn't have to change it. No one forced us. They would have released the film with the old title regardless (albeit potentially with slightly less enthusiasm). It is still our film, through and through. As is every scene, cut, line and song within the film. It's all ours.

Setting teenage rebelliousness aside, it was always the right title for the film and I was relieved when we were finally able to embrace it as our own.

So that's that. The Invention of Lying. I trust, in time, you'll agree. Or you might just hate the movie altogether in which case, god bless you in all your passionate glory.

My plan is to update this blog every few days until the release of the film... and on. So check back often. In the coming months we'll start to be able to release lots of fun stuff like clips, set photos, trailers, posters, etc.