3 women, 1 tiny car, 10,000 miles of epic adventure — The Mongol Rally 2012 – SM Stowaway from Charlie Grosso on Vimeo.
I am sitting in front of a wall covered in chalk board paint, blowing cherries with my lips trying to relax my face muscles as I am about to do another take for the 1000 time. There is a camera pointed at me, Oliver is behind it, shooting in HD, Alex is monitoring the sound and Raven is standing by with chalk to draw and re-draw a map of Europe / Asia on the board behind me.
There seems to be a small army of freshly minted graduates from NYU and Columbia University in the room, coming in and out, filling various crew positions on this tiny impromptu set and I am having trouble keeping all the names straight. There are shoes everywhere. Winter scarves and heavy wooly sweaters hang about the banister despite that we are well on into summer. The fridge is full of condiments and containers of mystery. How did I end up in this apartment in Bushwick?
I meet Oliver on a job over Memorial Day weekend. I was the still photographer and he was the videographer. Brooklyn Brothers, a PR agency in NYC who have generously agreed to do a pro-bono round of work for me and SM Stowaway had just told me that they think we need to make a new video, a video that introduces The Mongol Rally, the charity and us. I asked Oliver if he would be willing to help me shoot the raw footage that I told Brooklyn Brothers that I would get for them.
In a matter of 3 days, we went from Oliver acting as the cameraman to him being the director / producer on a fully conceived video for me. Another 4 days later, I am sitting in Brooklyn Brother’s office with Oliver and Alex watching a well-animated, well-produced, super fun video.
I felt an incredible sense of possibility and excitement sitting in Oliver’s apt that afternoon as we wait to reload for another take. There is something so indescribably sexy about “GO.” Lets go, lets do, lets just make it happen!
Age, experience and success are great. Except they extend the time between initial conception and go. Experience and success makes us hesitate a little bit longer before we pull the trigger. We stop and wonder about changing into our swim suits before we grab for the rope swing and jump into the lake. The unflinching gusto youth throw themselves into an endeavor is absurdly inspiring.
May I suggest that we think less, have fewer meetings, and more go! Lets just do. Lets just figure it out as we go along.
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AWESOME!!!