M E R I D I A N     M A G A Z I N E

12 Dogs of Christmas
by Kieth Merrill

An ancient Chinese proverb asserts, “A picture can express 10,000 words.” 

When the pictures flash before us at 24 images per second the pictures appear to move and we transcend altogether the ability to describe the experience with words.

Movies are ultimately about pictures – hundreds of thousands of pictures projected intermittently in such rapid sequence that they create the illusion of motion. When Aguste and Louis Lumiere projected their film, La Sortie des ouvriers de l’uine Lumiere [“Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory”] in 1895 they changed forever the power of pictures to express ideas and feelings that words alone cannot.

As “Film Editor” of Meridian magazine, I am continually expected to use words to talk about pictures. This month I decided to use pictures rather than words to express myself. Rather than write words about some “picture-related” topic, I decided to take you behind the scenes of my latest film, The 12 Dogs of Christmas, and let pictures say everything I have to say. I decided to let pictures express my passion for making movies.

The completed film will include over 144,000 distinct frames [pictures] and require no “words of introduction”.  Until then a few words are essential to put the few selected pictures in context.

Emma Kragen wrote The 12 Dogs of Christmas on a paper napkin when she was 7 years old. Her father, famed talent manager Ken Kragen, showed it to his publisher. “They flipped”, Ken told me, and Emma’s prose was made into a book. It rapidly became a best selling children’s book.

When Ken called me shortly after Christmas and asked if I would be interested in making The 12 Dogs of Christmas into a movie, I couldn’t say no. First of all, Ken Kragen is one of the really good guys in Hollywood. We have been friends – personally and professionally – a long time. But most of all, it was the challenge.

It has been said that there are 3 things to avoid at all cost when making movies: KIDS, ANIMALS AND SNOW. Moreover, the source material was a book for kids, 12 pages long with mostly pictures. Now THAT is adaptation.

There was a concept in place but no screenplay. It was already mid-January. I locked the doors, turned off the phone, asked Dagny to slide power bars under the door and wrote like a man possessed. Fourteen days later I emerged with a first draft that seemed to capture the spirit of the book and everyone’s imagination.  And why not?  It was filled with KIDS and DOGS and CHRISTMAS – which meant of course SNOW.

In our first meeting our animal trainers said bluntly, “it can’t be done.” In our last big scene we put 70 children and 58 dogs on stage into one spectacular finale’. You’re going to love this picture.

We found a magic little village in Maine that looked like a place created by Norman Rockwell. The town loved the movie. The movie loved the town.

To tell you the story with words in order to ensure that the pictures make sense, would contradict my picture versus word thesis, so use your imagination. Read the captions. Enjoy being on location with us as much as we loved making this marvelous movie. It has something for everyone and is coming for Christmas.

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