Coming to fruition

Dan O’Brien thinks you should go and see the film “Bottle Shock.”

It’s only natural that he would think this, considering that he co-edited the movie with its director, Randall Miller.

Looking beyond the obvious, though, it’s fair to say that “Bottle Shock” – a movie about how California wines burst upon the international scene, which is playing at AMC’s River Park Square Theatres – reflects how O’Brien feels about his own place in the movie industry.

“I just think it’s a great example of the American way of working hard, of having a dream and being fortunate enough to see it come to fruition,” O’Brien said during a phone interview Monday afternoon.

See, when O’Brien was attending Harding Elementary School in Post Falls, Lakes Middle School and Coeur d’Alene High School – from which he graduated in 1988 – he never thought that one day he would be making movies.

He took business classes at the University of Southern California.

“I didn’t go to the cinema school, which in hindsight is kind of a waste because the cinema school at USC is considered one of the top two or three in the country,” O’Brien said.

That choice seemed particularly unfortunate when, as with many of us, his first choice of career fell flat. By the time he was barely 24, O’Brien, now 37, realized that life as a financial planner wasn’t working out.

“So I basically sat down and re-evaluated my life and my career path and thought about what I really liked,” he said. “And I loved the movies, so I thought that would be a fun industry to work in.”

And why not? Especially if, like O’Brien, you’re willing to see the opportunities that are there for the taking.

“I started over,” he said, “and I started at the bottom. I literally started out delivering tape and film in my truck around town and felt my way around the industry.”

Most of the jobs that came up involved postproduction, particularly editing and special effects work. But it was the chance to work with a demanding editor, a guy others were reluctant to be around, that earned O’Brien his start for a commercial editing business.

To this day, his major means of support comes from editing television commercials. Making the transition to feature work didn’t come easy.

“Doing commercial editing doesn’t cross over to feature editing as much as you would think,” O’Brien said. “It’s technically the same skill set, but people who make decisions in either industry don’t believe that you’re creatively qualified to cross over.”

It was through his regular job that he met Miller, who was in the process of making his 2005 film “Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing & Charm School.”

“Randy wanted to edit the film, and he’d never done that before,” O’Brien said. “He needed someone who could sort of hold his hand through the technical aspects of editing while he basically controlled the creative reign. And, once again, I saw it as an opportunity.”

O’Brien then worked with Miller on the film “Nobel Son,” which premiered at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival. He followed that with “Bottle Shock,” which earned a Golden Space Needle Award (best actor for Alan Rickman) in June at the Seattle International Film Festival.

He’s working on two more feature films, and he hopes one day to be able to make the full jump from commercials to features. If nothing else, it’ll let him enjoy some more free time.

“I do my 10-hour day at the commercial facility, and then I come home and put the kids to bed, hang out with the family for a couple of hours, and start working on the films at night,” he said. “It makes for a long day.”

One, though, that has led to more than a bit of fruition.