I have been playing with my Twitter, not obsessively mind you. I don't want to go blind or get hair on my palms. Mostly I use it to link to interesting articles that I don't have much to say on, things I wish others would read too. You know, the stuff I would like to have a conversation about. Follow me and see where it goes...
I do find my mind changing due to the Twitter-phenom. Maybe it is the combo of everything. It feels like Social Network discourse and Twitter are for the distribution of raw ideas or promotion of the fuller meal. Blogs are for the half-baked dish. I still lean towards traditional media for the fully cooked offering. Nonetheless, being only in month four or so of this experiment in communication, I feel like my brain is re-wiring itself for the sound-bite-esque concept, for whatever is needed to fit on the Twitter page. It's a bit discouraging. I like the deep thoughts of days gone by.
This article on Why You Should UnFollow Those Who Don't Follow You is getting a lot of notice. It's written from the perspective of business first, and not surprisingly I don't agree. One thing I enjoy about Twitter is the unique information it brings me, working as a filter of news on my select interest. I am not interested in what people had for breakfast or how their sick cat is doing. It seems like Twitters might want to split themselves in two if they need to provide the personal details in an effort to gain followers of those who don't want so much information. We shall see shall we not?
And the WSJ has decided also to tell you How To Twitter. They sum it up as a broadcast tool to promote yourself.
But alas, I think I have to move to Brazil to get it. I was reading in Variety, how a distributor (Rain) there has gotten all their art cinemas to go digital and use the same software management system, enabling them to get their films via satellite. They then allow the audiences to organize themselves via a social network platform and select what films they want to see where and when.
Rain's COD will allow moviegoers, grouped in online MovieMobz.com film clubs, to recommend what films play when and where over Rain's digital cinema network.
Once exhibitors slot a film, virtual cinema club members can buy tickets, refer further wishlists to friends and, exploiting MovieMobz's social networking system, let other people know what films they're attending.
"For the first time in the market, we are offering new opportunities for the entire cinema chain: Consumers can choose their content; exhibitors can more efficiently program their screens; and content licensors can more easily find their audience," Lima said.
MovieMobz will book film screenings of new and old features as well as niche content.
Ahh..... one day soon, maybe America will catch up.
How did you get involved as a director on My Cousin Vinny?
JONATHAN LYNN: I had just finished Nuns on the Run, which was made by Handmade and distributed by Fox. Joe Roth [Chairman of Fox] had misgivings about the last three or four minutes of the film. When I discovered this I was delighted, because I didn't think the ending worked and had thought of a much better version. We hadn't been able to do it because we'd run out of money.
I told Joe what I had in mind and he immediately offered to put up the money for it to be changed. We shot three or four extra days, three months later, and the whole film worked.
Joe was pleased, and asked me to direct My Cousin Vinny. Danny de Vito was to have directed and starred in it, but he had recently dropped out.
What was it that drew you to the material?
JONATHAN LYNN: I was immediately drawn to it. I have a degree in law, and had always loved courtroom dramas. Among my favourite films were Anatomy of a Murder, The Verdict and To Kill A Mockingbird.
I also saw the film as a statement against capital punishment, something that I have always been totally against. When Tony Jay and I wrote Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister, we always looked for a hideous dilemma as the basis for the comedy; I don't think comedies work unless they are about something desperately important for one or more of the main characters.
Also, I wanted to do a film about the real America, small town America, not set in New York or LA or a big urban centre. And finally, I thought it had two really original leading characters, Vinny and Lisa, who were truly funny.
Originality is rare. I had seen plenty of courtroom dramas, and plenty of funny scenes in courtrooms, but I'd never seen what could truly be described as a courtroom comedy, so this seemed to be a great opportunity.
How involved were you in the casting of My Cousin Vinny?
JONATHAN LYNN: Joe Pesci was already attached to the film. He and I met in New York and after a conversation over dinner we shook hands and agreed that we'd do it together.
Casting Lisa was difficult. Fox wanted a 'name'. Without checking with me they offered it to Gina Davis She had a deal with Fox so they were anxious to use her, but she was about a foot taller than Pesci and had nothing of Brooklyn about her. Fortunately, she passed. Fox then tried a few other well-known Italian-American actresses, none of whom wanted the part. I think they thought it was too small. We then auditioned dozens of actresses. None were suitable.
One day I was invited to lunch at Paramount by John Landis, who was making a film called Oscar. A young actress was plaing a scene; her character was a blonde 1920's flapper. She was nothing like Mona lLa Vito in Vinny but I could see that she could act and had excellent timing. Her name was Marisa Tomei. I looked at footage in Landis's cutting room.
Then I asked my casting director to get her in to read for me. He was reluctant. "William Morris has suggested everyone on their list who they think could possibly be right for it." he said "So she can't be." I don't have much faith in the aesthetic judgment of most agents so I insisted on getting her in to read. She was seemed perfect. Fox wanted to see screen tests of our three top choices. We tested them, and to me and the producer Paul Schiff it was obvious that Marisa should get the part.
I took the precaution of showing the tape of the screen tests to Joe Pesci. He too agreed that Marisa was the one. We sent the tape to Fox and they chose one of the other actresses. There followed a long and tense meeting. I was getting nowhere until I played my trump card - Pesci also wanted Marisa. That did it. They didn't want to irritate their leading man. So with an 'on-your-head-be-it' attitude, I was allowed to cast Marisa.
Casting Fred Gwynn as the Judge raised a few questions ("Herman Munster as the Judge?"), but I was confident and there wasn't much of an argument about that. Lane Smith as Jim Trotter III, the prosecutor, was the idea of Dale Launer, the writer. All the other casting came from auditions.
What qualities were you looking for in the actors?
JONATHAN LYNN: An ability to play the comedy, but with the utmost reality. Vinny is film about the class system (which does exist in America, whatever people might say) and about the death penalty. If Vinny screws up, the boys will be sent to the chair and fried. This is serious, and though the treatment is comedic the film depended on the truth of the acting.
I wanted the audience to believe that Lisa was a real blue-collar Italian-American girl from Brooklyn. I wanted the southerners to be southern - but not caricatured.
Are there any lessons you learned on My Cousin Vinny (or any of your features) that would be helpful to low-budget filmmakers working on a much smaller scale? That is to say, can a low-budget filmmaker learn anything from how Hollywood makes movies?
JONATHAN LYNN: I can't think of any. But then, my movies have seldom been made for big budgets, at least not by Hollywood standards. Essentially, the thing that costs the most is time: the number of days shooting is the biggest factor in determining the cost of a film, no matter how large or small. Therefore, low budget films need to be shot fast. The key to this is preparation. The more comprehensive the prep, the faster you can shoot.
Prep time for a low budget film should therefore include sufficient rehearsals. You don't want the actors showing up unprepared, not knowing their lines or wanting to discuss their motivation. That must all be taken care of in advance. If possible, scenes should be blocked with the actors in advance, like for the theatre. The Director of Photography should be present at rehearsal whenever possible, and after rehearsals the director and the DP should map out every shot so that no time is wasted when shooting. If the DP knows what the scene looks like he can plan the lighting much more efficiently.
Obviously some things cannot be prepared: weather can create real problems on the day. But there should always be a back-up plan ready. If an exterior scene can only be shot on one particular day, then you must prepare a way to shoot it whatever the weather. If it means re-thinking it so that you need umbrellas and wellies instead of bikinis, work this out in advance. Also, if you are shooting in changeable weather, shoot it tighter so that the audience won't notice the changes in the light or the sky.
If you look at my low(ish) budget film Nuns On The Run, you will see a chase and shoot out in the street after the two heroes steal the money. That scene was shot in a couple of days, during which we went repeatedly from sunshine to rain. You can see this if you look closely, but no audiences ever noticed because of my use of tight shots when it rained or because of the speed of the cutting. This sequence was storyboarded. Prep is everything.
I got this email from filmmaker/blogger Jamie Stuart, and thought it was a good spark for some discussion...
I just read your piece on the tax incentives and current state of NY indie film, and I thought I'd pass along a few general thoughts. I've observed for a little while now that there's a generational shift going on in the community, and within that, there's a host of issues.
1) The spark that fueled indie film in the '80s and '90s was the marketing concept of the "breakout" -- first time filmmakers establishing themselves with trademark styles and no money. These filmmakers were the poster children for the movement. Now, however, the paradigm has shifted to a situation where filmmakers are making small, dirt-cheap movies for niches and their friends; the debut film isn't as important so much as slowly building a track record. In this model, indie film has essentially become regional folk art. I think we need to return to the prior model, but there are some things holding that up. Like:
2) A lot of the pillars of the scene have fought their battles and moved up in the world. The "dependent" phase from the mid-'90s through the early '00s gave a lot of people a raise in options. Instead of struggling to make a movie for 6-figures or for maybe $1-2M, budgets swelled to $6M as a low, all the way up to $15-25M (some even higher). In this context, I think a lot of these pillars are self-admittedly not as in touch with new talent anymore, and they're glad they don't have to do guerrilla scrambling anymore. I recall a panel with you and Christine at Tribeca a few years back, where you both admitted that you were no longer in a position to find and nurture new filmmakers anymore.
3) I think we need to re-think how movies are made. Micro-features and DIY productions use crews in a much different manner than movies made for 7-8 figures, and I think producers need to study what people like myself are doing. For example, the NYFF46 series I created last fall was a 4-part non-linear sci-fi/action mind-bender -- it was made for an entire budget of $75, and at least 70% of the time, since I was shooting it while starring in it, nobody was even behind the camera. Now, I happen to think that under the circumstances, the project had pretty good production values. Not that I expect larger budgeted productions to use the exact method I did (they wouldn't have to if they had money), but there's got to be something that can be learned and adapted from what I and others have done.
4) Now, if you combine all of the above, you get another problem. It used to be that aspiring filmmakers started with a small budget, either on a short or a small feature, and that was used as a calling card to get a larger budget. The issue here is that due to the drop in budgets based on prosumer cameras and editing, producers don't seem to take those projects as seriously. What they mistake, however, is that you're getting an equivalent production value as before, only it costs a fraction of the amount. But producers aren't saying: "Wow! Look at what so-and-so did for so little. Imagine what they could do with a larger budget? I want to work with him!" Instead, they seem to be looking at the budget, and on that basis alone, writing it off: "Let me know when you've moved on to bigger things, but for now, you're a small fry."
5) The internet is not the savior. The internet is great for sales and marketing, but it's a lousy delivery method. The quality is terrible. I've never looked at the internet as anything other than a means to get exposure and establish myself -- so I can get OFF the internet and make real features. However:
6) Internet filmmaking still isn't taken seriously. It doesn't matter how good my work is or how good it looks, there are people who simply, either by virtue of the size of the player, or through general snobbishness, don't consider it serious filmmaking. I think a lot of the indie community still believes in the film festival model: If you're a serious filmmaker, you need to submit to festivals. They seem almost fundamentalist in this regard. And it's holding up progress.
All of that said, I'm still of the belief that the biggest problem in indie film right now is simply the product. When indie film was booming in the '80s/'90s, young people like myself were drawn to it because it seemed to be the most creative arena in filmmaking. Not now. Young people look to big FX blockbusters as the most creative arena. People now equate indie film with poor production values, cheap-looking handheld photography, amateurish acting, etc. They look at it as a joke. I approached the prospect of DIY filmmaking from the view that ambitious films could now be made inexpensively -- I've always used tripods, dollies, cranes, special FX. But DIY filmmaking on the whole went in the opposite direction -- small, handheld slices of life. And while that aesthetic certainly has its place, it's never going to find a larger audience, in my opinion. Until we shift out of this phase and DIY filmmakers start creating ambitious pictures at dirt prices, the movement will remain derided. And until the bigger people start lifting up the small, there's going to remain a major class divide.
On his Indiewire blog, Anthony Kaufman made the kind of observation I love: simple, right before us all, but ignored time and time again by the mainstream. His point is that all the corporate acquisitions of art film companies have only led to disaster, and maybe this extends to old school media companies too. The problem seems accentuated when it is an entity with new media dreams that acquires the traditional media company; what once worked with steady cash flow limps its way into non-existence.
There was a faint echo of this in the NY Times recent article on the difference between Hollywood and Silicon Valley cultures. The necessary change from a salary mentality to an ownership one is not the easiest transition. I have repeatedly been surprised by how few producers even are willing to take true entrepreneurial approach to production. Sure we slave without fees for years on development, but when the time comes to go forward most remain strictly fee based. Sure, I can't consider a back-end weighted deal when I need to pay my bills, but when that's not the case, I can get more creative.
History has shown repeatedly that Hollywood, and even the movie industry in general, just don't get new media. Remember Pop.com? Before there was YouTube, there was Pop.com. It had it all: Dreamworks, John Sloss, Eddie Murphy, & Steve Martin. Here's Business Week's 9/25/2000 article on why they failed. Take a trip down memory lane here.
Frankly it's also looking like new media doesn't get the movie industry. To me it comes down to the fact that film viewing is not a passive experience. It is a collective community experience. It is the aspects of community & collectivity that new media has to enhance when entering the film world. And it is these very same aspects that we have to bring back to traditional cinema for it to grow vital again. Ten years of impulse viewing and mass-market sell has destroyed the indie film culture. We have to focus on developing audiences' informed decision making behavior and the aspects that extend film culture beyond the simple viewing process.
Since I was pushing the big 4K projectors on the exhibitors a few hours ago, it only makes sense that I now push pocket projectors on all filmmakers. Who needs an exhibition hall when you can project from you iPhone for under $300?! Me, I still like the old fashioned cinema, but I can also get excited about every abandoned building being transformed into a movie theater on the fly.
I just came across this post on Celluloid Junkie: evidently Sony's digital 4K projectors are on sale for 50% off until March 20th. Prices start at $34K if you happen to have that laying around. Seems to me that should have been part of the stimulus plan for all art house theaters!
Instead of typing publicly that is. I will be one of many panelists at IFP's upcoming SCRIPT TO SCREEN Conference March 7 & 8. My session "Working With Producers and Production Companies" will be Sunday at 230PM. There's a whole bunch of folks who will be there, and many even more interesting and knowledgeable than me! C'mon down! I hope to see you there.
The good folks over at Tribeca asked me to post on the NY State Film & TV Tax Credit debacle. So I did and surprisingly I was able to come up with a few more things to say...
Read the whole post on their blog. Let me know your thoughts.
My gist is we all have to be a hell of a lot more vigilant about the issues that may effect us if we want to be able to earn a living working in this field. I list out a starter course, but really the question is what can we go to dinner on? And let me know what you think I left out.
Here's the menu:
Net Neutrality—Our ability to access and distribute work and ideas, organize around it, is dependent on this core democratic principle.
Media Consolidation—The lack of an antitrust action has created an environment that is virtually impossible to compete in.
Labor Union Stability—The unrest of this year across the guilds has helped no one.
Copyright Law Revision—The rules are antiquated, protecting corporate interests over the creators, while limiting the audience's access to new art forms.
Copyright Protection—The blatant disregard for artists' rights across the Internet make a bad situation even worse.
Government Funding For The Arts (or lack thereof)—The only work artists can expect to be compensated for are the most blatantly commercial endeavors.
Social Network Rules—The Draconian control different networks exert over user content does not bode well for community hopes of sharing information and content.
Data Portability—Everyone’s right to the information their work generates is a necessary principle if artists are ever going to have a direct relationship with their audiences.
Demystification of Distribution and Exhibition Practices—The last twenty years were about demystifying the production process, but there will be no true independence unless the cycle is made complete.
Exhibition Booking Policies and Practices Revision—Distributors require exhibitors to book on full weeks, restricting their ability to become true community centers, providing their audiences with what they want, when they want it.
New Blood Recruitment for Distribution and Exhibition—Since virtually all of the specialized distribution and exhibition entities are run by people who came of age in the days of pure theatrical exhibition, they yearn for a return to those days and are resistant to new practices. Or are they?
Ratings Structure—The current system is not applicable to the diverse work being made today.
Loss of Film Critics’ Old Media Platforms—Our critics were our curators, letting audiences know what to see when, and now most have been fired. Where will our new curators be found? We’ve started HammerToNail to help audiences find the best in true indie American narrative work, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Filmmaker Re-education for this New Media Universe—Let’s face it, we are all a bunch of Luddites. Until we recognize what tools are available and how to use them, we are depriving both ourselves and our audiences from the quality of work we all deserve.
Creation of Indie Film Promotional Portals—How can we see good work when we don’t even know it exists?
Broadband Availability and Strength—America lags behind the rest of the developed world not just in terms of broadband penetration, but also in the quality and level of that broadband service.
Digital Film Archive—As more and more filmmakers move to a digital medium to both originate and finish that work, how will this work be preserved for future generations?
Indie Film History Archive—The history and process of how this work we are now creating will be remembered will be impossible without some joint effort to preserve it.
We're gearing up for our April/May 2009 production of Under Jakob's Ladder--a full length feature film that tells the story of a man imprisoned during Stalin's regime in Ukraine at the outset of World War II.
And we're looking for a whole range of volunteers of all ages to serve as movie extras.
So, if you live in the Hudson Valley region -- in and around Chester/Monroe (just north of New York City), this could mean YOU!
We got our sheepskin coat yesterday. Shipped to us all the way from the Netherlands...
That's good news since the sheepskin coat is one of the important costume items in our feature film, Under Jakob's Ladder.
The real Jakob did indeed own such a coat; one that came with him to prison when he was arrested during Stalin's purges. (A Russian sheepskin coat was almost a necessity for people living through those frigid winters in the Soviet Union.)
And our coat not only will dress our protagonist, but it will also act as a plot device. (But we can't give away any details about that!)
Props and costumes. They're beginning to come together.
Love Letters not a very typical Roger Corman film.
AMY HOLDEN JONES: It's the only art house film he ever made, actually.
Where did the story for Love Letters come from?
AMY HOLDEN JONES: My husband and I had written each other love letters. We had been apart after we first met; we met on Taxi Driver. He was the cinematographer and I was Scorsese's assistant. And then we were apart for quite a while. I moved to the West coast and he was on the East coast. So we wrote letters. That was four or five years before.
I had our daughter when I was twenty-six and did Slumber Party Massacre when I was twenty-seven, and I was casting around for an idea for an art film and I came upon those letters. And I thought, well this is really interesting. What would happen if our daughter someday read all of our love letters? How would that affect her?
At the same time, I saw a movie called Shoot the Moon, which was about an extramarital affair and the traumas of the married man dealing with his wife and the girlfriend. I thought at the time, man have I seen this a zillion times. Forever I've seen the point of view of the husband or the man, torn between his wife and the girlfriend. You see it today in Match Point, for example. It's done over and over and over again. I've even seen the story of the wife who was cheated on.
But I had never seen the story of the girlfriend and what it was like for her. I put that together with the love letters and thought it would be interesting if someone came upon the love letters and realized that their parents had had an extramarital affair, if the love letters were not in fact between her mother and father, as ours were, but between the mother and a lover.
In other words, what would happen if you were confronted with an understanding of a time period in your parents' life which you never really understand -- none of us have a real idea of what our parents were like in their twenties. How would that affect your life? And I thought it would be interesting if that then thrust her into an affair with a married man, trying to replicate what she saw her mother had.
Basically, it was designed to be a movie about what happens to the woman outside of the marriage, who is usually, in fiction, painted as a terrible villain and often is kind of a victim who gets left in the end.
Why did you structure the film as a flashback?
AMY HOLDEN JONES: I was doing an art film, and unlike most people who seem today to only set out to do art films, I had been working in big commercial movies, like Taxi Driver and the two pictures that I had cut. I wasn't fancying myself to be Fellini or anything like that.
But I went and read all the screenplays of Harold Pinter, believe it or not, because I felt that this would be high art, and there are some great screenplays in book form by Harold Pinter. Probably there was something in there that inspired the flashbacks, would be my guess. It's certainly an overused device now.
Although you term Love Letters an art film, it gets up and running very quickly.
AMY HOLDEN JONES: Well, I was a ruthless editor. I think of all the things I've done, the thing I was best at was as a film editor. That sounds like braggadocio, but what I mean is that I was better at it than I am as a writer or a director. (laughs) It really suited my sensibility. I like things to move. To this day, I'm always thinking, why didn't I lift that out, why didn't I move it along? I like to take an audience on a journey and go.
In Love Letters, you have Anna watching the famous kissing on the beach scene from From Here to Eternity. When you wrote that, how worried were you about getting the rights to use that scene?
AMY HOLDEN JONES: Actually, I didn't worry about it at all. At that time period, it wasn't that hard. I think there was a limit of how long the clip could be before it started to cost a lot more money.
Did Roger Corman have precise direction on the amount of nudity in the film?
AMY HOLDEN JONES: Yes. He wants either sex, violence or humor. He actually told me that lovemaking wasn't so much required as nudity. And he didn't mind if she could just be lounging around the house nude, but there had to be nudity. He had to have some way to sell the thing.
It's actually the one thing that troubles me about it. I find some of the nudity really gratuitous. But it was the price we paid to get it made.
I was really impressed with the simplicity of the Polaroid scene. It's a lock-down shot, we don't see the couple, we only see each Polaroid photo he takes of her as he drops it into the shot. It said a lot about the relationship, but it was also very cheap to shoot.
AMY HOLDEN JONES: That's one of my favorite scenes. That's a really good example of how you come up with stuff. Writing for a lower budget really focuses your mind. It doesn't necessarily mean that you're sacrificing quality.
I see so many really big budget movies, where they've had everything to spend and have covered everything sixty ways from sideways, but they never did the hard thinking about what was important in the scene. Because they had the time, they just threw spaghetti at the wall and covered everything. As a result, they never thought about what was actually going on.
This time last year... we posted the first blog post to this blog. Although, technically, it wasn't our first blog post...
Confused?
Actually, if you count our original blog for 'Liars and Lunatics' (which began March 2, 2007), this would have been our 83rd blog post. You see, the blog changed names when the movie changed to Dear J. And we decided this blog wasn't just about that one feature film.
So, that means we've actually been blogging for almost two years now!
And to date, while if you count the number of blog posts in this blog, this is our 93rd blog post. Counting the former blog site, it's our 175th blog post.
And while that's peanuts compared with those who blog everyday (frankly, we just don't have the time)... it's been pretty consistent over those two years. If you don't think so, you try making movies and blogging all at the same time!
Movie Marketing Madness tipped us to a very extensive article in Smashing Magazine on current trends in Movie Website design. Although it slants heavily towards the studio pics, several specialized films (the great Waltz With Bashir, The Class, & Milk) are featured as well. Check it out here. It would would be great to see the same for True Indies, but I won't hold my breath.
Chris Monger, screenwriter, director, artist had this to answer my plea:
I started a reply which turned into a rant which morphed into my history of why Indie Film did not start, but died with sex lies and videotape - and that's even before I'd started on why Indie Film should also forget the form of the 90 minute theatrical feature. The future is here, we are free to try anything.
And that's the conclusion I was working towards: There's nothing to save.
We can't hang on to what was (and what was often totally imperfect) anymore than we can hang on to newspapers. Regular Film / Studio Film / Indie Film as we know them may limp along for a while, or may even exist like Opera for a long time, but stories / moving images are not going away.
Now's the time to have fun with them. In the late 60's early 70's a lot of Indie Filmmakers (and I'm talking about people who processed their own film, ran their own printers - really Indie!) believed that film was at the same point that painting was at the turn of the 20th Century: Rather than being ruined by photography, painting was liberated into all the isms of the new way of seeing and looking and re-presenting.
So I say, where are the Picassos and Matisses, the people who will throw away the rule book?
I find the current debate regarding micro-payments for print journalism fascinating. Each morning, I work to talk myself out of a panic that we will soon be deprived of all the great newspapers, writers, and journalists. A friend chimed in that after the papers fall then next up is the free internet. The line of dominos is really easy to imagine.
But maybe it shouldn't all be free. I, like all my film friends, are looking for a model of survival, no longer success. Reading Steve Brill's defense of micro-payments makes me wonder if there is anything that film fans and workers are really committed to paying for. Variety & Hollywood Reporter start to feel like real luxuries these days. Guilds and unions, like membership in IFP and Film Independent, are crucial in the same way that if you want a vaccine to work, virtually everyone has to partake -- but my son still screams with every shot (maybe if vaccines had a networking attribute like these organizations my son would respond better...).
But what will we pay for? My Netflix subscription seems like a better value with each new film that is available for streaming, even if I still prefer DVDs. As they just hit 10 Million subscribers it seems that everyone will pay for access to every film. As a devourer of new international film, I need a festival diet of projected new work from around the world every two or three months. It's one of the reasons I can never leave NY. Jaman may offer it online but I need to see it large in a room full of people. And as much as I like to see it, I like to talk about it, read about it. So what will I pay for? I honestly don't know.
Anyway, read Brill's suggestion, and ponder the applicability to our world of film. I am.
When we were shooting our feature film Dear J, we had to keep an eye on the weather forecast, especially for one of our key outdoor scenes. As the first Friday approached, we had scheduled filming in Flushing Meadows Park. (This is the site of the 1939 and 1965 World's Fair. And, it's the site of the annual U.S. Open Tennis competition.)
The weather forecast predicted sprinkles of rain for the Friday morning. We could deal with that. But by the time we arrived, the weather had turned... worse.
When we arrived, another film crew packed up their equipment and left. But not us. It was raining cats and dogs, but we figured we would film anyway. Umbrellas and raincoats protected the camera. The actors, Joe and Maya (role of James and Paige) were great sports about running around in the rain. (They were supposed to be having a picnic in the park. They just did it in the rain!)
Good thing we didn’t have to worry about sound!
However, later, when we got to our next (indoor) filming location, we discovered that a tornado had touched down not too far from where we were filming. Come to think of it, that must have been why the sky was a sickly green color!
(Yes, we know that the color of the sky in the photo looks blue. That's color correction for you...)
How did you first get connected with Francis Coppola?
ROGER CORMAN: I hired Francis out of the UCLA film school as an editor. I had bought the American rights to two Russian science fiction films, which had wonderful special effects, but they were filled with outrageous anti-American propaganda. And so I hired Francis to re-edit those films, and delete the anti-American propaganda. And then he went along and worked with me on several films as my assistant, and particularly on a Grand Prix Formula One race car picture, called The Young Racers, in which we traveled from track to track.
Francis and our key grip built racks and various compartments into a Volkswagen microbus, so that the microbus was actually a traveling small studio. We used that, with a crew of six or seven professionals, and then we would hire local people.
When the picture was finished, I had to go back to do a picture in the United States, but it occurred to me we had efficiently functioning crew and everything in microbus, so we could stay and do another picture.
We were finishing at the British Grand Prix, which that year was at Liverpool, but the problem was that British labor laws were very difficult. We only had permits to work in and around the track. But I knew that the Irish labor laws were looser. So I said to Francis, 'If you can come up with an idea for a horror script, you can take the microbus and several of the crew and just put it on a ferry and go across the Irish sea and shoot there.'
He came up with a very interesting idea for Dementia 13, and he contacted some people he'd been with at the UCLA film school and they flew over to Dublin and everybody lived in a big house there while he shot the picture.
It was a very interesting psychological suspense story. We took one idea from Hitchcock, which was that the leading lady would die early in the film, just as she did in Psycho. I always thought that was great, because nobody ever expects the leading lady to die halfway through the film!
Jon Jost, longtime true indie filmmaker of great talent, innovation, and commitment, commented on Jeff's recent post. We bump it up in hopes that no one misses it (and next time, Jon, please send me an email address or something so I check in with you!):
As a, oh shall we say somewhat experienced filmmaker in this regard, I think much of the above makes for a delicious meal of red herring.
There are as many truly awful films that were tightly scripted, etc., and Lipsky's assertion that scripting is some path to betterment is folly.
There are also many truly awful films that were improvised.
So what might one learn from this? Maybe that it is not whether something is scripted or not, but whether all the aspects of a work - the underlying "idea" of it, the imagery, the sound, the acting (assuming there are acting figures, which itself is a fat assumption about what a film is - there's many stunningly wonderful abstract works with no actors) which all combine to make a film work or not. Maybe one should learn to open one's thought processes a bit, and think and feel a bit more clearly, and not jump to rather simple-minded views.
On a personal level I can pass along that of my own work, while each was rooted in some fundamental idea or structural framework, my films CHAMELEON (1978); SLOW MOVES (1983); BELL DIAMOND (1985); REMBRANDT LAUGHING (1987); SURE FIRE (1989-90); ALL THE VERMEERS IN NEW YORK (1989-2000); UNO A TE (1995); all shot in film, were completely improvised - though frankly most people looking at them would assume they'd been fully scripted and thought out before hand, but they were not. VERMEERS had not one page of script or dialog,nor did any of the others listed above. What they did have, in the broadest sense of the term is "direction" and craft skills and an overarching cinematic sensibility guiding them.
Subsequently, the narrative digital films OUI NON (1996-2000), HOMECOMING (2004), OVER HERE (2006) and the most recent PARABLE (2008) were all similarly utterly without script.
It is true - sort of - that digital media, drastically bringing down the costs of actual shooting, enhances the opportunities to improvise and take risks. My shooting ratios are higher, though not by much, than they were in film (in film averaged about 2.5 to 1; though some films were virtually 1 to 1); I suspect now I average in narrative work something like 3.5 to one. I am not interested in wading through piles of crap to find a film in it. Some people are and some very good films have been made that way.
So the real matter is not whether one improvises or scripts, but rather how one goes about orchestrating the totality of what makes a film. Digital enhances this by letting people shoot, fall on their faces, make total crap AND LEARN IN PROCESS, rather than sitting around waiting for $2 million or whatever to materialize so they can go replicate a script and make another cookie-cutter film, however well or badly. And, for those few who seem to actually be willing to deal with it, digital also offers a far richer and more complex palette of aesthetic possibilities, though frankly most of our younger filmmakers treat it as if it was just cheaper film and don't begin to touch what it really is.
My two bits - a friend of mine in Stanberry MO, filmmaker Blake Eckard, pointed me to this item. Thanks Buck.
Jon Jost www.jon-jost.com www.jonjost.wordpress.com
We've had a fair amount of discussion about the need for producer training programs here. The need for training programs in other film-related disciplines is equally pressing. The need for training programs that focus on diversity and champion under-represented groups is particularly of need. Let's face it, the film industry remains a bastion of privilege, and unless serious efforts are made, everyone just keeps helping out people that are like themselves.
Luckily, one of the longest running training and most successful programs is dedicated to increasing diversity in the film biz, and that is Film Independent's Project: Involve. THERE IS A FEBRUARY 23rd DEADLINE so best download your application here, fill it out, and submit it pretty damn quick!
WHAT IS PROJECT:INVOLVE?
Project:Involve is Film Independent's signature diversity program, dedicated to increasing cultural diversity in the film industry by cultivating the careers of under-represented filmmakers. The program, which runs from October through June, selects filmmakers from culturally diverse backgrounds and filmmaking tracks. The Fellows are paired one-on-one with a mentor from the film industry. In addition to the mentorship, the Fellows also attend filmmaking workshops, community screenings, and receive career development assistance.
During the nine-month program, the Fellows are assigned a 2-minute short film project. They work in pairs to develop and shoot a short film that incorporates the concept of diversity in our every day life.
40 Fellows are selected for the program each year.
Project:Involve Fellows receive:
A one-year membership with Film Independent A pass to the Los Angeles Film Festival (Westwood Pass) Alumni support Applications are accepted in the following categories:
Acquisitions, Acting, Agent/Manager, Cinematography, Composing, Costume Design, Development Exec, Directing, Documentary, Editing, Entertainment Law, Film Programming, Marketing/Distribution, Music, Producing, Production Design, Screenwriting, Sound, and Writer/Director.
Read more about here. And again, download the application here.
Imagine if we had government funding for the arts in this country. For a brief moment I had hopes that the stimulus plan would include something more than a token. As Scott Macauley at Filmmaker Blog reported with a good round-up of the lack thereof, it ain't gonna be so? You'd think with almost 3 million people employed in the arts in this country, they'd be more of demand for such a stimulus. It's crazy that when investments like this and the state based film tax credits bring more revenue in, that the politicians don't make the happen. Sigh...
Well, image if we had a website like this promoting our culture. What would be the ramifications of that? Would media literacy increase? Would artists prosper? Would that be so bad?
I don't think I need to tell anyone reading this what a boost the credits have been to NY State, or how many jobs they have created, or how horrible it will be for the industry if they are not reinstated.
We all need to call Governor Patterson. We all need to write him a letter. But you can start by signing this petition:
To: Governor David A. Paterson CC: Speaker of the Assembly/Assemblyman Sheldon Silver, Senate Majority Leader Malcolm A. Smith
We are writing to you today, on behalf of the thousands of men and women employed in the film and television industry in New York State. A recent article in the New York Post, titled "Cut! And Run Looms: NY Out of Film Lures", reported that the successful state program that provides tax credits to lure television and film productions to New York has run out of money. The report goes on to say that "A Paterson spokesman said yesterday that there is no additional funding for the tax credits included in his latest budget proposal." This is alarming.
With an unemployment rate of over 7%, now is not the time to cut programs that create jobs and foster new businesses in our state. This program is proven to be highly successful and at a time when this industry needs all the help it can get, you must rethink the true impact of not funding this valuable program.
According to a 2007 study by Ernst and Young, the state and city combined have issued $690 million in tax credits and have collected $2.7 billion in taxes from movie and television productions. This program pays for itself! It helped create over 7,000 jobs, directly, in 2007 and over 12,000 jobs indirectly.
As you are aware, New York City has seen a surge in new television, motion picture and commercial filming in recent years. The Mayor's Office of Film, Theater and Broadcasting reports that in 2002, there were 14,858 NYC location shooting days and in 2008, we reached over 27,250 days. There is a direct correlation between the growth of this industry and the tax credits provided from the state - we need to keep the momentum going, especially during tough economic times.
New York City and New York State have become"Hollywood of the East". We are finally a player in the international film industry. Please, Governor Paterson, fund the New York State Tax Credit program for television and motion pictures. Real jobs depend on it!
There are quite a few definitions. Everything from the name of the main character in Dicken's classic Great Expectations, to the name for the little bulb that Lily of the Valley flowers come from, to the dots on a pair of dice.
But for our purposes, pips refer to the shoulder insignia indicating an officer's rank... In our case, the rank of a Soviet NKVD officer (which would be worn on the collar, not the shoulder.)
Ah, yes... we're still working on researching the uniforms that we're going to need for our feature film, Under Jakob's Ladder. And that means we have to know what kind of pips to get, and how many...
For example, enlisted men wore triangles... junior officers wore squares... senior officers wore rectangles... and the big wigs wore diamonds. And do we need red or green?
We've been looking for reasonably-priced pips on ebay. There seem to be a lot of Star Trek pips for sale. Not very many Soviet-style pips.
If we go with the Star Trek ones, do you think anyone will notice?!!!
Today's suggestion is from filmmaker and blogger Pericles Lewnes:
Every indie filmmaker should figure out a way to become a minor league exhibitor. The new indie production company model should have a new component for screening other indie filmmakers. Not just their own movies, but their colleagues movies, heretofore seen as "competitors." These would be small screenings for sure, but if all filmmakers could set up some time with their friends to show the movies of colleagues, the grassroots level of the indie film seen will grow. These screenings and the reactions they would produce would be a good place for higher tier exhibitors to find new talent.
Filmmaker Jay Anania encourages us to return to the love of doing:
I can only speak about what I think is the state of 'independent' film, the films themselves, and what they seem like. For it is the films themselves that must be the beginning of whatever the future holds. I will speak of it idealistically, for to do otherwise would negate the very purpose of having the conversation at all.
Putting aside, for the moment, Ted’s belief that too many films are being made (and I suggest putting it aside because there is simply no way to stem the impulse to make a film when you actually can, and everybody these days actually can), I would argue that there is a seemingly contradictory need for both humility and ambition amongst independent filmmakers.
First, ‘ambition’: Independent films must ambitiously return to its original dream of high and even exalted artistic hopes, a compelling and selfless desire to advance the art form, find new ways of telling, celebrate the purely visual aspect of film viewing. I am confident when the lights go off in a theatre (or the FBI warning leaves the screen on a home viewing), if I have a sense that the filmmaker is trying, successfully or not, to make work that can take a legitimate place amongst serious music, literature, painting, etc. Why in the world not?
On the other sad hand, the not-so-truly-independent film, no matter how 'other' it calls itself, is often simply trying to sneak a place, it seems, amongst other films, bigger films, measured often by their commercial success, or the social advancement accorded its makers.
By ‘humility’ I mean that filmmakers should modestly steer very clear of the commercial (and social) arrogance of presuming/hoping that their small works will lead to access to the privileged and moneyed corridors of the mainstream industry (what Ted means, I think, by ‘crossover’ ambitions). They can, of course, crossover, but nothing is more deadening than having such imagined access as the primary reason for making a film. No matter how passionately many filmmakers talk about their Vision, too often the overriding impulse is to garner admiration from bigwigs who can finance bigger films, and the attendant, supposed, freedom this will bring for future work. I would argue that this future work is already devoid of inspiration, as it is based upon a filmmaker whose work was made, at least in some measure, in order to secure career options, rather than having been made out of a serious, undeniable urge to craft a particular film, regardless, totally regardless, of its career implications.
So, ‘humility’ in this context, is a profound and complete abandonment of this careerism. A truly independent film is made with blissful indifference to what it might bring the maker in terms of money and status. It is made in the spirit of the amateur, a word that derives from the Latin amator, lover. An amateur, in this usage, is not someone who does something in an untrained way. Rather, it is someone who does something for the love of doing it, the thing itself. Lest one worries about ‘amateurish’ ineptness of craft, I would argue, in fact, that the craft of this kind of amateur is at the very least, commensurate with the craft of the professional, as it is the work a filmmaker who is concerned only with the work on its own terms. This bodes well for the quality of the making.
To be sure, money changes hands in order for a film to be made, and I believe that every director, no matter how ‘independent’ should assume a responsibility to those giving the money that allows them to make their work. However, both producer and director should operate with trust that a film made very well, as inventively as possible, will be the film most likely to justify the investment. To not have such trust is to take the initial steps down a slippery path toward the crass and manipulative.
1. MPAA. Want your movie to play outside of the art house circuit? Chances are you will need to pay to have it rated. Here’s the link if you want to see how that works (http://www.mpaa.org/CARASubmittalPaperwork8.doc). It is not cheap.
2. Box office split or four wall. These are the two basic arrangements you are likely to face. In the first scenario, box office split, you will simply share a certain percentage of the box office with the theater owner. In the second scenario, you will pay an upfront fee basically to rent the theater. Then, in return, you will receive a share of the box office, usually much higher than in the box office split scenario.
3. Paid ads. Depending on the market, some theaters will obligate you to spend a certain amount on advertising your film if you want them to show it. I’m trying to avoid these places wherever I can.
4. DVD window. Just got off the phone with one of the larger theater chains and they want to obligate me to a four month window, which means in theory I can’t sell DVDs for four months after playing there. But it is part of my hope and plan perhaps to sell DVDs during this whole theatrical run. What to do?
5. Booking a theater. Convincing a theater owner to take a chance on you is just like convincing a potential investor to give you money for your movie: You have to sell them. The thing they are most interested in knowing is how you plan to promote the movie in their area and who your audience is.
Mike Ryan, producer of the lowest budgeted film ever nominated for an Academy Award, producer & co-conspirator of both Todd Solondz's and Bela Tarr's latest opi, frequent contributor to Hammer To Nail, and all around opinionated mofo and raconteur (bless his bbq & bourbon lovin' soul) had this to rant:
For me one of the scariest aspects about the future state of indie film is not the problems connected to distribution (though they are formidable and problematic for other reasons) but instead I am most worried about the future DEMAND for the auteur driven films that I love. I am not into film because I like to sit and watch moving photographs of talking heads, I like cinema that gives me drama in a form that is unique, specific and distinct from any other medium. Most movies really are just filmed radio shows, driven by talk, and that's not why I am into the film medium. The problem is not just getting true auteur driven cinema made but the problem is about maintaining the demand for that kind of cinema. Unfortunately the types of 'solutions' you are proposing do not address that aspect of the problem. In fact ,watching 'films' on computers or, god forbid, hand devices, will only further reduce film literacy and increase demand for these types of 'filmed radio shows' that play best on tiny screens. For me 'indie film' is not a business model that worked for twenty years because films were made for cheap and sold high. For me indie cinema is about artists expressing themselves in a way that was NOT overtly commercial. The 'decline' did not just start last year, in my opinion it started with SEX LIES AND VIDEOTAPE, a generic filmed soap opera that was made cheap sold high and shifted the 'success' criteria from individuality and formal innovation to box office numbers. So my 'solution' would be more connected to maintaining/creating an appreciation for the true cinema experience. I would like to see that arts funding (Redford mentioned that he hopes that Obama may be arts friendly) be earmarked for cinema programs in local museums/libraries. This means projecting actual film prints of both classic art house films and contemporary work by true cinema auteurs, in the style of the rep theaters of old.
I do believe that trends move in a dialectic counter swing pattern: the current generation of 18-25 year olds are buying more vinyl than ever before, this is the first generation in which parents did not own a record player and so the kids have become curious and have discovered the joys of uncompressed music. Yes indeed an acoustic guitar sounds very different on a record than compressed on an MP3 and consequently small record stores across the country are hauling the old crates out of the basement as cd inventory decreases. Likewise, Starbucks announced massive layoffs yesterday, stores all over the city are closing and yet MUD COFFEE and other indie coffee store fronts are doing great business. Untill Starbucks came to NYC it was hard to find a decent strong cup of coffee, Starbucks raised the bar on coffee literacy and that allowed other places like MUD, who serve way better coffee than Starbucks, to prosper. Likewise Tower records on Broadway closed and the tiny specialty store OTHER MUSIC is still open.
So I am hopeful that in the future age of VOD DOD on your IPOD the demand for true cinema will return. In my dreams Bela Tarr will be recognized as the living God that he is and demand for his films to screen will increase because it CANNOT be seen on a computer or hand device. But , I still think we need a little help from big bro to keep cinema alive while we weather this transition period so my 'solution' would be in directing government art money toward local cinema museum/library screening clubs.
Didjaknow The Workbook Project had a podcast that you can download? I didn't until yesterday. Oh happy day.I just subscribed. More knowledge to be gained as I walk these mean streets...
Seybold Scientific had a great posting on what you need to do build an effective social media plan. It's written for businesses but is easily adaptable for film. Read the whole thing, but here's a brief on the first four:
1) Clearly articulate who your stakeholders are before you begin. 2) Clearly articulate the key issues these stakeholders care about as it relates to your offering. Use a bulleted list with no more than three or four words per item. 3) Begin by researching which, if any, top bloggers are discussing these issues. 4) Inevitably, any substantial subject matter area has a back channel where top bloggers and influencers chat.
Once you had the idea, how long did it take to write Grief?
RICHARD GLATZER: I wrote it quickly; it was the easiest script I’ve written. I usually don’t keep journals, but I happened to write down in a little notebook the day that (producer) Ruth Charny suggested thinking about this. It was the end of October in ‘91, and I had a draft of the script by early January ‘92; and I hadn’t even starting thinking about it at the end of October, ‘91. So it was pretty fast.
How did you go about funding the movie?
RICHARD GLATZER: I had about $20,000 saved, and we raised another $20,000 from people who were willing to put up $5,000 investments -- none of which was easy.
I think the gay content helped a little bit, that people felt that it was some sort of community function or something. But it also, obviously, limited the film in terms of people thinking they were ever going to see a lot of money coming back. Ruth put up $5,000; it was mostly little bits and pieces, mostly from friends.
We raised $40,000, and at the same time we were doing that, I put together my cast just by going to Sundance and seeing Craig Chester in Swoon, and meeting people at parties or wherever.
That’s where I met Illeana Douglas. Just as I was leaving -- I hadn’t even spoken to her, really -- and I got my coat and was on the way out the door and suddenly clicked that she was perfect for Leslie. I just went up to her and said, “Hey, you wouldn’t by any chance do some low-budget, independent fag film, would you?”
And she said, “I bet you’re the kind of guy who loves Edgar Ulmer movies.” And I was a big Edgar Ulmer fan, so within a day or two she said, “I’ll do your movie,” as soon as I got her the script.
So I assembled the cast and felt like I had this really great group of people. We’d all been hoping to get more money than $40,000, but there was nothing coming.
Did you write the script with particular actors in mind?
RICHARD GLATZER: No. Alexis Arquette and Jackie Beat I knew from this club I was doing; they both performed there. I was thinking of them as I was writing the script; not from the outset, but as I was writing it, I started to realize that I was hearing Jackie Beat saying these lines.
So by the time I finished the script I definitely had them in mind for those two roles. But it wasn’t like from the beginning I was going to write a role a role for Jackie Beat or write a role for Alexis.
How long did you shoot?
RICHARD GLATZER: We shot for ten days. It was ten days for the bulk of the shooting, and then we did an extra half day in the courtroom. That was our big production value, which of course we made look like shit by deteriorating it. We shot it on film and it looked really good, and then we went and shot it off a monitor.
At the time we didn’t know how it was going to work. And I thought if I shoot it on film, I have the option to use it on film, and if I shoot it on video, then I’m stuck with video. It was basically a half day; we were out of there at three, three thirty.
Do you think there were any advantages to not having a larger budget?
RICHARD GLATZER: I set out to make a movie in one location for financial reasons; I think the whole idea of grieving, and the fact that Mark’s dealing with the death of his boyfriend, to me is so much more interesting indirectly and seen only in the office.
I think if we’d had money to go shoot Mark crying at home, or something -- just because we maybe had the money, and you’d think, “Oh, we have to cover that” -- to me the movie gained its identity and meaning from giving him that sense of privacy and from being limited to the office. That was a budgetary limitation that ended up working in the movie’s favor.
Of course, it probably would have been distributed wider and seen as a more mainstream movie if we’d had more locations -- a lot of running around and all that stuff.
How long did it take to finish the movie?
RICHARD GLATZER: It took forever to post it. We didn’t have enough money; the $40,000 was to shoot it, but we didn’t have anything left to do any of the post. We were trying to raise money and trying to find freebie stuff. This was this UCLA student who had this KEM deck at home and she was synching dailies for us. She let us in there to cut some stuff.
It’s so frustrating when you’ve got this in the can and you want to work on it and you can’t. It took us about a year to edit the thing, getting a few bucks here, a few bucks there and begging favors everywhere. There was a post house near me, an editing facility that would let us go in there for free; they were sympathetic and trying to help us out.
And really the only reason it ever got finished was because Mark Finch, who was the head of the Gay & Lesbian Film Festival in San Francisco, saw a rough cut of the film and loved it and said he would give us the closing night if we could finish. So then it was this panic to finish it.
I put up more money -- fool that I was -- in order to finish it. No one was coming up with any money. I made him a personal guarantee that I was going to get the film done, and we had two or three months and there was no money, and so I finally just put the money up.
One last question: Am I nuts, or is the actor who plays The Love Judge doing an impression of Lionel Barrymore?
RICHARD GLATZER: Yes, the Love Judge is doing Lionel Barrymore. You’re the only person who’s ever figured that out.
The actor, Mickey Cottrell (the clean freak in My Own Private Idaho) loves to do shtick. That morning, when we were at the location of the courtroom scene and he’s getting dressed, he said, “You know, I do a really mean Lionel Barrymore.” I said, “Let me hear it.” And he did his Lionel Barrymore. And I said, “That’s perfect, just do that.”
It was perfect, it was just what I wanted -- a curmudgeonly character. But no one else has picked up on it. That’s so funny.
As screenwriters, we're always trying to create conflict for our characters; after all, conflict helps make a good story, right?
A good story, perhaps. Movies definitely need conflict. It's why we watch films... to see the hero overcome all sorts of obstacles. But we'd rather keep the problems out of real life.
Well, sometimes life imitates art. Have we tell ever told the story of the "Digibeta Caper"?
While maybe it's not worthy of its own film, but it certainly was a time full obstacles that we have to overcome... all to get our film Dear J transferred onto a digibeta tape.
And it all began so nicely. We had sent off what we thought was a good tape, only to get an email saying it was "a bad dub"; that the video was jumping up and down.
Okay, now to get a good dub.
Thursday. After re-doing the master, we drive it down to the production house for the transfer. We are told that the guy who does the transfers would pick it up that night. Because we don't want another "bad dub", we attach a note saying something like: "Phone us is there is a problem... even if it's late at night. We need this asap."
Friday. Saturday. Sunday. We hear nothing, so we assume that all is well and that the transfer has been made.
Monday. We call to see how things are going. The answer is not encouraging. The guy went on vacation over the weekend!
Tuesday evening. We get a call. Yes, there is a problem and the dub can't be made.
(It took them how long to tell us this?! Let's see, Thursday to Tuesday...)
We talk to a few different people on the phone, trying to figure out how to fix the problem so the transfer can be made. What comes of those conversations is having to re-render the movie one more time; this time in a different format...
Wednesday. Rendering usually takes several hours. But this rendering takes something like 12 hours... Yes, we start to render the movie around 11:00 am. Although we arranged to bring it in to the production house at around 2:00 pm, we can't. It just keeps rendering. Finally finishing around midnight!
Thursday morning. We jump into the van and head off to the production house. We hand the new rendered version over. This time, the transfer guy is on the ball.
Friday. We get the call that all is well and we can pick up our digibeta.
Friday afternoon. We post the thing in the mail. The stress lifts from our shoulders. Our digibeta caper is over...
Actress, writer, director, producer, political activist, choreographer, and independent film enthusiast Rosie Perez knows, it's all about the money:
If you do not have the realistic financial support, outside of your production buget, to promote and advertise your film in the same way studio supported films are, the possibility of a successful box office is lessen, which then lessens the possibility of financial support for your next independent film project, regardless of it's content, which then hurts the future of all independent films.
Most independent film makers and lovers would say that it's not about making a profit but that is naive and pure independent snobbery. If your film is not marketed to the masses or even just to the independent film lovers' community in a relevant way, the chances of making a substantial profit is not likely. If your film does not make a substantial return, your film will be considered a failure. If your film is considered a failure, just based on the box office and not on the content, the studio's, distributors and future independent financial investors response will be that independent films do not work and will be hesitant to support other projects! This is a hard truth that "we" as independent film makers do not want to accept. Well, we can not afford to be blind any longer.
Marketing dollars for television ads, magazine and newspaper campaigns, movie trailers shown not only online but in theaters , press junkets, billboards or at least poster snipes are vital. Even the "festival" route takes a lot of money after your submission is accepted - word of mouth just does not cut it anymore and if you do not think this is true you are fooling yourself. This is not a part of selling out, it is being business smart about getting your independent, artful and important film seen by as many as possible!
Independent film makers must be competitive and this can be done with out losing our souls. We can be market savvy producers with out selling out our product. We get on our high horse and say amongst ourselves that we do not care about the box office, we care about the content of our films, which we should and do, however, in the real cruel world we must care to an extent otherwise we will be left in the dust.
Much hard love to the Independent Film World, ROSIE PEREZ
Karina at Spout called me out on my liberal use of an already overused term. You ask me though, the meaning of the word "hit" left this world long ago. And it brought a smile to my face to type each letter as a result. I couldn't resist.
Her further critique of Jeff Lipsky's Reasons To Be Bullish, Pt 1 & Pt 2, then reminded me of the response of few friends have called me out on my current optimism: that it left them depressed.
What can I say? In every silver lining broods a deep dark cloud. Karina labeled it "cranky old man-ism". She might have something there: I am writing this from the rocker on my front porch. But Karina got some good response back too. Old men and their reprimanders are always worth a hoot in my book or blog. Check it out.
This past summer I was a mentor at Sundance's first Creative Producing Lab. I was completely impressed. In regards to Jane's earlier post today, this is that program. Granted it can only be accessed by a very limited number of participants (there were 4 fellows last year), but it was a comprehensive and intensive program that I would advise for everyone.
And you know what? The deadline to apply is quickly approaching.
The Sundance Creative Producing Initiative much more than just the summer lab though (from Sundance's own literature):
it is a year-long creative and strategic fellowship program for emerging American producers with their next project.
The program was conceived to develop and support the next generation of American independent producers. For over 27 years, the Sundance Institute has offered in-depth year-round programs for feature screenwriters and directors. In an increasingly competitive and complex marketplace, the health and excellence of the independent film movement hinge on sophisticated creative and strategic producers with whom these directors and writers can collaborate.
The initiative focuses on the holistic producer, who identifies, options, develops and pitches material, champions and challenges the writer/director creatively, raises financing, leads the casting/packaging process, hires and inspires crew, and navigates the sales, distribution, and marketing arenas. The program is designed to hone emerging producers' creative instincts in the scripting and editing stages and to evolve their communicating and problem-solving skills at all stages of realizing a project.
Five producers will be selected for a one-year fellowship and participate in the following:
Creative Producing Lab (described below) Producers Conference attendance Sundance Film Festival attendance (screenings, networking opportunities) $5,000 living stipend; $5,000 pre-production grant Year-round mentorship from 2 industry advisors Community building among producing fellows Year-round support from Sundance staff SUNDANCE CREATIVE PRODUCING LAB
Fellows will attend a 5-day lab focused on creatively strengthening their projects from script to screen. The idea is to give producers the chance to explore their own creative take on material and to give them skills and experience in evaluating and developing this material at script stage and beyond. Scripts will be discussed in one-on-one sessions with advisors, as well as in a collective notes process with the group. Case studies will be used to explore creative issues in the production and editing processes, while techniques in communicating with writer/directors and potential production partners will also be addressed.
ELIGIBILITY
Candidates must have produced at least one short or feature-length narrative or documentary film (no more than 2 narrative features total). Producers must have a completed, legally-optioned, scripted narrative project in hand with a director attached to the project. Candidates may not be writer or director of submitted project. Candidates must be based in the U.S., although submitted project does not need to be English language nor filmed in the U.S. Sundance Institute strongly believes in strength in diversity and actively encourages applications from women, people of color, differently abled people, and all persons who support the Institute's mission.
I should also add on another front, it is also deadline time for IFP's Independent Filmmaker Labs. I just blogged about it on Let'sMakeBetterFilms over on HammerToNail. Check it out too. Get those applications in the mail! These are great programs that we are fortunate to have.
Much of the struggles of the industry are due to the lack of resources, training and mentoring to producers. If we have enough support for the group of people whom actually greenlight the pictures then maybe that will trickle down over everything.
I can't think of one organization that strongly focuses on the development of indie producers. Film school producing programs are just the beginning of training. And most indie producers don't attend film school anyway. You must already have films distributed in order to join the Producers Guild as a producer. By then you have already typically made a few crappy ones that never got distributed. IFP and Film Independent and Sundance try to offer help but they also heavily service directors and writers. And much of the best resources are given in tiny labs that are very hard to get into.
I think we need an organization specifically for producers -- that will be the most effective.
Most of the interviews in film magazines are with writers and directors. I know more about the writers and directors of indie films than producers. That needs to change. More publicity and knowledge of what a producer does will help. Maybe those less experienced won't jump in so quickly if they really understand how big a job it is.
I think that if we start an organization that is helmed or guided by successful producers that really gives back to the next generation of producers then we are on to something that can help indie films get better. Teach indie producers how to develop strong films and be a strong creative partner to the director. Help them understand the importance of a strong cast. Distributors have said they want projects with name actors. How do indie producers make this happen? They need help. Bigger producers could help make inroads with the agents so they are more open to having their clients in smaller films. Give indie producers resources that really help them secure distribution.
You help to teach and build the skills of indie producers and I guarantee there will be significant change in the quality of films being made. They will develop projects longer. Staff it right and cast it well, etc. We lament the loss of billions of dollars each year on indie films. Who is gathering this money and using it? Producers! Let's get us trained and organized and perhaps these losses will diminish. I'm ready to do what it takes to fix the situation. This is my livelihood. If I don't help fix it, who will?
If there were an organization providing more significant training and support from the top at the producer level, we would see a huge difference in the quality of films being made. I know my producer colleagues and I could use more support and the problem is that we haven't been able to find this "ongoing" support. We lean on each other and we join all the usual associations that do exist, but we still struggle finding the mentoring that we really want and need.
Sure, most of us have worked with amazing producers in the past who try to be approachable but it's not an effective system. These amazing producers are extremely busy and have their own projects to worry about. I think these producers would be more available if they were working within an established system of giving back. I personally find it much easier to give back through an established means rather than random email and phone requests that have a high chance of getting lost in the shuffle. In addition, an established system would allow mentoring from multiple sources, which benefits everyone.
I am a case study in what is broken in our system. I work extremely hard and have the best of intentions for making entertaining films that appeal to a wide audience. I want my investors to make their money back, and I believe I am making the right decisions but if I had a system to lean on a bit more, I know I would increase the odds of my films being a success. And if producers like me have a hard time building a proper support system, how do those just starting out have a chance? It's a real dilemma.
We need a system that offers producers a means for receiving guidance and training, and in turn, allows those producers who have "made it" to give back in a significant way. By the time a producer has made a name for him or herself, he or she has usually already made a few films that have lost money. I am sure this "learning" period is where we are seeing the greatest loss in the billions of dollars of investment money. We catch producers at this phase in their careers and we provide a foundation for a thriving independent film industry.
Today's suggestion from filmmaker and blogger Pericles Lewnes:
What if an internet site could be set up to premiere a movie that an internet audience could watch together on stream at a pre-determined time? There would be a limit to admission - say 200 "seats." This would prevent any disruption from server traffic. The admission would be low ($2?) and buzz can be created on a shoestring. After the movie is over, the filmmaker can open a chat with a q&a. Instant reviews can be posted on a Wordpress style section of the site. Fans of "The Site" itself would end up building their "brand" as reviewers.
An idea of the virtual run life of the movie could be determined by how many virtual ticket sales can be calculated.
Say for instance, you have sold 200 seats and 150 more people try to buy tickets. Well, after judging from the reviews and reaction of the first screening a second screening may be in order. After the movie has had it's "run" it can be made available through DL or DVD sale in a bside style set-up if the filmmaker wants that. Again, I am still trying to formulate the concept and it is only half baked - but there is plenty of room for the DIY filmmaker to get excitement built for their movie and to immediately act to create that important relationship with the audience immediately after. Everything can monitored.
