Sean Tracey on "The Jesus Guy"

What was your filmmaking background before beginning The Jesus Guy?

SEAN TRACEY: This was my first documentary. However, I have been directing TV commercials and corporate films for over 20 years. I wrote, produced, and directed an entertainment TV program before that.

How were you introduced to the subject of your film?

SEAN TRACEY: The film kind of came to me. I had read about the subject, who goes by the name, ‘What’s Your Name?,’ in a TIME magazine article. I had been involved with a company called Maysles Films in New York, where I was directing TV commercials. Albert Maysles, who owns the company, is one of the world’s most famous documentary filmmakers. I fell in love with his style of filmmaking, called Direct Cinema, and since working with Albert, I wanted to make a film in this style.

Why did you decide that this was a story worth following?

SEAN TRACEY: I had been looking for a good subject for some years, and when I first met ‘What’s Your Name?’ I realized I had found a subject that could sustain the viewers’ attention for an entire movie. That’s what made me decide to do it.

What was your editorial process like -- that is, did you know going in what the shape of the film would be, or did you find it in the editing?

SEAN TRACEY: No actually, I was still looking for an ending when I completed the first cut. I thought, most movies have an ending. People expect an ending. For instance, maybe my subject, ‘What’s Your Name?,’ would give up his mission and take a regular job. Maybe he’d become a priest or a monk. There was even some rumor of him going to see the Pope, because he was being looked into by the Vatican. I thought that could be a big ending, you know, meeting the Pope, getting recognition for what he’s done. Any of those things would have been an ending.

But at the very first public screening for The Jesus Guy, at Washington University (a wonderful program called Docs in Progress), there was an opportunity for the filmmaker to ask questions to the audience, (as opposed to the usual/opposite). That was the premise of this screening and this organization. It’s usually done before the filmmaker finishes editing. I got that opportunity. When I asked the people that were there, “Where do you want this film to go and how do you want it to end?” they said, “We don’t! We love it the way it is!”

How have subsequent audiences responded to the film?

SEAN TRACEY: From what I’ve been gathering from our screenings at film festivals, the average person who is not particularly religious sees the film as a really interesting observation of an unusual person’s life, commitment and mission. But people who are highly religious -- curious, philosophical, or on their own spiritual journeys—get even more out of it. It gets under their skin. A number of clergy have told me it made them lose sleep and seriously consider and reassess their own commitment to their faith and God. People see it on a bunch of different levels, especially if they’ve ever tried to do anything like that themselves.

What was your favorite part of the process on The Jesus Guy?

SEAN TRACEY: Both the shooting and editing were very difficult on this film. I couldn’t have a crew. It interfered with the intimacy of the encounters of people with my subject. The fact that I never knew where/how to find my subject during the years I filmed him, that he had no home, no phone, no itinerary—all made it feel impossible to do it. My favorite part, then, was having it all done, and seeing people’s stunned reactions to the film in screenings, their open mouths, especially, of course, those that involved hundreds of people on the big screen. Makes it all totally worthwhile.

What did you learn making this film that you've taken to subsequent projects?

SEAN TRACEY: I have another documentary I’m about to jump into. I’m looking for some funding for that film. My friend, Albert Maysles, has already signed on to collaborate and contribute. He has some wonderful ideas.

What I learned is that, this time, I’m not going to go it alone. I love to collaborate. I won’t work on a film with so many restrictions on size of crew and equipment, etc. I’m also in preliminary discussions on some dramatic scripts. This would be not a documentary but a scripted film for me to direct. So, I guess I also learned that I’d like to do a film with which I have more control of the outcome.

Jedrzej Jonasz on "Low Budget"

What was your filmmaking background before beginning Low Budget?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: I studied film at Queen's University in Canada and graduated in 2000. Since then I have been working in Toronto, New York and Los Angeles on many different productions in just as many different roles. After making a few short films I started getting into long-form projects by directing the World War 2 documentary Against The Odds: Resistance in Nazi Concentration Camps.

My comedy production background came from working at a company called Trailervision ("Trailers for movies that should exist") [http://www.trailervision.com ] in Toronto and directing a humorous reality series for Toronto One.

What was the inspiration for the story?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: The style of Low Budget was inspired by the work of Christopher Guest, with films such as This Is Spinal Tap and Waiting For Guffman. But the inspiration for the story itself came from a film I co-directed in film school called Where The Change Is, which was also a mockumentary about filmmakers, but in Where The Change Is, they were making a documentary about the 1999-2000 year change as an excuse to travel across Canada for a millennium party in Vancouver.

Why did you decide to do it in a 'mockumentary' fashion?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: The mockumentary style seemed most appropriate for this type of story where it was important to document the process the characters when through during the film. Plus, due to our inherent low budget, it is often easier to shoot a mockumentary with a smaller crew, lack of permits and basic equipment.

What obstacles did you overcome to make the film?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: The downside to shooting a mockumentary is that you end up with a lot more footage than in a regular narrative, so this means that your post-production is much more complex and can take a lot longer. We had a lot of great footage and spent a month just going through it and seeing how it would alter and shape our story.

Fortunately, with such ubiquitous access to editing systems, like Final Cut Pro (which is what we used), you can take a lot more time with editing and not rack up a huge bill... as long as you have financially flexible editors :)

How have audiences responded to the film?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: Low Budget is clearly a film industry insider movie and the audiences that have enjoyed it the most are filmmakers, film students, actors, artists and film enthusiasts. It's strikes a particular chord with those audiences as they can easily relate to what drives Jason and Jaye, even if they are caricatures.

Traditionally, film industry movies do not appeal to a mass audience and if popular, develop more of a cult following. This is why we have decided to pursue this method of online self-distribution where we can much more specifically target our core audience. That said, there has been a great response to the film from 'regular' audiences when screened in large groups. For some reason, non-film individuals can watch the film by themselves and not really be that into it, and then watch it again with a crowd and love it.

What was your favorite part of the process on Low Budget?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: The on-set production was my favorite part of the process. As the actors did a lot of improv on set, everyday was filled with constant laughter from the cast and crew. And because the script and production process was very flexible and we didn't have to answer to any studio execs, we had an enormous amount of creative freedom to experiment and take advantage of real-life situations around us.

What did you learn making this film that you'll take to subsequent projects?

JEDRZEJ JONASZ: Well, I guess the two main things I learned during Low Budget are somewhat contradictory. On one side we would have benefited from spending more time on the script in pre-production and working out some weak story issues before we went on set.

On the other side, we found that allowing the actors to improv and be spontaneous was invaluable and added elements to the story we could have never come up with ourselves. I guess a good balance of those two ideas is what I will be aiming for in my next projects.

http://www.LowBudgetComedy.com

Low Budget - Part 01 "Creative Financing" from Jedrzej Jonasz on Vimeo.

Determining Foreign Sales Fees

The question came up over one of last weeks posts, why foreign buyers base license fees on budget percentages.  I have accepted this for so long, I had stopped questioning it -- but it is one of those things worth questioning, so I am glad it was raised.  Thanks.

It made me feel we should have an ongoing "ASK THE EXPERTS" section over here at Truly Free.  For this one I went to the legend of Glen Basner, a graduate of the Good Machine School of Everything, and the man behind the founding of the new sales powerhouse FILM NATION.  The Baz explains:

There are many factors in determining what a territorial license fee should be – a percentage of the budget is only one. These are standard amounts that are “typical” for an individual territory based on what distributors have paid historically (Yes, the world has changed quite a bit recently!). I don’t believe that they apply in singular fashion unless you are contemplating some form of output deal. 

On a single picture license, a distributor will want to know what the budget level is so that: a) they understand what the production value will be; and b) they can feel comfortable that they are not paying an excessive amount in relation to the cost of the film. These are valid points but what people forget is that ultimately the budget of the film does not necessarily have a correlation with its success at the box office (Blair Witch etc). 

Our approach is to think like a distributor and run estimates – both revenue and expense – for a film in all media to determine a low, base and high value a film is likely to have in any given territory. With these estimates we can back into a license fee figure that would allow for a distributor to make money should the film turn out well. The budget comes into play if the sum total of our international estimates do not raise enough money to finance a film.

Curiously enough, the WSJ has chimed in today on the issue of value of foreign licenses, albeit the lack thereof.  Check it out here.

It's All One Big Continuum...

My post on "Is There A "Too Many" When It Comes To Playing Film Festivals" generated some good questions and points in the comments.  I hope to get to them all in the days and weeks ahead.

One thing that truly resonated for me though was Jon Jost's dismissal of the box office performance of Ramin Bahrani's, Lance Hammer's, and Kelly Reichardt's recent films.  These artists, along with a few others, represent some of the great hope for American Art Film in the near future (and Jon probably raises them precisely for that reason).  

It's a mistake to take the theatrical results of their most recent films as the criteria for their financial success.  No one can think about a single film anymore as the litmus test.  When all filmmakers still dwelled in the world of acquisitions, that way of thinking was understandable; people felt you were only as successful as your last film.  What your film sold for and how it performed was all that seemed to matter.  In a world where it makes less and less sense to license your film for all media in exchange for a paltry sum (should you even be so fortunate to have such offers), new ways to evaluate success are emerging.

Bahrani and Reichardt licensed each of their last films to quality art-house distributors.  Hammer took another approach.  Yet, Bahrani and Reichardt built on their audience from the prior film, as you can be assured that Hammer will too.  These are what the music business would see as catalogue artists.  Their fan base will grow with each new release.  The more they are able to maintain an ongoing dialogue with their audience, the richer a dialogue they can offer, the more that audience will support them.  It is not about the one-off film anymore -- nor that film's results.  It is all about the community of support that artists can develop for their work.  That community will only flourish to the degree that there is both dialogue within the community, and well-maintained flow of content.

Artists who maintain a rich dialogue with their community will benefit in many ways from what they have built.  Some of it will be directly financial, both in terms of amount of that reward but also predictability thereof.  Other ways will include increased access to audience (which has a wide and varied group of benefits), decreased marketing & distribution costs, and new streams of revenue.

The more filmmakers can think of how to maintain and deepen the on-going dialogue with their supporters the better off they will be.

P.S.  I disagree strongly with Jon's comment that the aforementioned films and filmmakers don't do anything "aesthetically daring or difficult" -- but this isn't where I chose to look at such issues.   But since it was raised, dare I say that whereas no one is reinventing cinema, that compared to the norms, each one went out a limb without a net -- and they flew pretty damn high when they jumped.  And man that ain't easy  -- and it is extremely brave is this world of ours.

Carol Littleton on "Body Heat"

Back when I taught screenwriting, in order to help demystify the screenwriting process, I would have students read along with the script for Body Heat while we watched the movie.

CAROL LITTLETON: Did you work from the shooting script?

Well, that's the crux of my question. I got the shooting script and in order to make it match the finished movie, I had to tear it apart and literally cut and paste it back together.

CAROL LITTLETON: Well, that's what editing is. If all we had to do is follow the script, it would be very easy. It would be like a dress pattern; you lay the pattern down on the table and you pin it against the material and you just cut along the lines. If that's what film editing is, then everybody could do it.

As editors, we're given the pattern -- which is the script -- and then we make a movie out of it. And in Body Heat, you saw exactly what we did. We changed the structure, we dropped a lot of stuff.

What was the process of finding that movie?

CAROL LITTLETON: It was like any movie. The routine for us, those of us who work on Hollywood films, is that we start cutting when they start shooting. In this particular case, Larry (Kasdan) wanted me to be involved early on. I went to rehearsals.

He felt, and I think it's one of the smartest ideas going for a director, if you can get all the people together, even just to read through the script and discuss the script before you start shooting, then everybody knows what his intent is from the beginning.

So if I'm there in the rehearsals, I know the direction of the scenes, what would be ideal for those scenes: where the emphasis is, how the humor plays out, all the different values in the scene. I can get an idea of that in rehearsal. So I sat there and took little notes for myself about choices that were being made in rehearsal and how to look for them when the footage would come in.

We start from the beginning. If it's not rehearsals, then it's day one. We're putting the film together, out of sequence -- in shooting sequence -- and we're revising as we get big blocks. We look at those big blocks another one once all the material comes in.

A week or so after they've finished shooting, we have a film that represents the script. Every scene is in. Everything they shot is there. And we sit down and look at it.

In the case of Body Heat we took it to a screening room and looked at it with no interruptions. And then we said, "Well, we have a lot of work to do."

All of the things that the script had were not in the film at that point. It wasn't suspenseful enough -- it was suspenseful, but not enough. The humor was not as funny as it should be. The characters were not as clear as they could be. It was too -- I don't want to say pornographic -- but it was not suggestive enough as a sexy movie. It needed to be more erotic and less specific, less obvious. And in too many scenes, things were revealed literally too soon for them to be erotic (from my point of view). I think things are erotic when they're suggestive and indirect. Eroticism is not just showing a naked body; it has to have a certain amount of romance as well.

We had some problems and that's where we started. We just said, "Well ... let's start." Larry saw the problems as well as I did, it wasn't a one-way street. And we sat down and literally collaborated.

The pictures I've done with Larry have been the best, from the standpoint of collaboration. I really respect him as a writer, he's a fabulous writer. He's a wonderful director. He's an extraordinary person, very humane, very kind, very gentle. We just have a very good working relationship.

We experimented a lot, because you don't know the 'how.' You know 'what' needs to be done, but the editing process really is discovering how to do it the best way. When I'm working on a film -- every film -- we will have screenings and people feel that they have to tell you what's wrong with the movie and how to fix it. I never listen to how to fix it; I only listen to what they perceive the problem to be. They aren't editors and they don't know what the footage is, they're not inside the process at all.

I could drive your car around the block and say, "You know, it's riding kind of rough and I think you just need to take the engine out and put a new one in." And all it really needs is a spark plug. So that's how I listen to people's comments at screenings; they are utterly worthless to me, unless they just say, "I didn't like that moment and I didn't get it -- it wasn't clear to me." That's helpful.

But to come to me, or to Larry, or to any director for that matter, and say "I think you ought to move this scene forward and that scene back," how would they even know how to say that? Producers today think they can do that, and I can tell you there's only one producer I've worked with who knows the process as well or better than I do, and he's phenomenal, and that's Scott Rudin. But he's an old pro and he knows to let the creative team figure it out.

How long did it take to edit Body Heat?

CAROL LITTLETON: I think we worked in editorial -- apart from the time that I worked while they were shooting, which was about three months -- I think Larry had ten weeks for his director's cut. We looked at it again, then took it up for George Lucas to see. George was the Executive Producer, although he did not take a screen credit. We took it up to Skywalker to show it to him about ten or eleven weeks after. We talked about it. We had a few little pick-ups to do, one day I think, and a couple of inserts.

And then we had another couple of months of revisions, so that would have put us at 18 weeks of post. Then, in those days, you mixed it, cut the negative, had an answer print and previewed the film at that point.

In our case, we had two previews after we mixed it and before we cut the negative. We had one in San Jose and then in Seattle. Then we finished the movie. So that would have been 22 to 24 weeks of post. It's not too little or too much. It's about what it takes to do a film.

Editing a film is not about speed. It's about thinking about it long enough and trying things. It's as though a writer takes yet another version of his script and does a huge re-write. You have to figure out new ways of solving problems.

So it's really just a re-write. That's what editing is -- the final re-write.

It was really funny, when we were doing E.T., which of course had a lot of changes and a lot of stuff that we did. I remember one day Steven (Spielberg) said, "You know, what we're doing is we're actually making the movie here in the editing room." He would always say funny, obvious things like that.

Is Art Sabotaged By Thinking About An Audience From The Start?

I have been falling behind on my blogging; I admit it.  Luckily, information never goes away. Nor is there anything like a shortage of things that need to be said.  We have so many hurdles to jump in the indie film world.  Or is it walls to break down?  Even after we made it through once, the same challenges face us again.  Even when one or two lead the way, the path gets overgrown immediately, and the rest seem to be lost all over again.  So here's to the better late, than never camp, a post on some old but still relevant news...

There is a good post from several weeks back on Spout "Five Thoughts on Independent Filmmaking from SXSW".  There's a lot in it that merits further discussion, but one thing said by indie distrib Richard Abramowitz leapt out at me: “It’s always a delicate situation to talk to filmmakers about finding their audience beforehand,” Abramowitz said on a panel about self-distribution. “Presumably, you’re making art. To think about the end user in that particular way is kind of a corruption of the process. It’s the producer’s responsibility to work off the director and understand who the audience may be.”

This could be considered a nicely condensed version of Brent Chesanek's post(s) here several months back, and certainly captures the thoughts and attitudes of many I know and have heard. I get it.  It makes some sense to leave art to the artists, business to the business types, marketing and distribution to the relevant experts, right?

I don't feel this attitude captures the realities of the time.  In my humble opinion, and particularly for the independent filmmaker, you are not being responsible or realistic if you keep thinking your job is simply to build it (and then to trust that they will come).  You need to build the paths and bridges to get the people there.  You need to have the pen to keep them there once they have entered the field.  You need to have the apparatus to help them tell their friends and family to join them.

You don't need to do it alone though.  You just need to find the right people to collaborate with and a plan on how to get them to work with you (money helps).  Sure it would be great to find a producer who knows all of this already (and yes this is what they should be teaching in producing programs at the "film schools"), but I have always found there to be far fewer producers than there are writers and directors who are looking for the help.  Presumably all filmmakers work a very long time prepping their films.  Unless they are working in the studio world, all filmmakers invest a tremendous amount of time without any promise of financial return.  With all that energy and effort, doesn't it make sense to figure out how the work may actually reach an audience?

I am not a marketing expert, but my thoughts on marketing have helped get many of my films made.  Before pitching the financiers, we try to come up with the different handles on how we will get an audience in to see our film.  This effort is for naught if they don't respond to the script in the first place, but once they want to meet, I better have an answer to those standard questions of who is the audience and how do we reach them.  If I can come up with ten or fifteen decent approaches, the financiers assume their marketing team can up with a host of even better strategies.  

Every step in filmmaking and marketing is a collaborative effort; it is our responsibility to help our collaborators do their jobs better.

Sharat Raju on "American Made"

What was your filmmaking background before beginning American Made?

SHARAT: American Made was my Masters thesis film at the American Film Institute. So, at AFI, I had made four short films prior to that. Immediately before enrolling at AFI, I was a casting assistant for the late Mali Finn, one of the all-time greatest casting directors. I worked for her on The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, 8 Mile, High Crimes and Gideon’s Crossing on ABC. Before moving to LA, I did some work as a freelance production assistant in Chicago, my hometown. I also wrote and directed a handful of student projects at the University of Michigan.

But American Made was really the first film I’ve taken out into to the world.

What was the inspiration for the story?

SHARAT: My inspiration was to not get kicked out of film school. No, just kidding...

So, I wrote this in the summer of 2002. At that time there was a lot of talk by the government about being careful of anything "suspicious" or "un-American." It was about 8 or 9 months since Sept. 11, 2001, and there was a lot of fear and this sort of talk going around. People like my parents, who had been in the US longer than they had been in India, felt the need to have an American flag, just to be safe – even though this is their home country for the last 30 years. So I thought, what does that mean – “Un-American”? What would that look like?

I was driving in the desert north of Los Angeles and I saw a stranded car on the side of the road and started to think – does a stranded car look suspicious? What if there was a hitchhiker, wouldn’t that be suspicious? What if the person wasn't white, or was Indian or wore a turban -- does that make them "un-American" because they don't fit within the traditional definition? What if it was a family stranded, would any one stop and help them? 

So this was sort of a starting point and I just kicked around the idea and used it as the backdrop for the story. It evolved into an exploration of it means to be American, especially then. And even that takes a back seat to what's more important -- focusing on the relationship between the father and the son, between assimilation and cultural identity, about holding onto a belief versus trying to blend in. The intersection of that is what interested me. To me, America is a place that allows for this expression of self, not a suppression of what you feel is your identity. But in the face of danger, what would you be forced to sacrifice?

What obstacles did you overcome to make the film?

SHARAT: The usual filmmaking obstacles – money and trying to prove you know what your are doing. AFI gives some money, but we wanted to shoot on film and we needed to be in the Mojave Desert for a week to make this happen. So we had to raise money, which we did, fortunately, from friends and family. 

AFI runs itself less like a school and more like a studio. So we had to prove to AFI we had to go so far away to shoot, and get a special exemption to do so because they don’t allow it as a matter of policy. We had to go to each department and prove to them that we knew what we were doing and had a rationale for going so far outside of LA, where we’d be in trouble if something went wrong on set. 

To prove we knew what we were doing, my cinematographer, producer, and I went out to the location and shot the entire script with stand ins (including me) on a video camera, edited it together, and showed professors and administrators that the only way to make the script believable was to shoot at this spot. They were convinced, thank God, and let us do it the way we needed to do it. Then we actually had to make the film. Which, actually, was the least difficult part, in retrospect. The cast was great, the crew was great – it all came together.

How have audiences responded to the film?

SHARAT: I think the most telling response to this question is the fact that I’m now answering this question nearly six years after we released it. 

It has continued to endure and continues to entertain, even as I work on other projects and evolve (hopefully) as a filmmaker. More than 2 million people have seen it around the world, it still airs on PBS’s “Independent Lens,” and it won 17 awards at festivals and the like. It’s being used by teachers in junior high and high schools, graduate film students study it, and even a police department in Texas is using it for cultural training and community outreach. 

It boggles my mind. A professional studio film that does this is really quite remarkable. The fact that this was a Masters thesis film really defies logic. Honestly, it doesn’t really compute in my head – it just seems like they’re talking about a different film. I’m not trying to be false modest, but it really does not seem like they are talking about the film I slaved over for all that time six years ago, just happy to have it in the can and properly exposed. But the acclaim and the reception are an honor and humbling, and I’m just happy that it’s able to do what it has. I simply wanted to tell a memorable story. I’m glad it’s moved many people this way.

What was your favorite part of the process on American Made?

SHARAT: After our last day of filming, I became quite sad. I wanted to keep working. I felt like I was just getting warmed up. And that’s a testament to my incredible production team – my producer Marcus Cano and cinematographer Matthew Blute. It was a professional set – I only had to worry about where to put the camera and how to get a performance from my actors. It was invigorating. Frequently on a poorly run production or a low-budget operation, you have to worry about other things, like getting kicked out of a location or will we have lunch today or not. But, because of my crew and the incredible cast, it was more joyous an experience making a film and spending a week in the desert than you can imagine.

What did you learn making this film that you've taken to subsequent projects?

SHARAT: Good question. It certainly has set my expectations high, both creatively and practically. But I really learned, even more so, the value of having a great cast. With a great cast, you can get away with a lot. The story, of course, is the most important. But really you’re watching a movie for the actors, to watch their lives play out on screen. I knew that as a casting assistant, but I really learned it in a tangible way as a director.

Is There A "Too Many" (When It Comes To Film Festivals)?

I moderated a panel at New York Women In Film two weeks back on "prepping for film festivals".  One of the panelists, Ryan Werner of IFC Films, said something that resonated with me.  Ryan said that there are films that play so many festivals that they diminish his company's appetite for acquisition.

That raises the question then: Can an undistributed film play too many film festivals?

Ryan's answer is essentially yes -- that is if the filmmakers are looking for acquisition.  The bigger question is whether anyone should be looking for acquisition these days, and if so, are film festivals still the best way to do it?

It sounds like it should be obvious, but I think it's worth asking what is so appealing about acquisition by a distributor these days.  Until very recently, the money you received for licensing film was the dominant factor.  We all have to recoup our budgets (and our marketing costs), right? But in this day and age, less than a handful of a films are receiving advances of seven figures or more.  Unless you are making your films for very low budgets, how do you expect to get your investment back?  If you don't get your investment back, why should anyone give you money for your next film?  If you don't get your money back, why should others invest in similarly themed films?  

Maybe it's no longer about theatrical, but we have yet to hear the success stories of films that receive significant amounts on the back end of VOD or increased video sales due to ad-supported free streaming either; that may come, but I wouldn't hold my breath waiting.  Sure, if you make your film cheap enough it may seem tempting to surrender your rights across all media for twenty long years for $75K and significant cut of future revenue, if any.  But without a theatrical release stateside, will there be any foreign value to it?  I have been getting reports that foreign acquisition prices have dropped 40% in recent times -- so where does that leave average foreign value for a US Indie?  36% of costs (that is assuming, foreign value was only at 60% of costs, which is pretty conservative on what hand, but probably generous for most indie filmmakers)?  Eek!

The problem is that most filmmakers still think of festivals as a step towards acquisition.  As Ryan's comment points out, that is only true for your first two or three festivals.  After those, if you haven't secured distribution, your chances of acquisition are diminishing with each festival play.

Festivals have an increasingly vital role to play in independent film.  They are one of the critical steps in delivering a Truly Free Film Culture.  As has been said here many times before (and I anticipate saying many more times in the future), festivals must be looked at as the launch in audience-building, marketing, and distribution.  

If you do not have distribution, you are not ready to play film festivals if:

• you do not have your trailer made and up on the web;
  
• you do not have clips selected and up on the web;
  
• you have not been writing a blog regarding the film for a significant length of time;
  
• you do not have a plan on how to keep that blog interesting for the next year;
  
• you do not have a website for the film up on the web;
  
• you do not have a simple way to collect email addresses for fans;
  
• you have not set up a way for fans to subscribe to updates about the film;
  
• you have not joined multiple social networks, both as an individual and as the film;
• you have not created a press kit with press notes for the film;
  
• you have not identified the blogs and critics you think will help promote your film;
• you have not built a study guide for the film for film clubs;
  
• you have not mapped out a festival strategy that builds to local releases;
  
• you have not made several versions of a poster, and have enough to sell & give away;
  
• you have not made additional promotional items for your film;
  
• you have not manufactured the dvd, and made great packaging for it;
  

and there are probably more to add this list, but....

I look forward to a time when film festivals actually make such things a requirement.  I would love to see a film festival that was only about films that were prepared for self-distribution if necessary.  Film festivals are currently selling the dream and not confronting the reality.  Filmmakers keep buying that dream.  It is all a downward cycle as the business side of it is being neglected.  Distributors, both corporate and personal, need festivals to launch the film to their core audiences.  If filmmakers aren't prepped to do that, they squander that opportunity and diminish their chances of reaching that audience.  Sure there are other methods out there, but why not use your best tools in the way they have been most proven to work?

Checking off the Props

It's getting closer and closer to production for our feature film, Under Jakob's Ladder.

And so, we're starting to make sure all our check lists are up to date.

Like the one for props. What props are needed for each day of shooting? Which props are still needed? Which ones do we have yet to buy? Or find?

And then, there are the props that have yet to be made... the ones we haven't quite got to yet, but that have been on the "to do" list for some time.

And then, there are the props that have been written out the script. Like the torches that were supposed to be in one of the major scenes. (For the prop people, the fact that they didn't have to deal with torches anymore, led to a collective sigh of relief!)

Last minute details... All part of the fun of pre-production.

Neal Israel on "Tunnelvision"

Where did the idea for Tunnelvision come from?

NEAL ISRAEL: The idea for Tunnelvision came from my job.

I was the head of on air advertising at a television network in LA. This was when there were only three networks, of course. I had to come up with ways to make people watch TV.

I watched hours and hours of shows. At one point I wondered what network TV would be like in the future. How would they get people to keep watching?

So I came up with a network in the future where they would stop at nothing to get an audience. I pretty much predicted Fox, cable and every other edgy type show that we have today.

What barriers did you have to overcome to get the movie made?

NEAL ISRAEL: No one would give me money to make a film like this. So I mortgaged some property I had and some of my friends and employees helped. Also we were able to use some of the editing rooms at the network at night.

When it was all done, no one would buy it. We finally got a company that distributed pornos to take it on. The film open at Filmex (a forerunner to the LA film festival) and got a huge response.

By this time I had been fired from the network when they found out I was making a movie satirizing them on their time.

Why I Started Blogging

Yesterday, Matt Dentler fired five questions at me on his blog.  A couple were on ADVENTURELAND (opening Friday!).  Another was one what to consider on your first feature.  And yet another was on what gave me the initiative to embrace the worlds of social networking and the blogosphere.  Check out the whole interview, but here's what I had to say yesterday about the latter.

I have always been a bit of an internet junkie, but have an aversion to personal information and for that reasons had steered clear of social networking; I don’t have enough time for my friends as it is. Meanwhile, I had been growing restless watching the indie infrastructure wither away, but had frankly felt comfortable in my seat of privilege—i.e. we were getting our movies made.

When Mark Gill made his “Sky Falling” speech, it was clear to me that no one was speaking for the filmmakers, for the real indie community. I had read and met with a slew of good thinkers and innovators and felt the picture Gill painted was only for the business side of the establishment. Someone needed to get the word out about the new model that was emerging for filmmakers. When Dawn Hudson asked me to speak at Film Independent last fall, I felt I need to put up or shut up.

The state of things needs not be looked at only with despair. We are at a major time of transition and the possibilities are huge. Collaboration has always been what has improved our movies and enhanced our potential and the tools for collaboration have never been better. Social networking and an open source attitude offers filmmakers the freedom from an entertainment economy structured around scarcity and gatekeepers. We are all owners but we have been acting as slaves. We allow ourselves to corrupted by wealth and ego instead of strengthened by the wisdom of the community. The pursuit of instant gratification and success leads most to foolish choices that sacrifice opportunity for all along the way. Greater participation & focus on building a better system will greatly increase everyone’s power and improve their art and process. That is, in my humble opinion, and the social networking blogging open source stuff is the means.