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My Films These Are Those Things

Read These Excerpts And You Will Have A Great Holiday Gift Idea

This past week or so, you had a chance to read some new excerpts from my book. If they don’t convince you to get “Hope For Film” as a gift for yourself or any film fan you know, what will?  Check these out:

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My Films

If The Art Of The Samurai Is Not Having To Draw One’s Sword…

IMG_9072Gary Meyer’s blog EatDrinkFilms captures three of life’s great pleasures in a single dose. I am very pleased to have one of my favorite tales from my book excerpted there now.

Picture this: it is the first film you’ve financed yourself. You and your team are in a foreign land. Your money has been cut off and your financier picks you up, refusing to speak, and takes you up into the mountains where you are required to disrobe.

“One trait that helps producers is an imagination that can take you to the worst-case scenario, so that you can guard against it. I am prone to many dark thoughts, but I hadn’t anticipated this.”

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My Films

Happy Thanksgiving!

"The Ice Storm"
“The Ice Storm”

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My Films

My Greatest Films That No One Has Ever Seen

whathappendposterRecently Jon Brooks at KQED wrote up a very nice piece on Tom Noonan’s WHAT HAPPENED WAS (1994). That film won multiple awards at Sundance but barely go seen.  Unfortunately it does not sleep alone in my bed of barely seen almost-masterpieces.  As strong as my track record may be, it still holds some flops, misfires, and damn bad luck experiences. It’s great that Tom’s flick may get some of the love it so richly deserves, albeit twenty years after it’s debut.

On my pleasure planet, Frank Grow‘s revolutionary LOVE GOD (1997) would have turned our business on its head.  

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My Films

Come To My First LA Bookstore Reading EVER!

Yup.  I will tell some great tales, read a few passages, answer a lot of questions, and distribute some free gifts.  All this and more this Friday evening.  At Book Soup. 7p.  8818 Sunset Blvd.  See you there!

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My Films

Book Excerpt: How Nicole Holofcener Got Her Start

Did you miss the excerpt of my book “Hope For Film” that Women And Hollywood ran the other week? It’s not too late.

Categories
My Films These Are Those Things

Why Producing Is Not My Profession

10151911_10153120209659688_407117678916482433_nIn reviewing my book, Nick DeMartino captures a great deal of what I am feeling these days. I think we can move things forward and build it better together.  Nick spots how my love of cinema drew us forward and then how that same love drew me away from a focus on project producing.

“At a certain point, living an independent life, you start to recognize how fragile the whole enterprise is. You can’t afford to ignore the big picture. And you can’t do it alone,” writes Hope, as he shifts gears in the final chapters to share the story of how he left New York and hands-on production to focus on that “reboot,” first in an ill-fated stint at the San Francisco Film Society, and now as CEO of Fandor, an indie-focused streaming video-on-demand service, where he’s busy trying to tackle some of the “141 Problems and Opportunities for the Independent Film World,” which is included in this book as an appendix.