Get ready for summer with an inflatable Death Star.
Check it out here.
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Author: Ted Hope
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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.
Isn’t it nice how sometimes everything seems to go right?
Years back, we were given a script by a director whose work we admired. He was committed to getting it right and luckily we all worked well together. He kept making the script better and better. Yet, times are always tough and a period youth movie is never high on buyers must -have list. Still, we were prepared to make the film at any budget even if you needed more than a little just to license the period songs that punctuated every page of the script. One of his TV buddies then offered him a gig on a flick without any stars, making it seem like a Direct-To-DVD assignment. But it wasn’t — not even close.
By the time Greg Mottola was done with that little film, it was SUPERBAD, and now he wanted to make some more changes to what now felt like our script. Summer was almost over and our project had to shoot when it still looked looked hot & sweaty. With a month or so left in the season, we went out with the script, and found financing partners who believed in our vision and wanted to go right away, happy to cast whom we wanted.
We assembled a great team to make the movie, some old friends, others that became new friends. Everyone was talented. Everyone had a good attitude. Everyone worked really hard and had a good time in the process. The prep was short, the hours longs, but it still was a great time. Kinda like the film we made, but with less drama and less ball taps.
Our partners gave us enough money, encouraged to keep making things better, and when we were done, they worked incredibly hard and with tremendous passion to promote the film to the fullest. Even more, they believed that whomever saw it would dig it just as much, and they’ve been willing to screen it over and over just to get the word out. Fortunately, the reviews do everyone’s efforts proud.
So this Friday night, our good fortune and everyone’s hard work is offered up to you, albeit for the price of a movie ticket.
Check out the website: http://www.adventurelandthefilm.com/
Michael Phillip’s Chicago Trib 4 Star Review
Michael Phillip’s Chicago Trib 4 Star Review
Another great review: http://www.thefilmtalk.com/2009/03/20/adventureland-review/
Hollywood Reporter review.
Hollywood Reporter review.
Oh, and Matt Dentler threw five questions at me about the film, sucky jobs, social networks, and first features. Check it out here.
Adam Chapnick twittered about NeoFlix’s DIYFlix blog posting about most popular pricing techniques for their clients. It ran counter to my instincts as I would have thought more gravitated to the high and low end, but by far the most popular price point is $15-$20. The DIYFlix blog itself has a pile of good advice & food for thought, so check it out.
Some of the best advice in this category comes from the example of HELVETICA. As Scott Kirsner points out in his indispensable right-of-the-moment guide to building an audience (Fans, Friends, & Followers) “Selling just one thing is old hat”.
Multiple versions and merchandising is the way to go. So much more can be done with this. By all means there should be multiple versions of all films, with different additional content, commentary, even cuts. Why is that we only get the dvd with the film, and maybe a t-shirt or action figure? If fans want to show their appreciation for a work there should be something more substantial. One of my favorite pieces of film fetish paraphernalia is this: Brendan Dawes’ Cinema Redux print of Kubrick’s 2001 The film is reduced to one image from every second of the film in high resolution. Each row has sixty frames in it.
Why can’t we have more beautiful works derived from the films we love?
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The Evolution Of Life
Is it the mayfly that has shortest life cycle? I think in 24 hours they are born, live, mate, grow old, and die. Maybe I am wrong. Yet in the history of time, humankind is like a blink of the eye, kind of like a mayfly’s life.
SEED magazine offered up this 60 second overview of life as we know it; that is, not human kind, but what it took to get us here, and how short our journey has been, comparatively speaking.
The Evolution of Life in 60 Seconds is an experiment in scale: By condensing 4.6 billion years of history into a minute, the video is a self-contained timepiece. Like a specialized clock, it gives one a sense of perspective. Everything — from the formation of the Earth, to the Cambrian Explosion, to the evolution of mice and squirrels — is proportionate to everything else, displaying humankind as a blip, almost indiscernible in the layered course of history.
Each event in the Evolution of Life fades gradually over the course of the minute, leaving typographic traces that echo all the way to the present day. Just as our blood still bears the salt water of our most ancient evolutionary ancestors.
This robo throws a net at robbers. The RoboCops are coming; don’t mess with them.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, remember how at the end of Iron Giant, the pieces started to put themselves together again? Well, we just got one step closer to that future too.
Jason Brubaker has “Prepping Your Film For Distribution” in current edition of The Independent. It’s all good advice and the equal attention paid to self-distribution demonstrates the reality-check that has finally seeped through the layers of denial most indie filmmakers have held on to for too long. I wonder why “getting pick up” is even looked at on even ground with the DIY approach. Let’s face it, the odds are practically 1 in 400 that your film will be picked up by a major distributor. The time to start to prep for self-distribution is now, not later.
I recognize how getting your film made is an all consuming task. Yet, I am struck time and time again how filmmakers don’t recognize that “prepping your film for distribution”, reaching out to your audience, and marketing your film BEFORE you shoot, all significantly increases your odds of getting picked up. It’s like wearing the right clothes before you go to the bar. It shows that you are serious. It shows that you are going to do everything possible for people to see your film, that you will give your all to get your investors money back.
Back in the Good Machine days, and every day since then, we have approached delivery like production. If you arrive at a film festival having done the due diligence that Jason discusses, your chances have acquisition are improved. Every distributor has had the nightmare of the unclearable or undeliverable film — and they will avoid the repeat like the plague.
We have had our films bought or financed because we showed how the film could be marketed, where the audience was and what they responded to previously. We didn’t wait until the movie had screened to address this. We thought long and hard about this before we shot anything. Waiting until your movie is done to approach these issues is going to hurt your prospects.
I am also of the firm belief that thinking about these aspects, whether they are marketing, legal, or delivery issues, makes your film better. It focuses the thought. It requires choices to be made. There is no excuse not to do everything that is raised in The Independent BEFORE you even approach investors. Take Jason’s advice to heart, but do it sooner, much much much sooner.
