Mike Ambs – Hope For Film

Should We Accept That Indie Film Is Now A Hobby Culture?

I don’t intend to get down on hobbies here; I love building model rockets with my son, but I don’t harbor any fantasies about earning a living from doing it (well, I do have a plan for a BowlOfNoses Summer Camp, but…). Thing is, there once was a time when all my friends earned a living making and sharing independent features. It didn’t feel like a hobby then, but now it does. I wonder if anyone still earns a consistent living making indie films?

Okay, the sales markets of Sundance & Toronto have increased my hopes that the economic situation for filmmakers will improve and, yes, “earning a living” is a relative phrase. True, many still are paying most of their bills from working in the film biz, but I suspect that either it is at a level 50% lower than it was three years ago, or else the company that pays them is earning substantially less than they were years back and just hasn’t passed the losses on to their employees beyond staff reductions. Yes, there are still some folks who hit a vein and get a windfall, but don’t mistake that good fortune as a career. I have seen highs and lows, but I don’t see consistency any more.

It’s not all doom mind you.

Thoughts On Audience Building

Today’s guest post is from filmmaker (and mind map builder!) Mike Ambs.

In a recent post here, Ted Hope listed “38 More Ways The Film Industry is Failing Today“; many of the questions and points made among the 38 stood out to me, and I’ve spent the last several days trying to openly brainstorm steps that could lead towards change. But today, I wanted to write about one in particular: Ted asked why we don’t encourage, or even demand, that a film build it’s audience (say, 5,000 fans) prior to production and greenlight.

For starters, I love the idea of audience builds. I think the practice of audience builds before a film gets too far off the ground would be a great shift in how we think of films, how we approach them, how to involve the audience long before they ever sit down in a theater – but it raises a few key issues:

Filmmaking is storytelling, and stories are told many different ways and take very different paths. Because of this, it might not be the best idea to mandate audience builds. One reason for this is it could, if taken advantage of, create yet another “door” that is opened easier only for some.

So the real question is, “why” take this route?

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