Tag: producing

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Truly Free Film

Remember To Never Forget: Communication For Producers

I have a lecture coming up on Communication For Producers. Seems to me before one can communicate they need to know what needs to be expressed. This is that list.

Why do you love this movie?

You are making the director’s movie. (which isn’t the same as doing everything the director wants).

You are trying to make the best movie possible.

You will make the movie profitable.

You will get the movie seen. You will find the film’s audiences.

The producer works to create the right environment for all.

You appreciate people’s good work & hard work.

You have chosen to be here and know others have chosen that too.

People like to be led. You are here to provide leadership.

People like to participate. Provide opportunities.

Anyone can follow a plan. What can you do to provide inspiration?

Calm = clarity What do you need to do to reduce stress so all see clearly?

Why will they believe you? How will they follow you?

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Truly Free Film

Ten Things We Should All Do On Our Productions

1. Be a mentor to someone. This is more than just hiring interns. It is about really educating someone, giving them access to experience.
2. Do something “the better way” instead of the easy way. We make ethical excuses in order to say money, but we need to focus on the big picture.
Avoid 15 Passenger Vans as they are the most dangerous vehicle on the road.
Provide housing when someone has worked an excessive day.
Recycle bottles and cans.
Print less. Use less paper.
Email Call Sheets
Provide production packages (shooting schedules, breakdowns, lists, etc.) on line.
Crew Lists as Address Cards so they can instantly be in one’s phone.
3. Remember that everyone is first and foremost a human being and not just a worker drone.
Learn everyone’s name and what they like to do. Remember that everyone is working together.

Help them stay in contact and participating in the world around them: provide news updates at Craft Service; provide absentee ballots during election periods; encourage petitions for favorite causes;
4. Keep the crew updated as to the progress of the production — through post and release.
Recognize they make the movie; treat them as partners.
Via email updates during post and release.
5. How can you have the movie actually help improve the world?
Can you generate charitable items that could raise money? Can you collect signatures on petitions for particular causes? Can you educate your cast and crew? What can you do with the completed work that will make this a better place?
6. Can you help out another filmmaker with your film? Invite another artist to film a doc about the process.
7. Stay focused on what the movie needs and don’t get distracted by the thrill of 100 new friends.
8. Show your appreciation. Feel it. You wouldn’t be doing this if it wasn’t for your cast, crew, and financiers.

9. Think health & saftety. Provide healthy food all the time. Have a medic on set, even if not required.
10. Follow the 20 New Rules Prior to Production so that your film might have a chance in this hyper-competitive marketplace.

Fine print: I try and set the bar high. I can’t say I always succeed myself.
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Truly Free Film

Sundance 2010 Producers’ Roundtable, Part 3 The Finale!

And didja notice? Liz’s film “Animal Kingdom” won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize. Way to go Liz!

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Truly Free Film

What Defines An Event? 10 Thoughts On Transforming Small to LARGE

Hollywood will survive because of its ability to develop, produce, market, and distribute “Event” pictures. Whereas Hollywood’s Event Pictures are defined as being designed for general audiences, Truly Free Film can have its own event pictures too by focusing on specific audiences and understanding what it is that will drive people out of their house to do something in conjunction with others. So what are those qualities of “event”?

  1. A conversation that inevitably will continue after the screening is over. It is an event if you are compelled to discuss it afterwards. Is that a memorable scene? A relationship to the world we live in? Truth? Understanding? Passion? Beauty? Transcendence? What? What is the return the audience gets on their 90 minute investment? It’s the after-effect, the conversation.
  2. Content whose impact is enhanced by timely consumption. The audience recognizes that their social and intellectual capital will increase by having been among those whom participated — and thus are compelled to attend.
  3. A once in a blue moon opportunity. It expires, is used up, & is gone gone gone. If you don’t go, you will never get this chance again. It is dated and defined by that date.
  4. There are many pieces that fit together into something much much larger. Maybe it is part of a series or a sequence. Maybe it is the fact that the screening is only part of a bigger activity.
  5. The awareness that a lot of people will be participating somehow. The larger the audience the more it is an event. The wider the audience the more it is an event. The more an audience is spread out, the more it is an event.
  6. The memory, the understanding, and/or the appreciation of the participation changes as time passes. Events aren’t static. They grow and transform.
  7. Events have a material aspect to them. We take events home with us somehow, but generally via the merchandise that we barter for with our dollars.
  8. People you will never know are talking about it. When the Velvet Underground or The Sex Pistols first played they were events, perhaps not so much in the moment, but certainly in terms of how they were discussed long afterwards. It is partially the knowledge that we have that others are talking about what we participated in that defines an experience as an event.
  9. Anticipation. What makes us think about doing things in advance? How often do we need to be reminded that something is happening here?
  10. Commitment. If we commit to participating in something, it’s importance grows tenfold. If we, by either our own volition, or the badgering or heckering of our friends and acquientances, commit to something, it becomes the event of the moment.
I am up at the Sundance Film Festival now, where every screening feels like an event. People wonder why certain films can pack the house at a festival but no one shows up when booked for an actual run. The context of a festival creates the urgency. Yet even still here, you feel that not enough is done by just putting it up on the screen. Filmmakers need to focus more on the context they create around the film. In this day and age it is irresponsible to simply screen your film. You need to build ramps up to the event, and bridges after the screening — tools & processes that keep the conversation going. It is surprising how few examples there are of folks who are doing it well.
For me, right now, being here in Park City, perhaps the most perfect practice of this is Banksy and his film Exit Through The Gift Shop. The mystique and craft and philosophy of the street art and artist leads me to the movie and keeps me wanting to see the film even though my schedule does not yet permit.
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Truly Free Film

50* Ways You Can Do Something Different On This Production

New work, and sometimes great work, comes from thinking differently. We all get stuck in ruts, fixed ways of thinking. How do we bring a fresh perspective to our work? What are different options that we have before us?
There are certainly a whole number of different questions we can all ask ourselves when it comes to indie film production. Granted it is a tad complicated when film cost significant amounts to produce (or at least generally speaking). Here in America, without any government support, we also are obligated to deliver a financial return to our investors, and that is a great influencer on the process.

I would love to have a list of fifty to put before myself before stepping into a new production. For now, I will have to settle for this list of 13 until you all add to it. Thanks for the help in advance (and here’s to hitting fifty)!

  1. How can you help other artists with this film you are doing? Can you bring others into the process?
  2. Do something stylistically just because you like it. Allow something to be “outside” the film, something that doesn’t fit so right and is only there because you dig it. Why does it always have to fit?
  3. How can you help the world by the content of this film? How can you work for impact first, and business second (without ignoring those financial obligations, that is)?
  4. How can you have less environmental impact on the world with your process? Recycle. Use less paper. No styrofoam. Car pool. Carbon credits.
  5. How can you do more to show appreciation for your collaborators? What if you put people first would that change your content significantly?
  6. Are you really collaborating with your crew? Do they feel like you are? What if you listened more, and spoke less?
  7. You say it is a team approach, but what if everyone was treated equally? What if your equality carried over not just to financial matters, but also in terms of access?
  8. What if you completely demystified the process and opened it up to comment by all cast, crew, and fans? As opposed to the studio’s no-twitter policy, what if you made it a requirement>
  9. What would be a different business model? Could you give it away? Free it? Never plan to screen it theatrically? What if the movie was not the main event, but something else was?
  10. Place the bar higher & reach higher. What makes something better? What if you made sure you could answer any question as to why before you started? Or maybe this would be the opposite and you should answer no questions but hold it all within yourself…
  11. Is your work truthful? Is every action, emotion, reaction honest? Are the settings truly lived in? Can you extend only from your characters, their psychology and socio-economic situation — removing your own intent from the design?
  12. What if you built your audience base prior to shooting? And maintained significant communication with them throughout the process? How might that change your final work?
  13. Innovate. Try some new equipment on every production. Improve a simple process. Isn’t production about the communication of information in the service of art, as efficiently, economically, and aesthetically as possible?
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Truly Free Film

What Does It Mean To Lead Well?

We start shooting tomorrow.

I have some plans. Like all the good stuff, they are pretty hard to execute well. Why? Well….

To lead while producing means:

You motivate. You inspire. You admire. You keep reaching higher.
You will innovate and always take some risks.
You are prepared, and anticipating what will and may never.
You follow through, step forward, reach across.
You recognize you are just like everyone else, exercising your labor for what you believe in, and the hope of some security down the road.
You are concerned for everyone’s health, safety, and welfare, their understanding and education.
You demystify, make things more transparent.
You delegate, and fill in the cracks.
You cast your crew with as much consideration as you have for your cast.
You never make anyone pick up after you.
You are accessible, open, and humble.
Your enthusiasm for the project is contagious.
You never forget the human factor. This isn’t war; making movies is a creative act.
You treat all people with respect, and will allow others to lead you too.
You limit and reduce waste, making the most of everything you have.
You take responsibility for everyone,their situations, but allow their aspirations to be their own.
You remain focused on the work at hand– which both here, and past, and far ahead.
You show that you know you are entering others’ homes and ‘hoods, that they welcomed you here, and you wouldn’t be here without them.
You produce for before, behind, and all around the camera.
You are always learning and helping others to learn too.
You are strict and stern, flexible and relaxed.
You remain mindful of the big things in life, not just on the movie.
You earn your break, work for your supper, invest in others.
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Truly Free Film

Why The Indie Film Industry Needs Producers

Time and time again, I get the impression that the “Film Industry” generally does not value producers. I suppose I shouldn’t deduce that The Studios’ abandonment of Producer Overhead First Look Deals means that the business doesn’t value Producers, and just that The Studios need to control costs or that they have other ways of accessing content, but…

Well, it’s hard not to feel that it’s just that Producers aren’t respected. I suppose that financiers willingness to under pay Producers should not lead me to think that they don’t know how much a Producer does. Maybe they are just trying to get a good deal. I suppose that I could take it as flattering that experienced folks in the business, assume that my overhead is covered, that my assistant’s salary is taken care of.
So what is it that Producers do for the Film Industry at large?
  1. Producers bring new investors into the business, both in terms of sourcing them, and structuring deals that make sense from an investors’ perspective
  2. Producers look out for investors’ needs (substantially more than distributors do), as Producers think long term and need private equity to stay in the game.
  3. Producers provide development supervision to get the scripts right — and they usually get a lot more writing done without additional costs — because the authors know they are doing it to get the best movie made, and not just to justify their jobs.
  4. Producers inspire talent to embrace work for affordable yet just rates — because everyone knows that the producer is doing also for the love but for a whole lot longer.
  5. Producers counter-balance industry pressure to increase costs and keep movies’ budgets at levels that make sense — which is good for the industry.
  6. Producers innovate — be it in the search to deliver a better film or to control costs, innovation is in their blood.
  7. Producers develop talent and take the chances on emerging artists.
  8. Producers keep in touch with the audience, weighing where their tastes and habits are.
  9. Producers bring content, talent, technology, audiences, investors together.
  10. Producers help show the business and the culture where they might aspire to be going.