The State Of Indie Film: Not Very Good at All

[Clint Johnson]

Fair enough, but where's the rant castigating the failures of private finance? It seems to me you're perturbed not by the defects of the product, but only by the means of financing it. In other words, it looks like you're more interested in preserving orthodoxy, than achieving quality. Frankly, I don't care how films are financed, and am equally unoffended by public and private financing, if the results are promising.

The private financing of film and television has created some truly bad material but "The Simple Life" does me no harm by its mere existence. I don't watch it nor pay for it. When private financing in a project fails to deliver, the people who invested in it lose. When public financing of in a project fails to deliver, they demand more money from me.

The "orthodoxy" is, as you've endlessly pointed out, for the state to subsidize the arts that cannot sustain themselves... I have no interest in preserving that and I certainly don't agree that it creates any semblance of quality. It isn't that state funding can be corrupted, state funding is itself corrupt and it is nearly impossible for anything good to come of it.

You seriously don't care where the money comes from? I could go the organized crime and they would be interested in using a film production to launder the money made from the slave labour of women smuggled into the country and forced into prostitution. It is being done as we speak and your concern would be whether the artistic results would measure up to your standards?

Damn, that is some serious dedication to the arts. I'm more leery about that whole "the ends justify the means" argument.

Sure. Me. My work may still be "pedantic and boring", but it's not for lack of exposure to popular culture, past and present. Of course, there are limits....

A kneejerk contempt for what is mainstream and popular, exposed to it or not, doesn't give any artistic credence to a work created as an anti-idea.

This is getting ridiculous. Your position here, which I would characterize as cultural relativism aggravated by a market fundamentalism which would dismay Adam Smith, leaves us nothing to talk about here. Best move on.

I have no illusions that I will change your mind, I'm writing to the rest of the folk here. Most of them fall in the spectrum between us and if I can sway a few over away from state funding being THE answer... then I have done some small good in this world.

Cultural Relativism? Really? Hmm, I suppose I am arguing that your cultural bias isn't a fundamental truism for everyone else and shouldn't be imposed on them... which would make you an ethnocentrist who believes that your art is fundamentally of greater value and should be imposed on others.

Market fundamentalism? You say that as if it were a bad thing?

Sure, but we live in the real world, and nobody is dismantling nation-states any time soon. Pretending there's no difference between Bush and Barack Obama is sheer privileged madness. The difference could well be one between life and death for people not as fortunate as we are. Not everyone is insulated from the real-world consequences of power.

We do live in the real world- in the midst of history, not at the pinnacle. We do need to have real change, just not the rehashing of leftist or rightist ideas that have failed countless times already. While they want to build the nation state's power and influence, I would argue against it at every turn.

Saying that you are the most changarific and changiest changifier the world has ever seen doesn't mean that there will be any change or that the change will be for the better. Although it would be hard to see how Obama could be worse overall than Bush has been, but, the choice is between Obama and McCain and there... all I see is two sides of the same coin.

One side wants to take away your civil rights while the other side wants to take away your economic rights. People need to realize that free markets are as fundamental a right as free speech. What these candidates are offering is the illusion of safety and the appearance of helping the downtrodden.

I'm not well insulated against the depredations of the state, only those who work for the state or give big enough campaign contribution (and can be tapped again) have any insulation. I have in the past, and may well in the future, lived well below the poverty line. Four years without electricity or running water and our family in a one room cabin. But hell, it was backwoods, we had roof over our head and didn't miss meals so it wasn't anything that would elicit sympathy from those who are homeless and haven't ate for a few days. Just giving my proletariat bona fides.

And... what was the subject again? Uuhhhmm indie films and the dire straits of the same. Right, so here are some random thoughts on the subject.

• I think there are more independent films being made today than at any other time in history- I also think that most of them are crap.
• Marketing is a major stumbling block for the few that are not crap to get noticed.
• There has been a glut of films on the market from the majors as they ramped up production in anticipation of the directors, writers and actors negotiations. As they filter through there will be a bit of a trough.
• The majors are contracting and limiting their schedules which means that trough will likely come up to a lower level which will cut down on the noise their marketing machines make. It should also leave more blank screens for distributors to go into indie acquisition mode to fill.
• Theatrical distribution is moving toward primarily "event" films due to the high price and effort needed to go out to it. Big action and comedy get the greatest boost from being on the big screen and so that is what will get the most distribution.
• Cheaper projection technology will allow a greater number of smaller and more flexible venues that could give limited theatrical runs for more esoteric and less popular material. It might also allow for more flexible pricing.
• The distributors need to use that theatrical release as marketing for the DVD, BluRay and Internet download releases. There is no real way to market the theatrical release so use it as a means to an end, not the end.
• What is the highest price one can charge for an internet download before it becomes tempting for the people to just pirate it? My guess is that download to own a high definition 1080p movie has to be less than $5. A television quality series might be, per episode, $1 for sd and $1.50 for HD.
• Film and television critics have been taking a pummeling lately but I think there is a need for them... even if it is a mob generated critic via ratings in Netflix or Zip.ca. The big movies will get thousands of reviews while the indie may only get one- but if that one reviewer has reviewed a few hundred other movies then there is a database that can be cross referenced with others to create a list of people who "if you liked THAT, you might like THIS." What they need to do is create an open standard for rating and reviews that anyone can set up a front end for and all the social networks can tie into. The more ratings, the more chance that an indie film can rise above the noise on its own merit. Hey Google, you got room in the lab?
• People, try not to work on a movie or show that you don't respect. I know that isn't always an option, the kids need new shoes and groceries don't just buy themselves... but if you are an above the line person you occasionally have some leeway to say "No thanks, the money is good but can we find a better project?" The less major studio mediocrity that is made, the less marketing noise the good indie film has to overcome.

 

[jpp]

You seriously don't care where the money comes from? I could go the organized crime and they would be interested in using a film production to launder the money made from the slave labour of women smuggled into the country and forced into prostitution. It is being done as we speak and your concern would be whether the artistic results would measure up to your standards?

Actually, you gave a pretty good description of the business practices of a number of American companies. Indentured slaves, including children, work 18 hours a day in factories which produce American products, and American oil companies routinely partner with genocidal governments. There are in fact pending court cases (in U.S. courts) against American oil companies in Nigeria and Burma. I believe the charges include mass murder, the use of actual (not metaphoric) slave labor and forced prostitution. Some of this money no doubt makes its way to Hollywood.

For my part, I was concerned only with public and private finance, and hadn't thought of organized crime, but I'm glad you raised the issue and reminded everyone that investment capital is often tainted by atrocious crimes against humanity.

A kneejerk contempt for what is mainstream and popular, exposed to it or not, doesn't give any artistic credence to a work created as an anti-idea.

What do you want me to say? That I love reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond, Seinfeld and Cheers more than Shakespeare, J.S. Bach and Carl Dreyer? How about your own exposure? Do you really know anything about the culture you dismiss with such contempt? Do you think popular filmmakers like Spielberg and Lucas share your contempt -- and possibly your ignorance? I can assure you, they don't....

It isn't that state funding can be corrupted, state funding is itself corrupt and it is nearly impossible for anything good to come of it.

There's a good deal of truth to that if you mean the Bush administration and right-wing government in general, but more interesting is the implied notion that private money and power have no destructive effects in the world. We clearly don't live on the same planet. In fact, let's go farther: in the words of John Dewey, "politics is the shadow big business casts on society". In that light, bad government is often indistinguishable from the private enterprise in which you put all your trust. It's no secret that business lobbyists write Republican legislation, so it's hard to see why you would object to Bush & Co. At worst, the Bushies are skimming some off from the top.

Cultural Relativism? Really? Hmm, I suppose I am arguing that your cultural bias isn't a fundamental truism for everyone else and shouldn't be imposed on them... which would make you an ethnocentrist who believes that your art is fundamentally of greater value and should be imposed on others.

Who's imposing anything on anyone? We've already established that the State funds Charlie Sheen, pro football and big oil. Am I an ethnocentrist for demanding some diversity in the matter?

Market fundamentalism? You say that as if it were a bad thing?

Yeah. Like all religions, it leads to madness.

I'm not well insulated against the depredations of the state, only those who work for the state or give big enough campaign contribution (and can be tapped again) have any insulation.

I was talking about villagers who get bombed in their beds in Afghanistan and Iraq, thanks to the Bush Doctrine. In the last week or two, I think the total was something like 130 innocent villagers, most of them women and children. Last time I checked, the U.S. hadn't declared war on British Columbia. So you ought be pretty safe in your bed.

But let's call it a day. I can't parse the rest of it, and the U.S. will never support art films, so the argument is as pointless as it could be.

 

[GlennChan]

Guys, I didn't mean to open up such a polarizing debate. But if I may, I'd like to point out that opposing film subsidies can satisfy both 'lefties' and 'righties'. In my opinion, we should subsidize homeless people instead of art films.

From a left-wing perspective, would it not make a lot of sense to get our priorities straight?? Would we rather build homes for the homeless or would we rather make "art" (or indie films)?

From a right-wing perspective, it either doesn't matter or it would be slightly better to subsidize the homeless. By providing housing and food, the homeless no longer have to beg and can focus on getting productive jobs (because begging doesn't create any wealth).

Is this not common ground we could all agree on?

 

[number6]

In my opinion, we should subsidize homeless people instead of art films.

From a left-wing perspective, would it not make a lot of sense to get our priorities straight?? Would we rather build homes for the homeless or would we rather make "art" (or indie films)?

From a right-wing perspective, it either doesn't matter or it would be slightly better to subsidize the homeless. By providing housing and food, the homeless no longer have to beg and can focus on getting productive jobs (because begging doesn't create any wealth).

Is this not common ground we could all agree on?

(post removed: decided I might be giving away too much information)
This is the plot of an Indie art film so yes... this is on topic.

 

[Mark Toia]

WOW!!!
This thread has just scared me away from ever doing a film.
I'd like to say thank you to you all.

I think I'll stick with AD's, then Retire early.

Good luck to all who tread this path to doom and gloom.

 

[Joe G.]

-

-

This textbook Ayn Rand Libertarian propaganda is morally indefensible. It's fed by irrational ideological formulations that never matched reality:

"While the worst of the business folk will lie and cheat you if they can, Politicians are far more dangerous because they prefer the use of legally monopolized violence as a means to their ends."

"While the worst of the business folk will lie and cheat you," AND POISON YOUR AIR AND WATER AND GIVE YOU CANCER AND HIRE THUGS TO MASSACRE YOUR LABOR LEADERS AND BRIBE THE POLITICIANS TO MAKE IT ALL LEGAL, AND PUT YOUR CHILDREN IN SWEAT SHOPS FOR 16 HOUR DAYS...

The gross ignorance of the history of the labor struggle in the western world is not to be tolerated.

He uses a wedge issue like "funding art" to push his radical reactionary ideas that really don't have any merit. Been there, done that, the workers had it quite miserable. They rose up and put regulations and laws in place to restrict the brutal immoral excesses of the businessmen which you don't seem to have any knowledge about.

Case closed. I have nothing further to say to you. Go rant in your Ayn Rand oppressed white people anger club. You aren't fooling me.

 

[jpp]

In the ongoing dispute with Clint, it seemed best to keep quiet on this one, but what the hell, it's a slow Sunday. One more dip in the lake:

I think the lowered cost of filmmaking will provide some opportunity for truly independent artists to get unique creations to their market at a profit.

Just imagine if you were right. In 3 years from now, virtually everything beyond consumer grade will likely be delivering resolution approaching or exceeding 35mm. And by then, higher end cameras (Epic, for one?) may well exceed the dynamic range of film. For maybe half the purchase of an EX1 today, you should be able to rent that equipment for 3 or 4 weeks. You may even get it for nothing, if the owner/DP believes in the project.

So if you're correct that resolution and dynamic range are enough to make indies competitive, there will be so many competitive indies that the competition will bury itself in its own technical excellence. But can this be right? Isn't acceptable theatrical quality already as cheap and accessible as it can possibly get?

I for one would say "yes". In the end, the lack of celebrities in your masterpiece is a far greater disincentive to festival directors and distributors than the defects of, say, full screen projection of Canon HV20 footage. And notwithstanding [uninformed!] claims here to the contrary, distributors don't give a damn. A grunge look consistent with the performances and the production design (or lack thereof) may actually enhance indie box-office potential. The movie is supposed to be different, after all. And if you achieve a great look with the HV20, that also satisfies the marketing dept. -- it means viewers can tell themselves that they can also achieve fine results with a $700 camera.

There's a dirty secret in indie film marketing: you're not really selling the movie. What your selling is a fantasy about making the movie, an appeal to the illicit filmmaking desires of the multitudes. And a significant fraction of the indie audience isn't even interested in the film: they're would-be filmmakers doing market research.

There's a good case to be made that the medium peaked years ago; the fact that so many of us are trying to enter an overpopulated field through technology is proof of the hopelessness of the endeavor.

That said, interesting work is still possible on the margins -- maybe. But that work hinges on funding, not resolution or dynamic range. And as this idiot has already said a million times before, commercial funding is by definition hostile to the qualities indies usually need to be commercially successful. Whatever you think of them, the biggest non-celebrity indie successes (Stranger than Paradise, She's Gotta Have It, Poison, The Unbelievable Truth, Swoon, Slacker, Clerks, Brother McMullen, Pi, Blair Witch, Brick, etc.) were not commercially financed. That should tell us something, about commercial finance(?)

Andrew Young began the thread touting the quality of the work, but lamenting the state of distribution. So, FWIW, the view here is dimmer: few distribution opportunities, but relatively few films deserving distribution. This unwinding has been going on for a long time, and it will continue for a long time, because there are always new players ready to lose their money (and waste their lives?). No learning seems to take place; one wave just replaces another. Which is why indie film looks to be alive, when it's really all but dead in the U.S. (though not elsewhere!).

Of course, it's still possible to make an idiosyncratic masterpiece for nothing, or very little. Odds are that few people would actually see that masterpiece, because most folks in independent film, including festival directors, want Hollywood movies in indie wrappers, not challenging or unfamiliar material. But some fine day you may have a screening, and if you live long enough, your fame or your cult may grow.... You may even be offered an episode of Law & Order, if you know somebody in the front office. So the future is rosy....

 

[Tom Lowe]

The fact is, that only one out of a million people could or will ever truly make a masterpiece film. They are more likely to make a great looking masterpiece indie for $400K on Red One than they are on an HVX200, or even 16mm. That is the point.

A million novels get written every year, and only a handful really get properly published by a big house. The difference is, any Joe can sit down with a laptop and write a brilliant novel.

Technology is simply leveling the playing field for cinema a little bit, and that's a good thing.

 

[jpp]

Technology is simply leveling the playing field for cinema a little bit, and that's a good thing.

The key phrase there is "little bit". IMHO, it's next to nothing, but there is a small case to be made that 35mm production value did salvage some indies (I can think of two: "The Unbelievable Truth" and "George Washington". And both were made for well under $100K.) But they're not masterpieces, either, the world wouldn't be poorer without them.

 

[Tom Lowe]

By "a little bit" all I was talking about is the difference between Red One (essentially S35mm) and something like the HVX200 or shooting 16mm with a very limited ratio of used vs unused shots.

Masterpieces like Badlands and In the Mood for Love have been made relatively cheaply. Let me ask you this: Would you like to see Badlands shot on a DVX100? No thanks.

I agree with you that the improvement in terms of leveling the field is small, but it's still significant to the 1-in-a-million filmmaker who DOES manage to pull off that 1-in-a-million low-budget masterpiece.

 

[jpp]

Let me ask you this: Would you like to see Badlands shot on a DVX100? No thanks.

Of course not, and you're right: Badlands is a good example of production value being absolutely critical to the experience of the movie. But nobody in his right mind, with Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek, and the budget Malick had at his disposal, small as it might have been, would have shot that film with a DVX100. So it's kinda beside the point.

I'm not saying production value or camera quality doesn't matter, but that camera quality probably doesn't matter on low budget productions which have other more glaring defects or aren't attractive to distributors for other reasons. And the marketing of indies raises a host of other questions. A professional sheen isn't necessarily an asset in all cases.

I agree with you that the improvement in terms of leveling the field is small, but it's still significant to the 1-in-a-million filmmaker who DOES manage to pull off that 1-in-a-million low-budget masterpiece.

I dunno. Imperfections can become part of the seductive charm of cinema. Maybe a 16mm Badlands would have had other qualities.

OTOH, it IS conceivable that somebody in a low tax bracket will pull off a feat which would have been all but impossible, before the advent of this equipment. We'll just have to wait and see.

 

[Priyesh P.]

maybe it was the fact seeing tom cruise in a cheapish video look which made it kinda special for me, but nonetheless, after a few minutes of watching "collateral" the crappy image didn`t impact on the film`s entertaining qualities. highest resolution is not the most important point. "city of god" was mainly shot on 16mm, but it had such breathtakingly beautiful images that I was shocked to hear how seemingly "easily" César Charlone captured the picture...