making BLANK.
I cut together a very condensed recap of the last 6 years during production. It covers finding Larry, principal-photography, post, IFP, right up to where we stand now with plans to premiere the film this Spring!
Everything is ready to go! By this time tomorrow night the film’s official trailer will be live! I’m so excited. I wanted to write a quick recap of the week, and what to expect come Monday morning 12:01 PST.
- I spent much of today putting the film’s original score into the timeline, seeing everything finally come together has been such a rewarding experience. Again, we’re announcing the film’s composer tomorrow when the trailer goes live.
- We should have a few write-ups by sites early in the week - we’re hoping this helps put the film infront of new people.
- Today I added an email-link and newsletter-signup form to the film’s main page - I’ve tested it in Safari, Chrome and Firefox - but, if you see any bugs, please let me know. Hopefully these additions make the site easier to navigate.
- We’re getting ready, after the 4th, to submit the film to two more upcoming festivals: BFF and Rooftop.
- There’s also a few funds we’re applying to in the next two weeks. If anyone out there knows of any amazing documentary funding / grant programs, we’d love to hear from you.
That’s all for now. I think I’m going to attempt and get a full night of rest, I have a feeling tomorrow night is going to be a late one.
I listened to three new pieces of the film’s original score yesterday - I am still, a full 24 hours later, beside myself with happiness.
Music has always been incredibly important to the film, and I’ve been editing for so long using temp-music as placeholders; but then, yesterday, listening to the four-total pieces of rough music so far, I heard, for the first, how the film’s score is taking shape… and it was amazing.
The score is so beautiful - I can’t wait to share it with everyone.
via 17272dorsetave:
The Really Good Things In The Indie Film Biz 2012 by Ted Hope
- Direct distribution is really working.
- Hollywood is taking more creative risks. As Ben Affleck noted about this year in film, “, “movies that involve taking risks by the filmmakers and the financiers have been successful.“
- The film industry is moving towards proportional gender representation in front of and behind the camera.
- There is an appetite for acquisition from the distributors.
- Worldwide, the industry is asking questions if there is a better way.
- Technology is confronting the problem of our transition from an entertainment economy based on scarcity and control of content, to one recognizing the abundance of, total access to, and full distraction from that content.
- There has never been a better time to both preserve and advance the film culture I dearly love. That’s why I chose to change my life and focus not on project producing but on producing infrastructure and change. I am not going to be able to do it alone, but working with the support of the organization that launched the oldest running film festival, should hopefully prove far more fruitful than from proclaiming on high from my private soap box.
- New financing options are both here and on the horizon for independent & documentary film.
- Transactional VOD Players hit the flashpoint. VHX.tv, Vimeo PPV, Dynamo player, and many more. Whether you want an aggregator or prefer to sell on your own, it is easy and painless to do now. Just ask Louis C.K.
- We have our first VOD Superstar. You want big numbers on VOD? Just cast Kirsten Dunst. Bachelorette. Melancholia. All Good Things. She’s beautiful. She’s a good actor. She’s fascinating to watch. She’s funny. She’s scary. And she doesn’t have too many letters in her name, but just enough to stand out. Hell, if Elizabethtown premiered on Ultra VOD today, it would set records. Okay, this isn’t really the GOOD thing but just an aspect of a Good Thing. The Good Thing is that VOD is becoming more marketable and people are not treating as a lesser product. Once all media outlets start covering VOD premieres that will be an Awesome thing.
- Tech and film are talking to each other. Soon they may even speak the same language.
- The dominance of the feature film form is starting to wain. Whether it is great webisodes, a tremendous number of wonderful shorts, transmedia experiments, or just cross-platform experiments, cinema is evolving beyond it’s historic constraints.
- The two films that I helped produce this year, DARK HORSE and STARLET got great reviews in the New York Times. They also got great reviews many other places too. I can only state this here as a personal positive though. Stay tuned, as this exact same fact will also be on my “What sucked in 2012″ list too.
- While I am on that double list tip, here’s another that will repeat on tomorrows list of the big and the bad. To quote A.O. Scott of the NY Times: “By the end of this year, The New York Times will have reviewed more than 800 movies, establishing 2012, at least by one measure, as a new benchmark in the annals of cinematic abundance.” From the point of view of the audience, right now this is a beautiful thing. Conceptually speaking, we should be able to match audiences with the film that is most right for them. Audiences don’t have to compromise. There are more better movies than ever before. Unfortunately, we have to build an infrastructure to support this, but that is a rant for another day (like tomorrow).
- There is a lot of real & meaningful support for indie writers, directors, and producers working in the genres & realms traditionally supported by indie film support organizations.
- The online community that supports the effort to advance a sustainable culture where the artist & their [supporters] benefit by the work they create, works to both preserve and advance the vibrant & diverse work that ambitiously reaches further, is committed to transparency, openness, opportunity, & our communal well-being, and knows that it is a team that builds the future and thus gives back in so many ways including posting, commenting, pointing, liking, and financial contributions. I know this as I am experiencing it daily. Thank you.
(via zadi)
Source: etsy.com
This very-weathered folder holds the last several drafts of the film’s script… I stumbled across it today when cleaning, not that I had lost or misplaced it, but it has been a few months since I needed to dig it out for reference, I was surprised at how heavy it felt.
When the film was first released, the technology of using an articulated metal armature inside the figures was considered so amazing that TV guide devoted four pages to the story.
Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964)
When I hear the term “independent filmmaker,” I immediately think of John Cassavetes. He was the most independent of them all. For me, he was and still is a guide and teacher. Without his support and advice, I don’t know what would have become of me as a filmmaker. The question, ‘What is an independent filmmaker?’ has nothing to do with being inside or outside of the industry or whether you live in New York or Los Angeles. It’s about determination and strength, having the passion to say something that’s so strong that no one or nothing can stop you.
Whenever I meet a young director who is looking for guidance and advice, I tell him or her to look to the example of John Cassavetes, a source of the greatest strength. John made it possible for me to think that you could actually make a movie—which is crazy, because it’s an enormous endeavor, and you only realize how enormous when you’re doing it. But by then it’s too late.
John died much too soon, but his films and his example are still very much alive. He once said, “You can’t be afraid of anyone or anything if you want to make a movie.”
It’s that simple. He was a force of nature.
Martin Scorsese, via Aren’t we a fine pair of misfits?
Source: strangewood
This is it! We’re getting ready release the trailer to For Thousands of Miles, and when that happens, we’ll also start taking pre-orders for the film! If you don’t want to miss out on that announcement, be sure to add your info here.
We’ve started submitting the film to major festivals. We’re drafting our plans to self-release the film through services like VHX. Mapping out event-screenings in cities around NY, WA, OR, CA, MI.
Another very exciting announcement regarding the film’s original score is coming soon!, so please stay posted for that as well. In the meantime, we’d better get back to work!
Raw footage from the 10 days spent filming pickups in Northern California and Reno. I found this clips - some with sound, some without - hiding away in a folder I had all but forgotten about.
Vimeo’s New Pay-to-View Service Heats Up with Six Compelling Films
In September, video-sharing website Vimeo announced an exciting new feature—Pay-to-View—which allows moviemakers to sell access to their films and videos behind a paywall. Now, the site is making good on that promise.
Interesting… this is turning out to be perfect timing.
Source: futureoffilm
I would just like to say that finishing the film in FCPX has been a *fantastic* experience. Fantastic. 7 already feels so outdated to me.
…you’ll have front row seats to the long and painful process of independent filmmaking… before this ends I’ll have been turned down, shut out, knocked out of the race, dragged through the mud, riding on the edge of disaster, against all odds, between a rock and hard place… and that’s just preproduction.
Strangely enough… I wouldn’t want it any other way.
The above is from the first post on For Thousands of Miles - well, back then, before it had the title it does now, it was just called Project Pedal; re-reading it now it feels like something from another life… I remember very clearly writing it, I remember the apartment I was living in back then… I remember thinking I might be wrapped up in this undertaking for the next two of my life, maybe three years, at worst.
We filmed in the summer of 2007, I imported the first handful of tapes in 2008, I finished importing / logging all 120+ hours five long months later, in 2009 I had assembled a 5+ hour edit of the film, I spent all of 2010 and then some writing the script for the film, locked down the first 2 hour edit in 2011, more writing followed, more editing. And, as of 3 nights ago, I locked down the version of the film that I’ll be submitting to a handful of festivals - thanks in large part to the encouragement and advice of IFP.
I feel happy… surreal… the road that took me from point A to point B has been such a mess of wrong-turns and sidetracking that it’s hard to even really see how far I’ve come. I think about all the people who helped me… all the people who kept the film going… all the people who gave their time, money, wisdom, on and on. I hope when the film is released that it lives up to their expectations.
This is, I’ve been told, the half way point in the life of a film, not so much in time specifically, but definitely the half way point in energy-spent; from here on out things will build a natural momentum, the film will start to go on to have a life of it’s own after the festivals, but there is still so, so much to do! Here’s to whatever comes next!
Page 1 of 8
