Cheers for those that work movie for money, i work movie for sensing, feeling, for me its still an art not a money making machine, if that comes along, well, its welcome.

I think it is bad position. To make any good movie you need a bunch of money. If after shooting you make film that can not return this money it is not called "this is amazing art that few people can understand", it is called "getting money and never returning them under false pretense, as you made shit film or average film that you are unable to sell to public".

@CRFilms

No, I don't believe they're "bad directors" (not that either of them consults me on the matter!). Just that they've enjoyed enormous advantages, have had tremendous luck, have good commercial instincts (or share the tastes of the mass-market, if we want to be unkind) and are privileged to work in an industry full of people who offer any Hollywood production very high levels of technical accomplishment.

Consider Clint Eastwood. Here we have a mediocre actor with no prior writing/narrative experience, and who does not appear to have a towering intellect -- he is a public figure, after all -- but he becomes a top Hollywood director, one of a handful.

By contrast, how many formerly famous actors have become great novelists, violinists, philosophers or painters? What does that say about the movie business and the directing profession?

@TheNewDeal

Most of a filmmaker's time these days is spent raising money and trying to sell projects. The disposition which compels people to work alone, day after day, mastering the craft and plumbing the depths in more traditional art forms (the solitary ones like writing, music composition, painting, etc.), demands a very different kind of motivation and will kill most filmmaking careers -- one reason, maybe, that hundreds of millions of dollars routinely go into material which looks like it came from the mind of a male adolescent and is far worse than it needs to be, even by commercial standards.

The kind of motivational zeal you describe may well be essential for unknowns, and certainly worked out well for Robert Rodriquez, but it just doesn't account for many professional successes in the movie business. Do you really believe, for example, that Sophia Coppola or Clint Eastwood or Ron Howard would have succeeded as directors, if that had had to do it on their own, starting from zero?

Besides, the medium speaks for itself. It's not a place for "amazing artists" (to use your term). What we get is James Cameron, Robert Rodriquez, Clint Eastwood and Sophia Coppola -- not Shakespeare, Picasso or Mozart. There's a reason why.

@Kholi I'm talking more about succeeding in an artistic sense rather than a commercial sense. Two different goals, that sometimes overlap. The way I see it, the commercial side has a lot to do with marketing, while the artistic side is about captivating people with a great story and relying on word of mouth. Who knows! There's a million ways to skin a cat. I think somebody will make the next "El Mariachi". Just want it to be me. :)

"Love or hate them, Rodriquez and Smith are far from being world-class filmmakers."

Well, that's all in the eye of the viewer sir. I would certainly say they are. If nothing else, for the fact that they literally make their own films. Most "world-class" directors, for one reason or another, just so happen to work with the best cinematographers, editors, and composers money can buy. So I wouldn't even call some of "the best" directors real film makers at all.

"Most of indie films looks so shitty exactly because people "write, direct, edit, shoot, compose all by themselfs"."

This is true. But it's also how you cut corners and bring in something great on an indie budget. Got to save money somewhere. Indie films are a bitch.

I was also being a little facetious. :) You obviously need team-work, but I was trying to make the point that you need to know ALLOT more these days than in the time of Mr. Rodriguez and Kevin Smith.

But on a serious note, I really don't know how you can direct and create a "mise en scene", without being a good editor and cinematographer first. They are the language and building blocks of cinema.

I agree with @Kae once again. Being a great director and filmmaker is, in itself, a one in a million occurrence. People like to think that "if you put in your time" or gain "professional experience" you'll one day have the skills to make a quality film. But I really don't think it works like this. A director's vision is a gift, they're people that literally see movies in their head... with music, editing, ect all there. Robert Rodriguez and people like that have rare minds... he can draw, paint, compose music, write, ect... he was literally born with 8 different gifts. Few people are lucky enough to have 1 or 2. 90% of people have 0.

I do believe that if you really have the skills, I think it'll show no matter how low of a budget or how little resources you have. And like Kae said again... out of all the shorts, forum "script fests", and internet pitches I've seen in the last 4 years... I don't even think I've seen one that I would go see in a theater... even if they had a hollywood budget and crew.

Then there is also the problem of escalation. You're going to need even MORE talent than someone like Kevin Smith or Robert Rodriguez had. To break through today, on top of being a good writer/director... you're going to need to be a GREAT cinematographer, composer, editor, VFX artist, and bla bla bla. Look at movies like Monsters and Bellflower. The stakes keep getting higher and higher for the no-budget arena. If you can't write, direct, edit, shoot, compose all by yourself... I wouldn't even attempt to make a feature these days. But still, if you've got the goods. You've got the goods.

Good luck to everyone though! I hope we see a game-changing indie production come out soon that's not just some trite garbage like that "Tiny Furniture" movie. ;)

I don't think the chances are quite one-in-a-million. There's only about 3000 features made in the US every year.

I thought I was ready to make a feature, but went for a 25 min short instead. It was a great learning experience, mostly when a packed house on opening night was slightly underwhelmed. It was immediately apparent that story still is king and all the technical achievement in the world won't change that.

@shian Where can we see the full film?

@shian - Congrats on making Singularity at that price. It's quite an accomplishment. It is difficult to scale up to a feature at similar prices because all the complexities creep up disproportionately from a short.

I've written and directed a couple of features with some known actors that have been released. I've stepped away from features for a while because I think that Internet Television series are a much better format for creators in many ways. My new company's first series DIVERGENCE is an action/sci-fi series made very inexpensively. http://WhatIsDivergence.com but I think we got a lot out of it.

Trailer:

Anyone who wants to be a feature film director should go for it and start small with a no budget feature. If you really have it, your talent will shine in that format. If you don't have it, and the film turns out to be s**t, you can try again having learned from your mistakes and you won't have mortgaged your house for your "art" because you've spent very little money on the films. Of course, Paranormal Activity, Primer etc. are all one in a million, i.e. micro budget films that made decent or huge money. Will that happen to you? Probably not. But an excellent micro budget film you can show will do one thing for you - GET YOU A JOB. I've been in the mainstream feature film business 32 years in various capacities from producer, writer to director and one thing has never changed -- Studios LOVE to find that next genius. And they WILL hire you to direct a medium to sometimes high budget film based on a great micro budget feature that you have directed - especially if it's something you've WRITTEN and DIRECTED. IMHO the studios do this to their detriment most of the time, but they keep doing it. Most of the 'shorts' I watch that are linked to on this forum are pretty pathetic but I admire the hell out anyone who has the guts to make one and show it. That's how you learn.

@CRFilms

"Fair point on if they'd get distribution now, but that doesn't change the fact that they're great movies...."

But I don't believe El Mariachi or Clerks are "great movies", or that any subsequent Rodriquez or Smith movies are great movies, and I'm not alone there. These movies attracted attention at the time, because they were curiosities -- thanks to their low budgets, which was still a novelty at the time. That's how I see them, anyway.

Note that Eraserhead is a very different case -- that film cost several hundred thousand dollars (a long time ago) and enjoyed all sorts of resources which would never be available to an unconnected filmmaker (Lynch was in the AFI MFA program for much of that time).

As for "making it", I have no opinion, that's a marketing, not a filmmaking question. There may always be movies, maybe one out of ten thousand, which succeed on a gimmick -- like Paranormal Activity today, or Clerks in the early 90s. But that it's an entirely different question from whether it's possible to make movies requiring dramatic illusion, persuasive performances and a decent visual aesthetic, for little or no money. The example of Clerks or El Mariachi doesn't in my view answer this question with "yes".

I think it's important to recognize that in today's climate, no two micro budget filmmakers are going to be able to get their films made in the same way. Rodriquiz did it one way, you do it another. He didn't have a gh2 or digital editing or internet distribution. We do.

We're going to have to cobble together our own way to make a film. Borrowing, writing in only sets we have free access to, and the one thing everyone has to have- connections. This is the single biggest benefit of film school, getting connected with filmmakers- so you have people to call who might work on your film.

There's just no way to make a micro budget film without a crew and actors that will do it for nothing or near nothing. And the filmmaker has to be able to do it all, direct, write, edit, film.

There's also no rule to say filming has to be done in a compressed two week time period. If we have equipment and access to sets and friends, it can take months or even years to get principal photography done here and there.

It seems to me a far bigger challenge is getting the film seen and distributed. There's too many psuedo beret-wearing "filmmakers" out there who haven't learned their craft, who haven't paid dues, who have no passion, who just want to be famous and cool. They create noise and too many good and great films never have the opportunity to find an audience because there's just so much of this noise.

The internet has been the great equalizer- everythings is on the same crap level. Distribution is everything if we're ever going to make any money. But fuck it, get the fim made. Make the film you have to make.