1. By the end of the 80's, many independent distributors had overextended themselves into financing pictures with larger budgets and eventually went under. The term "indie-blockbuster" refers to movies made with on a smaller scale that are meant to replicate box-office performance and marketing strategies of large scale Hollywood films. Every major studio created or purchased at least one specialty division meant to produce these kinds of movies.
2. First, they chose movies that would be considered to be quality "art" movies (Pelle the Conqueror, The Thin Blue Line). Second, they selected nonclassical movies containing unconventional subject matter. Third, they used savvy marketing strategies to appeal to the public. Limited spending and continued search for new acquisitions instead of producing their own movies.
3. RCA/Columbia and Virgin. The title suggested the possibility of a low-quality movie shot on videotape, which led producers to think it would not do well with audiences. Miramax recognized the tremendous marketing potential sex, lies, and videotape had in both subject matter and the title.
4. Miramax placed the film in Cannes, in which it won the Palme d'Or; rejected Soderbergh's "arthouse" trailer for an audience-friendly one. The poster appealed to both the arthouse audience and the youth audience. They used well-known critics' reviews and film festival honors for the arthouse people and played on the films "edgy" mystique for the youth audience. "Finding high-concept in low-budget films" means identifying what aspects of a low-budget film are of capable universal appeal and marketing the film based on these aspects.
5. They realized that the film had to compliment major studio pictures. Instead of outdoing the big-budget marketing of financial investments, they relied heavily on word-of-mouth and counter-programming strategies. They allowed it to build its prestige on positive reviews for almost six months. Hollywood blockbusters are meant to make as much money as possible in as little time as possible and then repeat with the sequel.
6. Studio fare would be less cost effective, relying mostly on stars and stories. Big event movies are based on special effects, super effects, and simple marketing hooks. Star-driven films, even when they didn't make money domestically, would still perform well abroad.
7. It was a marketing tool for studios to attract one of two audience preferrences: niche or high-concept. Ironic that all of the "independent" films were produced by subsidiaries owned by major companies. The two Hollywoods had similarities in their search for niche films, minimizing the distinction between the two. Films that may have previously been produced by independent distributors are now handled by subsidiaries of major studios. Independent filmmakers are currently struggling due to the lack of actual independent distributors and the distributors are suffering because everything is bought by major studios.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Sunday, February 7, 2010
February 8th
1.On Good Will Hunting and Finding Forrester:
Van Sant says he was not worried about selling out and wanted to experiment with a type of filmmaking he'd always enjoyed but never done before. He liked the human dramas of the 70's was intrigued by the Good Will Hunting script. He wanted to experience what it would be like to be hired out to do a film as a "stand in director" for a studio. The Good Will Hunting success led him to want to try that sort of filmmaking again. After being constrained to studios and producers in Hollywood, he claims that doing films like Gerry and Elephant are liberating in that they are free-form and don't require a screenplay.
2. Van Sant considered traditional screenplay formatting restricting. Taking a page from Cassavetes, he filmed Elephant with little to no scripting prior to filming, leaving room for improvisation and naturalism. Adding to this, he uses long patient takes to build to a quietly explosive release when the violence begins. The long takes add a level of intensity and focus around the characters that remove you from a typical film-watching experience and into a more organic one. He creates a web of characters that meet throughout and even have a role in the repetition of scenes. Van Sant manages to avoid emotion and sentimentality in his utterly cold portrayal of such a sensitive subject.
3. The second act may have been the complicating action. This structure doesn't apply to Elephant since it is composed in a different way than Classical Hollywood filmmaking does business.
4. The long, unbroken takes give the audience a sense that the events are happening in real-time. Again, this adds to Van Sant's naturalism. The final act contains as many shots as the first two combined, meaning that the pace is much faster and ultimately builds upon itself.
5. The psychological motivations are left out of the equation and Van Sant paints a broad picture of high school as a social function and explores the way different groups interact with each other. The shooters are not given a purpose, but shown from purely objective lenses. The focus is not on the individual but on youth as a whole and all the dysfunctions that may come with it.
6. Heath gives directors credit for their work, but claims that looking at films as products of auteurs is one-dimensional in that it ignores the audiences and the social conditions in which it is made. Edward Buscombe suggests augmenting the theory with an attention to "the effects of the cinema on society... the effect of society on the cinema... the effects of films on other films." It relates to our discussions on Van Sant because it is concerned with whether or not authorship is significant in filmmaking and what effects it has on cinema and its audience.
7. Without authorship, the viewer is free to create his/her own meanings and come to conclusions purely subjectively. Meskin questions whether or not authorship really is restricting. "Limitations and exclusion of meaning are good things." He also adds that meanings vary from culture to culture.
8. One argument claims that due to the large crews that often work on Hollywood films, giving one person credit is wrong. The counterargument is that the director has creative control and therefore is the creative source behind the art. It relates to our discussions on Van Sant because of the exploration of the meanings of authorship and whether or not the collaborative nature of filmmaking nullifies that idea.
9. It questions whether film interpretation should be concerned with author's intention or the text itself. The collaborative process of filmmaking is not the same as a single author writing a novel. Van Sant's intentions in his films are an unknown, but can be inferred through repeated motifs found throughout his body of work. Whether or not his "authorship" is help up even when he makes a Classical Hollywood film like Good Will Hunting is up to debate and challenges the concept of authorship even further.
Van Sant says he was not worried about selling out and wanted to experiment with a type of filmmaking he'd always enjoyed but never done before. He liked the human dramas of the 70's was intrigued by the Good Will Hunting script. He wanted to experience what it would be like to be hired out to do a film as a "stand in director" for a studio. The Good Will Hunting success led him to want to try that sort of filmmaking again. After being constrained to studios and producers in Hollywood, he claims that doing films like Gerry and Elephant are liberating in that they are free-form and don't require a screenplay.
2. Van Sant considered traditional screenplay formatting restricting. Taking a page from Cassavetes, he filmed Elephant with little to no scripting prior to filming, leaving room for improvisation and naturalism. Adding to this, he uses long patient takes to build to a quietly explosive release when the violence begins. The long takes add a level of intensity and focus around the characters that remove you from a typical film-watching experience and into a more organic one. He creates a web of characters that meet throughout and even have a role in the repetition of scenes. Van Sant manages to avoid emotion and sentimentality in his utterly cold portrayal of such a sensitive subject.
3. The second act may have been the complicating action. This structure doesn't apply to Elephant since it is composed in a different way than Classical Hollywood filmmaking does business.
4. The long, unbroken takes give the audience a sense that the events are happening in real-time. Again, this adds to Van Sant's naturalism. The final act contains as many shots as the first two combined, meaning that the pace is much faster and ultimately builds upon itself.
5. The psychological motivations are left out of the equation and Van Sant paints a broad picture of high school as a social function and explores the way different groups interact with each other. The shooters are not given a purpose, but shown from purely objective lenses. The focus is not on the individual but on youth as a whole and all the dysfunctions that may come with it.
6. Heath gives directors credit for their work, but claims that looking at films as products of auteurs is one-dimensional in that it ignores the audiences and the social conditions in which it is made. Edward Buscombe suggests augmenting the theory with an attention to "the effects of the cinema on society... the effect of society on the cinema... the effects of films on other films." It relates to our discussions on Van Sant because it is concerned with whether or not authorship is significant in filmmaking and what effects it has on cinema and its audience.
7. Without authorship, the viewer is free to create his/her own meanings and come to conclusions purely subjectively. Meskin questions whether or not authorship really is restricting. "Limitations and exclusion of meaning are good things." He also adds that meanings vary from culture to culture.
8. One argument claims that due to the large crews that often work on Hollywood films, giving one person credit is wrong. The counterargument is that the director has creative control and therefore is the creative source behind the art. It relates to our discussions on Van Sant because of the exploration of the meanings of authorship and whether or not the collaborative nature of filmmaking nullifies that idea.
9. It questions whether film interpretation should be concerned with author's intention or the text itself. The collaborative process of filmmaking is not the same as a single author writing a novel. Van Sant's intentions in his films are an unknown, but can be inferred through repeated motifs found throughout his body of work. Whether or not his "authorship" is help up even when he makes a Classical Hollywood film like Good Will Hunting is up to debate and challenges the concept of authorship even further.
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