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Two Week Film Challenge

The Royal Baronial Theatre in San Francisco is sponsoring a Two Week Film Festival (or #2wkfilm). One of the participants is Mike Peter Reed (or @britmic). He has until May 14 22 to complete, and is blogging the process on Filmmaker Slog. He'll be shooting using the Panasonic TZ1 TZ5 (see comment below):

There are many reasons why I have opted to shoot my #2wkfilm feature using an old stills camera in video mode. This will result in 848x480p @30fps Quicktime files encoded with MJPEG. Let's write a list and see if I an remember:

1. Tapeless workflow. This means no tapes. This is important to me. I hate tapes with a passion.

2. No sync sound required on exteriors. Which is just as well really since the Tz1 audio is less than a bad joke for any serious use. But that's fine because I'm not using this camera to record any audio.

3. Discrete. With the microcrew on hand we'll look like nothing more than dumb tourists/students larking about. No tripods, no trailing wires, no obstructing or harassing the public, no problem, no permit, no public liability.

4. 10x Optical zoom.

5. Good lens. It's a stills camera innit.

6. Optical stabilisation that works well.

7. Fits in a pocket, no kit van required

8. Media is cheap. Found at £6.99 for 2GB SD Ultra II Plus USB (built in USB connector)

9. Reasonable battery life, batteries are removable.

10. MJPEG is easy on the CPU when it comes to editing. Large filesizes perhaps, but storage is a problem how?

I'll also be participating in the roundtable portion of the fest. My contribution, A New Auteur Theory for an Age of Social Media, is running today here along with a bunch of other great essays. Or read below...

Go to full post to read "A New Auteur Theory for an Age of Social Media"...A New Auteur Theory for an Age of Social Media

Can a film possibly have a single author? Even Robert Rodriguez, who wears more hats than the Village People, does not make his films alone. And yet I continue to read reviews from mainstream film critics that speak of films being “by” the director.

This is the doing of the “Auteur Theory.” I have a personal vendetta against the “Auteur Theory.”

My friends must be sick of hearing me talk about the “Auteur Theory” and the devastation it has wrought on not just American film schools, whose professors preach a director-centric approach to impressionable young filmmakers, but all of modern film criticism. I hope my friends will humor me once more, because my feelings about the theory have lately undergone a subtle shift.

First, let me explain what I mean by the “Auteur Theory.” The idea developed from the essays of French film critic Andre Bazin, (founder of film crit magazine Cahier du cinéma) and conjectures that certain stylish directors have an identifiable personal style analogous to great novelists. Film as a medium at the time Bazin was writing was the new kid on the block, and he felt the need to devote a lot of ink and intellect to convincing the public that it was an art form deserving the same respect as written literature. He wanted them to think of the director as an author – in French, auteur – and praised the signature styles of directors like Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles. I have no objection to saying directors have distinct styles.

But after Bazin’s idea came to the United States and was filtered through such influential critics as Andrew Sarris and Pauline Kael, the Auteur Theory came to mean that the director is the only author of a film, and his or her contribution is the only one worth discussing in serious criticism. Hollywood has not been immune to this virus, and directors have seen contractual gains that go beyond currency. From this era came the “directors cut.” And, ever since this notion possessed the discourse, the great majority of films have been cursed with the so-called vanity credit, ‘A film by’ -- not because every director feels the need to have his or her name appear twice in the credits, but because he or she feels the need to pay fealty to Auteurist orthodoxy.

The good news is that this debilitating dictatorship is now beset on all sides by democracy. The explosion of personal movie logs with single-minded devotion to pet positions means one can read thoughtful analysis of recent releases in terms of screenwriting, cinematography, composing, sound design, editing... even from the perspective of a PA. When non-Auteurist voices proliferate, it becomes easy to recognize the absurdity of the “Auteur Theory.” (It is said that screenwriter William Goldman, when told the Auteur Theory asked, “What’s the punchline?”)

So what will the world be like with less print film critics and more web critics? It’s always been a pretty open secret that television and newspaper film critics have little effect on the box office, and that their reviews can be softened by junkets and freebies. To the average moviegoer, the only review that counts is word of mouth, and it can’t be bought.

Or can it? I’m not talking about the sites that make arrangements between advertisers and influencers, pay-to-tout payola for the social media age. I’m talking about good storytelling.

The most important part of any review, whether from a professional critic or your Uncle Tony is this: what's the story? Sure, the cast does factor in, or a known director or producer, but mostly as a shortcut to a sense of what type of story it is. An AIDS drama produced by Merchant-Ivory vs. an AIDS drama produced by Jerry Bruckheimer.

I’m not going to lie and say the playing field is level between indies and Hollywood. Hollywood will always be able to buy name talent and known franchises. But the indie filmmaker has always had access to word of mouth, and word of mouth just got its hands on the social media megaphone.

Now everyone is, literally, a critic. Whereas before we might share our movie opinions with a few friends, now we tweet it or facebook it for all our friends and acquaintances. Whereas before we’ve had to rely on a few gatekeepers with press credentials, now we can rely on the consensus of our wider peer group, or turn to an internet critic whose opinion we trust. Say what you want about Ain’t It Cool News, but they demonstrated how massive the fanboy audience was, and how truly under-represented it was. I’m looking forward to the emergence of other iceberg audiences, whose depth we do not yet fathom. Hollywood can’t afford to make movies for audiences Hollywood doesn’t know exist, indies can’t afford not to.

So what is the role of the director in an age where audiences understand film as a collaborative medium, a movie as a chaos of creative voices between two darknesses? It’s the same as it’s always been: to direct the damn thing.

Directing is no piece of cake, but in many ways the Hollywood director is less responsible for the existence of a film than his indie cousin. The Hollywood director is a replaceable cog in a big machine.

Instead of praising these directors, new criticism should praise filmmakers, the people who can make a film happen out of nothing, the indie filmmaker who, against all laws of respectability and economics – especially economics – with steady work and fast talk, with devotion and determination, with rugged individualism and creative collaboration, is able to distill a story into cinema and place it before the eyes and minds of a receptive audience.

I call this maker-filmmaker an auteur, an author of his or her own destiny.

The Auteur Theory is dead. Long live the Auteur Theory.

About J. Ott

John Ott is a writer, filmmaker and futurist. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.