AFI is a wrap, but Maja Milos’ CLIP is still haunting me
My girlfriend and I managed to attend eight films at AFI this year over the course of the seven-day festival: Amour; Rust and Bone; Clip; Caesar Must Die; Starlet; Beyond the Hills; Leviathan; and...
View ArticleIf You Make a Movie In the Woods and No One’s There To Watch It…
My name is Sam Mestman, and I run a film collective in Los Angeles and Toronto called We Make Movies (www.wemakemovies.org). Moviemaker asked us to write a weekly DIY filmmaking blog about tips and...
View ArticleWe Make Movies (Better): Please Don’t Have the Following Conversation About...
When I talk to filmmakers, way too often I have a version of the following conversation: Sam Mestman (Me): What’s your movie about? Filmmaker (FM): Well, it’s a love story. Sort of a When Harry Met...
View ArticleWE MAKE MOVIES (BETTER): Giving FCPX another chance
It’s become one of the film world’s great pastimes to sit around and hate on what Apple did with Final Cut Pro X. Upon its launch, you would have thought Apple had come in and kidnapped every editor’s...
View ArticleSuccessful Crowdfunding 2.0: Ways to stand above the crowd when crowdfunding...
As far as fundraising for your film goes, we all know that a decade ago you couldn’t reach a woman in Calgary who had some retirement money laying around that she just felt like giving to a struggling...
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Wisdom Wednesday: Randall Emmett’s 13 Golden Rules of Producing by Randall...
Born and raised in Miami, Randall Emmett started his long and prolific producing career in the unlikely position of Mark Wahlberg’s assistant. Since then, he has produced, amongst countless others,...
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When History and Cinema Collide: Fictionalizing Truth In Lee Daniel’s The...
We’ve all seen those stately biopics (usually with Oscar aspirations), in which renowned actors portray real-life historical figures (Patton, Queen Elizabeth, Gandhi, etc). They are often interesting...
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Wisdom Wednesday: Chris Weitz’s 21 Golden Rules of Filmmaking by Chris Weitz
This week, our Wednesday Words of Wisdom come from the Hollywood jack-of-all-trades that is Chris Weitz. The consummate professional reminds fellow moviemakers to avoid clichés and always mind their...
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Fictionalizing Truth: Lee Daniel’s The Butler & More
We’ve all seen those stately biopics (usually with Oscar aspirations), in which renowned actors portray real-life historical figures (Patton, Queen Elizabeth, Gandhi, etc). They are often interesting...
View ArticleClik here to view.
My New Film: American Jesus Is Not A Horror Movie
Larry Fessenden, producer of the new documentary American Jesus, explains why Glass Eye Pix became involved in Aram Garriga’s exploration of the sometimes bizarre relationship between faith,...
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She’s Just Not That Into You: Lessons Before You Make A Deal With SAG
This Wisdom Wednesday, producer Randy Bobbitt (It’s Gawd) shares invaluable lessons he’s learned about the SAG signatory process. Engaging SAG can be a tricky process, but here, Bobbitt provides the...
View ArticleIf You Make a Movie In the Woods and No One’s There To Watch It…
My name is Sam Mestman, and I run a film collective in Los Angeles and Toronto called We Make Movies (www.wemakemovies.org). Moviemaker asked us to write a weekly DIY filmmaking blog about tips and...
View ArticleWe Make Movies (Better): Please Don’t Have the Following Conversation About...
When I talk to filmmakers, way too often I have a version of the following conversation: Sam Mestman (Me): What’s your movie about? Filmmaker (FM): Well, it’s a love story. Sort of a When Harry Met...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Fictionalizing Truth: Lee Daniel’s The Butler & More
We’ve all seen those stately biopics (usually with Oscar aspirations), in which renowned actors portray real-life historical figures (Patton, Queen Elizabeth, Gandhi, etc). They are often interesting...
View ArticleAFI is a wrap, but Maja Milos’ CLIP is still haunting me
My girlfriend and I managed to attend eight films at AFI this year over the course of the seven-day festival: Amour; Rust and Bone; Clip; Caesar Must Die; Starlet; Beyond the Hills; Leviathan; and...
View ArticleJames Franco vs. the Fact Checkers Unit
Director Dan Beers’ moviemaking success story began with his short film FCU: Fact Checkers Unit, which premiered at Sundance in 2008. The film, about two magazine fact checkers tasked with confirming...
View ArticleJennifer Fox Turns to Crowdfunding for My Reincarnation
When moviemaker Jennifer Fox (“Flying: Confessions of a Free Woman”) completed her latest project—the documentary My Reincarnation, about a Tibetan Buddhism Master and his Western-born son—a...
View ArticleLights, Camera, Social Action: The Disposable Film Festival
With our world’s amazing technology making spectacular cameras small, cheap and ubiquitous, new types of moviemaking (and, by extension, moviemakers) are proliferating. From the highest-powered film...
View ArticleResurrecting Sixto Rodriguez: Malik Bendjelloul’s Searching For Sugarman
In the 1970s, the music of a mysterious singer-songwriter named Rodriguez became the anthem for a generation of Afrikaners increasingly isolated from the outside world by the international response to...
View ArticleAFI is a wrap, but Maja Milos’ CLIP is still haunting me
My girlfriend and I managed to attend eight films at AFI this year over the course of the seven-day festival: Amour; Rust and Bone; Clip; Caesar Must Die; Starlet; Beyond the Hills; Leviathan; and...
View Article