6580 Results for “production”
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Producer Data: The Numbers Don’t Lie (The Truth about Independent Film Revenue)
Last fall, desiring information to aid our own filmmaking careers, we launched an experiment to see whether we could obtain hard data on independent film revenue. Having experienced firsthand how difficult it is to get this information, we created a Google form and asked filmmakers to self-submit not just their feature film top-line revenue data, but thorough, detailed and specific numbers on everything from their budgets to best- and worst-performing revenue streams to cast to how much their films made in gross and net terms. From the details of the 104 submitted films, we have drawn critically important—and many surprising—conclusions. […]
by Naomi McDougall Jones and Liz Manashil on Mar 16, 2023 -
Editor’s Letter
“Go make movies.” That was my Editor’s Letter signoff here in the earliest days of this publication. And, over the ensuing 30 years, many of you did! I won’t give Filmmaker anything more than a small amount of credit for the independent production boom in the years following our 1992 launch, but we have certainly been out there issue by issue, web page by web page, encouraging new independent filmmakers. We’ve also tried in these pages to deliver doses of reality along with our encouragement. We’ve run articles on the vicissitudes of financing, the high cost of delivery, difficult sales […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 16, 2023 -
Paradigm Shifts: TV-Focused Curriculum Changes at Three Film Schools
A couple of years ago, I was chatting with writer Jack Epps, a colleague of mine at the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. We were marveling over the rise of the limited series as a format, and he explained that it allows for an expanded second act. “You can really develop the relationship between a protagonist and antagonist,” he said, using Killing Eve as a great example. I was intrigued by the idea that new formats could allow different aspects of storytelling to emerge so, for this issue’s column, I asked the heads of three […]
by Holly Willis on Mar 16, 2023 -
New Generation: How A24 Is Helping Keep Art Films Alive
A trio of celebrated and highly distinctive breakout movies at this year’s Sundance Film Festival—Raven Jackson’s visionary All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt, Savanah Leaf’s heartrending Earth Mama and Celine Song’s gripping Berlin Competition selection Past Lives—share a few conspicuous elements: They were all debut features made by women of color, they each display an impressive mastery of their forms and they were all backed by A24. A24 has been celebrating one of its biggest years ever—a record 18 total Oscar nominations and its highest grossing film in Everything Everywhere All At Once—but amidst the genre mashups, prestige star vehicles and […]
by Anthony Kaufman on Mar 16, 2023 -
One Step Ahead: Chinonye Chukwu Interviews A.V. Rockwell on A Thousand and One
The ever-changing landscape of New York City is the captivating, challenging backdrop of A Thousand and One, writer-director A.V. Rockwell’s feature debut. Chronicling a mother and son’s loving yet fraught relationship from 1993 through 2005, the film incorporates speeches and news reports detailing specific policies of mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg across two decades, a device that serves as a concrete reminder of time passing and stakes rising for the film’s protagonists. Strict jaywalking laws, the advent of stop-and-frisk and increased gentrification initiatives become tangible perils that the Harlem-based characters must navigate, lest they lose the freedom they’ve worked […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Mar 16, 2023 -
State Hopping: The U.S. Film Tax Credit Landscape
As the pandemic exited its first lockdowns and film production tentatively recommenced amid overall economic uncertainty, the fate of U.S. tax incentives for feature film and television appeared cloudy. Wrote James Cutchin in the Los Angeles Business Journal on August 20, 2020, “State coffers have been drained after months of lockdowns, starved of key tax revenues and exhausted by the costs of fighting the virus. With states facing such bleak financial outlooks, some wonder whether governments will continue to fund film tax credit programs.” Two and a half years later, those worries have been largely banished. Last fall in an […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 16, 2023 -
Case Study: Desperate Acts of Magic
Joe Tyler Gold made his magic-themed comedy Desperate Acts of Magic, co-directed with Tammy Caplan, “a day or two a month, over 18 months, until the film was done,” he says. The protracted production worked in the film’s favor because, with new crews shuffling in and out, “people kept getting introduced to the movie, and we kept getting new supporters. So, we were able to get donations and funding through the whole process and, toward the end, when we released our trailer, a producer saw and was impressed by it. He saw that we were looking for money, and he […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 16, 2023 -
Late Fees: New York State’s Film Tax Credit Delays
Increasing delays in receiving the New York State film tax credit are affecting profitability and even dissuading some from shooting in the state, say a number of independent producers. What has long been one of the most robust and dependable of tax credits in the nation has become less appealing to producers and financiers due to timelines that can stretch out to five years from the start of principal photography. These lengthening timelines, especially in the face of rising interest rates, affect independent films needing to borrow against the credit more than studio and streamer productions, which are often fully […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 16, 2023 -
We Need This Cleared: The Authors Behind the Latest Edition of Clearance & Copyright
Filmmaking is a magnificent creative act, one that unites a group of passionate individuals toward the realization of an extraordinary artistic vision. Or, viewed another way, it is simply the effective aggregation and well-planned administration of various creative outputs and intellectual properties. And while there are plenty of books that purport to inspire you toward the former definition, there’s one in particular devoted to the latter that’s recommendable to any producer, whatever their experience level. Clearance and Copyright, first published in 1996 by entertainment attorney Michael C. Donaldson, has been the best single book for navigating readers through the thickets […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 16, 2023 -
32 Days with Willem Defoe on a Virtual Volume Set: Vasilis Katsoupis on Inside
A thief breaks into a Manhattan penthouse filled with priceless art. Trapped by a high-tech security system, unable to communicate with the outside world, he must figure out a way to survive. At the same time, he begins to question how much the art surrounding him is really worth. Working on his first feature, writer-director Vasilis Katsoupis set his appropriately-titled film Inside almost entirely within a single set. A few other characters appear on monitors, through windows and in flashbacks, but the movie is a showcase for Willem Dafoe, who plays the thief. Starring with him is a remarkable collection […]
by Daniel Eagan on Mar 16, 2023
