Out of the Clouds
Mark Gill (former president of Miramax) is the most popular prophet of the end of the indie film world with his now famous sky is falling speech. What he said was nothing particularly new or surprising, but it sums up what has been happening of late. Where once there was a dim hope of having a career of some sort as an independent film producer, that dim hope has become the candle that just went out: if I close my eyes and focus I can still just maintain the illusion. In many ways struggling to become a filmmaker has become more like fighting the odds to become a rock star.
I’ve previewed enough film submissions to know that even though 5000 feature length films were entered into Sundance this last year, it’s doesn’t mean that many were, despite their two million dollar and up budgets, even watchable. Statistically only about five of those have a chance of making money. But it does mean that there is so much noise in the system that it’s almost impossible to be noticed.
Admittedly, I spent far too long working on other people’s projects before doing my own. This has put me a bit behind the curve, but what I’ve seen is that many of those friends who’ve produced a lot more and better work, have had successful festival runs, and even received small theatrical releases still aren’t bringing in any more food money than I do. In a quick informal survey after a recent shoot most were living off of about $9k a year. I felt like a wealthy baron with my $13k and health insurance.
This is the moment when you wake up and realize that you are not building a career, but are in fact living much more like a painter. (Although, sadly, the brushes are far more expensive.) It doesn’t make me want to quit making films. On the contrary, I feel liberated. If I don’t have to fuss about the potential commercial success of projects I work on, I can focus instead on making things I care about. Their value is determined entirely by my own metrics, and not where they might take me.
I’ve also been repressing my other artistic outlets, like writing and music, so that I could focus on film projects. This shift also means that taking time to work on music, either for one of my current film projects or an album of children’s music, becomes more viable. Without profit there is only art.
Kevin Bewersdorf comes from a different world. Despite his work in indie film, he considers himself to have been in the realm of painters and installation artists from the beginning. We exist in a new era wherein individual copies of an artwork have no inherent value. Everything digital is immediately pirated and available for free online. So borrowing from the world of prints, he made limited edition DVDs of one of his recent video installation projects and sold them, with certificates of authenticity, for extremely high prices. The buyers know they can get a copy of the work itself for free online. What they are buying instead is a piece of the artist’s work that may increase in value as a collectable over time and, more importantly, they have the opportunity to support a valued artist’s continued productivity.
I should also note, for the record, that Kevin’s deadpan, playfully sardonic artwork has been hugely inspirational to me lately. Highly recommended are his photographs and his Four Sacred Logos bit.
So while the road may have become rough with the remains of broken dreams fallen to earth, it doesn’t mean that I have to stop and turn back. If the sky really is falling, I can finally take my head out of the clouds and realize that what remains to be seen is just as beautiful.
