I always like this picture of my friend Helen Norton. She massages horses for a living. I had the pleasure of torturing her while making one of my no budget movies. I keep trying to make movies for next to nothing just to see how much the new digital technology could cut costs and, as they say, "democratize" the process. My conclusion is that it does not democratize or make things cheaper at all.
Film stock costs might have been cut from the budget, but that is about it. If you make a film with no money even the delightful Helen will not disguise the fact that you are essentially making a home movie. If you do not spend the time and effort setting up each shot and making sure it is lit, correctly focussed, has good eye lines, continuity, and composition, then you are not making a movie.
There are so many elements to consider in film making that thinking one can do without them merely because one can afford to buy a kick ass camera is, as I have sadly discovered, folly. I am a fan of Lars Von Triers and he inspired me to attempt the "Dogma" approach, which is to make a film with ambient sound, ambient lighting, and hand held. The aim is to reduce the cost and time of shooting to a minimal amount and allow the performance and script do all the heavy lifting. And I have seen some of his films where one can say it worked, sort of. On closer inspection one discovers that money and time was spent on other elements beside the camera crew and those shaky hand held shots with light flares and random compositions were definitely more a distraction than a help. In short, Dogma was a false economy that even he did not dare follow.
The Dogma approach appealed to the Guerrilla Film Maker but in the end has proved unworkable. People prefer their art house films beautifully shot. They like their genre entertainment pieces to clearly tell the story without the distraction of eccentric, i.e. bad camera work. And ultimately whatever movie you are making is competing with big budget productions out of Hollywood and so you have to bring a lot to the production to stand out.
A shaky hand held thirty second clip of a man setting fire to his trousers while stuffing a ferret down them might get a zillion hits on Youtube, but it isn't a movie and bringing those values to a production is not helpful. My friend Dean Head, a DOP who shoots 35mm film with various Hollywood productions that come to Hong Kong, complains all the time about how people think that just because any can afford an HD camera it means anyone can shoot a film. It is the Cameraman not the camera that counts! This is how I suckered him into shooting my latest film for me to prove his point. A very good move for me.
And so I have moved from the no budget approach to the cheapish approach. Zombie Radio was a relatively low budget piece with a more studied photography and dramatic set pieces. It was still a rushed and manic affair when shooting it with many frustrations that I wont bore you with. But here I was trying to rely less on the happy accident that a more documentary style of filming can some time throw up, though mostly does not when shooting within the narrow time schedule of an acted piece.
Which brings me now to Queen of Queen Street where, as you can see, I spared no expense in buying myself a director's hat.
Or surrounding myself with beautiful women.
Although I cannot say I spent a huge amount of money on this, I did allot a budget of US$5,000 on what is ultimately to be a ten minute film. The money was not spent on the camera. I could have spent another five thousand just hiring myself a RED Camera but that did not seem necessary in the end. But I did spend money on having a lot more of the general kit that skilled cinematographers need to make their shots just that bit more aesthetically pleasing. Lights, dollies, various filters, lenses, and flaps and stands, and a van to transport everything around so that it was always available, made for a happy cameraman. Dean complained that there was never enough. He wanted more lights, more jibs and cranes and more crew to rig set ups quickly and efficiently so that we could have more options, but watching what he shot compared to what I have shot myself is a very different experience. Even within the limits my stinginess imposed upon him, he made an enormous difference. He warned me of false economies and I now know what he means. One can save money on the length of the film, but should be wary of anything that undermines the quality. So I wished I'd spent more money of having an art director and having someone designing the costumes, and looking after props and set dressing. I tried to get people to do it within my limited budget but in Hong Kong they all turned me down. This is an area where the sheer pleasure of working on a creative endeavour holds little appeal for people. Only money talks.
The biggest expense I accounted for though was simply the amount of time I allotted to the shoot. Instead of trying to clear up five pages of script a day, I went for two pages, and some times no more than half. And that did not mean we were working slowly. On the contrary, we were still rushing through the piece with a high degree of urgency. Lighting conditions change rapidly and locations have a habit of only being available for a short period of time. But it did mean we could get the lighting set up, get the composition, do that tracking shot, and just take that extra shot to make sure the focus remained rock steady throughout the whole of the action instead of making do with something that was mostly OK. And it did give us a little less of a heart attack when one of the actresses, who shall remain nameless Kannie! , turned up without her costume and we had to wait for a couple of hours in the broiling heat while she fetched it! (Not having someone in charge of costumes is, as Dean would say, a false economy because something simple like this jeopardises the whole shoot or can throw another day's shooting onto the budget.)
We could have perhaps operated faster with a huge budget because then one can secure locations, and have a large and experienced crew attending instantly to every need of the actors and DOP, let alone the Directors. But going up to that level of production is a serious hike in costs that only big commercial ventures can justify. But the cost is not in whether one uses film or a camcorder and that is a lesson I think most would be film makers need to realise. Cheaper though video is, ultimately it is not that much cheaper. It is however, very convenient.
I am currently editing the film (video?) and the film making process is far from over. I need to make sure that the sound is perfect, which means I might have to allot more money for that process. Filming in the streets of Hong Kong is guaranteed to have the noisiest environment for filming. And so ADR is probably the solution to make sure the dialogue is nice and clear for people. We shall see.
And remember that $5,000 budget? I spent over $10,000 by the last count on this. I know there are people out there saying they shot a feature film on $50 but they just did not pay for stuff that was given to them for nothing, like labour and equipment that would cost a million bucks. In the UK you have the likes of Chris Jone, writer of the Guerrilla Filmmaker's Handbook, claiming you can get 35mm film stock for free from helpful people like Fuji, and full crew and cameras willing to do nothing more than help a wannabe director fulfill their dreams etc. Well in Hong Kong that does not happen. And for that matter it does not happen in the UK for most people either. Besides that, the effort put into blagging free resources can cost you more in time and your own personal resources than it is worth. If you have a bunch of friends in the industry who will let you order them around for a month or so, fine, but if not, actually getting a job for a few months (years?) and guaranteeing you have money is a better strategy.
Nobody who undertakes this sort of thing is ever totally free of contacts. Why bother if you haven't at least got a job connected to film and TV production and made the whole thing your passion? So a mix of your own money and friends and favours can go a long way. But one should also realise that people lie. A $5 film is a story the press like. And it allows the audience to say, wow, it's not bad, considering... I shouldn't count on actually making a movie for that amount.
