Making Movies 20 Years Ago vs. Today: A World Of Difference http://t.co/qGCpq9pE
Of course the technology has changed seriously in favor of documentary filmmakers but, more importantly, the business climate has changed. Mike Masnick compares two podcasts: one with Kevin Smith revealing a bunch of voicemails:
that give you a taste of the process of making his original film, Clerks and actually getting it picked up and shown in theaters
He details the need to find champions to get the film through the gatekeeper process. Contrast with Alec Baldwin’s Here’s the Thing podcast that interviews two modern documentary filmmakers:
While the types of movies are quite different from Clerks, listening to the two podcasts, one after the other, you realize that the documentary filmmakers probably wouldn’t even have attempted to make those films two decades ago.
The article details the way the environment has changed with new opportunities:
hile people can go through gatekeepers, we see an entire new generation of filmmakers (and other content creators) who don’t need to hope that someone influential catches the flick in its only theater showing. They don’t have to find “the” guy who sold indie films to studios. They don’t have to find “the” reporter who writes about indie films. Yes, some of those things can help, but they can now use sites like YouTube and Vimeo to post the work (or snippets of it) online for free. They can use social media to build a following. They can use Kickstarter and TopSpin and other tools to make money. It’s an entirely different world.