Just before I started work on RAGE I wrote myself a private manifesto. I called it “Barefoot Filmmaking” and it was a way of reminding myself what I believed in and how to approach work on this new project. It is something I have often done over the years, partly as away of tracking my own principles and as a way of energising myself when I have felt like an outsider, working against the grain. A manifesto, even when kept private, dignifies an approach which may otherwise remain obscure. A recent lovely post on the forum made me decide to look up this last document again. I have subsequently revised both how I think about some of these things and what to call this way of thinking. “Poor Cinema” is my favourite, but in the past, when I started out, I called it “Kitchen table filmmaking” as that was so often where I ended up working. Anyway, here it is:
The best time to start is now (don’t wait)
Take responsibility for everything (it saves time)
Don’t blame anyone or anything (including yourself)
Give up being a moviemaker victim (of circumstance, weather, lack of money, mean financiers, vicious critics, greedy distributors, indifferent public, etc.)
You can’t always choose what happens while you are making a film, but you can choose your point of view about what happens
(creative perspective)
Mistakes are your best teacher (so welcome them)
Turn disaster to advantage (there will be many)
Only work on something you believe in (life is too short to practice insincerity)
Choose your team carefully and honour them (never speak negatively about your colleagues)
Ban the word “compromise” (or the phrase “it will do”)
(the disappointment in yourself will haunt you later)
Be prepared to work harder than anyone you are employing
Be ruthless – be ready to throw away your favourite bits (you may well be attached to what is familiar rather than what is good).
Aim beyond your limits (and help others to go beyond theirs)
(the thrill of the learning curve)
When in doubt, project yourself ten years into the future and look back – what will you be proud of having done?
(indecision is a lack of the longer view or wider perspective)
Practice no waste – psychic ecology – prevent brain pollution
(don’t add to the proliferation of junk)
Be an anorak – keep your sense of wonder and enthusiasm
(cynicism will kill your joy and motivation)
Get some sleep when you can (you wont get much later)
COMMENTS HERE
Comments
Just read your manifesto. It's exactly the same as the philosophy behind Pleased Sheep films - someone once described it as 'The Love Model'.
This was how we made our first feature, Diary of a Bad Lad, up here in Blackburn where you have no choice other than to 'get on with it as long as you believe it in 100%'.
It took several years to complete - but we could just as easily have wasted that time in a 'development' hell going nowhere. And then there was the battle to 'get it out there' - which was worth every round because we learned so much and met so many like-minded souls.
Finally we did make it to the end of the line. 'Bad Lad' is kicks off in a number of indie cinemas, from London to Newcastle, at the end of May. June 28 it's in HMV, Sainsburys and ASDA. And we now have interest from 19 different countries!
What makes me so sad is that, in recent years, more and more ex-sales agents, festival organisers, failed script-writers, and so on, have been trying to set themselves up as no-budget filmmaking gurus, inviting the gullible to hand over often very large sums of money in order to attend their 'seminars'. And always the advice is the antithesis of 'The Love Model' (make a cheap copy of a crap horror B-movie. Shoot it in one location over a couple of weekends, etc).
What has become obvious, though, is that there is a whole movement of filmmakers seizing the opportunities. In the North West this is now referred to as the North West New Wave (google it). We need to unite further - the old models are dead but they still have their icy fingers wrapped around the throats of the living.
La primera vez que te ví estaba traduciendo el libro de tu padre, Norman Potter, "What is a designer" al español. En esa época me asombré con "The tango lesson" y aún ahora, cada vez que la vuelvo a ver, el corazón me brinca y se encabrita con la música, la luz, las lágrimas...
Isn't it a miracle? Images survive and become infinite and immortal while the one that I see every day reflected in the mirror goes, little by little, looking alike more and more to himself.
A big hug
Hi Sally, for the same reasons, I have also created a film collective. To see the films that we have made, go to:
http://www.vimeo.com/thirdwave
Below is our manifesto:
THIRD WAVE MANIFESTO
________________________________
The age of filmmaking
has reached a crossroads in its history.
These days making films
has become,
to all intents and purposes,
a practice motivated
by a career trajectory that seeks to place
one person (the director) at the
top of the creative tree,
using a feudal model laid
down by the parameters
of Hollywood.
Filmmakers today
use the idea of the
short film more as
a 'calling card'
to mainstream
success rather than
just an idea motivated by the need to
express it within the
art of film.
It is within this cinematic environment
that the Third Wave is born.
In order to invigorate
our film practice
with new ideas,
we have created
the following 3 steps
to cinematic heaven
that will characterise
the spirit
of all our work:
1. All films must be created in the spirit
of spontaneity
– no scripts,
no pre-production.
2. All films must be
no longer than 2 minutes.
3. All films must be produced within
90 minutes
– from the start of shooting to the end
of editing. ?
Third Wave 07/08
___________________________________
Thank you for those wonderful warm and deeply humane thoughts, you wonderful woman. And keep your head proudly up.
For me the most important was:
"Psychic ecology; every day it's harder for every one of us to prevent brain pollution."
"Be an anorak – keep your sense of wonder and enthusiasm
(cynicism will kill your joy and motivation)"- this one builds up warming and caring image for road map to real connection between people who seldom get comfort from main stream.
Using the word 'compromise' seems to induce a state of disappointment. Deciding not to compromise (or use the language that supports it) doesnt mean being rigid or inflexible. Adapting creatively to changing circumstances, thinking on one's feet, being alert to necessary changes of plan and so on....these are not just different words they are a different attitude, one that seems to lead to fresh, interesting solutions when one encounters the inevitable problems and setbacks involved in filmmaking, rather than watered down versions of an original vision.
Sally,
Thanks for sharing this wonderful thought outline. I could use clarification on "Ban the word compromise" and "it will do". Does this mean ban the word, as in if you do have to compromise think of it differently and accept it, or does it mean avoid compromising your vision.
I do understand the haunting part!
Thanks, Mary
dolorescraeg,
sally,
i'm a senior, senior and i want to tell you that your manifesto applies not only to filmmaking but to life's journey. living by these rules is practically a guarantee that one will survive in a good way.
i just saw the press conference of rage and my appetite is whetted. i cannot wait to see jude law as a russian woman.....sally what casting. of course he's not so bad as an englishman.....
Sandybk
Reading them I was immediately struck by the fact that they apply no matter what you work at and will help face the road blocks (all mental) that we run into when creating
something new no matter the field or the endeavor. It's a primer of self-discipline,
the hardest to enact. This is the eve of the premiere of RAGE and I wish you the best of luck. My vibes are telling me to get excited and be surprised so I am anxiously awaiting the reception tomorrow and seeing the film as soon as it's released somewhere I will be.