Film Festival Secrets Podcast #29: Richard Gale, Director of “The Horribly Slow Murderer with the extremely inefficient weapon

Film Festival Secrets Podcast #29: Richard Gale, Director of “The Horribly Slow Murderer with the extremely inefficient weapon

This episode I'm joined by Richard Gale, creator of the short film "The Horribly Slow Murderer with the Extremely Inefficient Weapon," which is on its way to becoming a feature film thanks to a healthy festival run and a rabid YouTube fan base. Learn how Gale turned festival success into a cottage industry and a budget for a feature-length horror comedy.

Stop Making Horrible Crowdfunding Pitch Videos

Stop Making Horrible Crowdfunding Pitch Videos

When somebody gets as worked up on camera as Seed & Spark CEO Emily Best does in this clip about pitch videos, you can tell they’re making an important point. It’s also pretty entertaining – Best never shies away from plain talk while making a strong case for her point of view.

A preview for the jealous and bitter filmmaker in you

A preview for the jealous and bitter filmmaker in you

Hat tip to ATLFF Artistic Director Charles Judson for pointing out this one. It's parody trailer time again. The latest example, "Not Another Sundance Movie," lampoons some well-worn tropes that visit the indie film scene every year.

Everything I Learned In Film School In Under 3 Minutes

Everything I Learned In Film School In Under 3 Minutes

 "Some people are gonna want to be Tarantino a little too much. And then you'll find other people who wanna be Altman a little too much. No one will ever wanna be Michael Bay."

Comedian Mikey Gleason imparts the wisdom gained from film school in 3 minutes.

John Waters' Golden Rules of Moviemaking

Image via MovieMaker.

Image via MovieMaker.

John Waters, writing for MovieMaker.com. I hadn't planned on linking to this until I saw the very last rule. 

Movies people like at film festivals are not always the ones they like in real life.

Ouch.

Ed's first film - "I'm glad my short was rejected."

Ed Fletcher, writing for The Sacramento Bee about the process of making his first short film. The metaphors clash a little bit, but it's a fun read.

Producing a film is a little like putting together a football team for one game. Thankfully, Long, a recent UC Davis graduate, brought his own connections and a team of people who were involved in his earlier projects. In the subsequent weeks, people from his network and mine joined as others dropped out.

The job of the producer is largely to rent the kitchen, buy the ingredients, then get out of the director's way until it's time to sell the soup.

A 15-year veteran reveals his training tips for film buffs getting buff for MIFF

David Weir, writing for The Sydney Morning Herald with tips on how to prepare for the Melbourne International Film Festival:

A haircut is mandatory for tall competitors, to reduce air resistance and avoid friction with spectators seated behind. The final preparation involves a shopping trip and making a two-week supply of sandwiches.

Funny stuff, and not as facetious as you might think. Every festival veteran has a personal set of rituals that makes a marathon event bearable. I really do have a friend who gets what he calls his "festival haircut" a few days before his favorite fest.

Awesome film fest flowchart from Lower East Side Film Fest

LES Film Fest flowchart

This tongue-in-cheek flow chart is one of the cleverer ways I've seen of communicating a film programming ethos. There are plenty of "joke" dead-ends here (I especially like the hackneyed-but-still-funny thrashing of the Comic Sans typeface), but also a serious path through to festival acceptance that reveals the qualities in a film that these programmers want. 

The creators of the Lower East Side Film Festival (often shortened, somewhat misleadingly, as LESFilmFest) seem to have done a great job in their inaugural year of creating an identity for their festival. I also see some interesting experiments going on here (like the "QuickSubmit" tool that allows filmmakers with private screening videos on YouTube or Vimeo to bypass the usual submissions process).

I'm looking forward to seeing what they do in 2013.

Film Festicles 1: That's a Wrap!

New from Film Threat: an entertaining series of videos about the film festival process, written and directed by my friends Mark Potts & Don Swaynos. Above: episode 1, in which a filmmaker wraps his shoot and gets a little bit ahead of himself.

Potts' newest feature Cinema Six will debut in April at the Dallas International Film Festival.