If You Aren’t Angry You Don’t Understand The Problem

Bill, I'm sure you'll be ecstatic to read about "As The Dust Settles".

http://tinyurl.com/36wroos

Arin Crumley should spend less time talking about making Four Eyed Monsters and actually make another film. It's hard to take him seriously when his output equals one movie.

If you can even call it a movie.

We've been having a rather spirited discussion of this over on the Garage boards - some great insights and uniquely informed opinions:

http://www.theauteurs.com/topi...

But great site here by the way, I'm not trying to shamelessly drive traffic away - just want to say this is an interesting topic - so it deserves to be discussed.

Cheers!

This is embarrassing.

It's interesting, the people commenting on this post actually seem madder than most of the people in the video!

I put Four Eyed Monster on my Netflix list, but it doesn't seem to be available to watch on demand. Now that makes me mad!

While I applaud the enthusiasm, the message is immature.

When are we going to realize that film distribution is no different than any other business, and that it is operating on an antique model?

Digital distribution has broken down the barriers of reaching the audience, yet independent filmmakers are still desperate to compete over the same crappy cloth chairs. Theater chains are a brick and mortar business trying to compete in a digital world. They have finite screens and seats and patrons. As you see in the clip, this is a game that we can not win... so fuck them - we need to change the game.

OpenIndie is simply using new tools to an old end... the power of the community is not to drive bodies to the theater, it is to connect and to curate. Give me an app with an algorithm as good as Netflix's to connect me to new indie films that I will like... let me stream the movie directly from your website (like myspace did with music)... create a partnership with IndieWire and tie these all together... then refuse to sell to a traditional distrib the second you get any heat... do anything DIFFERENT.

Or better yet, you want to get angry??? Find a audience niche and make antagonistically BOLD, ORIGINAL films exclusively for them...because audiences are mad as hell that they get the same whiny, rom-com every time they take a risk on an independent film, and they are not going to take it anymore

I haven't seen Four-Eyed Monster so it's impossible to say, only for myself, whether he deserved the best distribution deal in the world, but thanks to the perversity and philistinism of corporate America, he couldn't get it.

But until this question is answered, what does this recorded rant really mean? Is this guy a great artist or just a schmo who made a movie? Is getting a distribution deal now supposed to be a birthright? 10 films out of 4000 Sundance submissions isn't all that bad. Who else has a chance to get rich, famous and privileged on 1:400 odds? Try the classical music business, if you want bad odds, and with a substantially higher investment required (tens of thousands of hours of practice, starting in early childhood, for starters).

What does this guy really want? To make money from a property which may not actually be commercial in today's distribution market (if ever)? A reward for brilliance and originality?

This is inspiring -- it truly is. I have such respect for people like Arin Crumley, Lance Weiler and Ted Hope -- we're lucky to have these folks on our side.

But here's a question: How come this anger isn't being translated into our films? A perusal of most of the films on Open Indie leaves me with words like, soul searching, sweet, introspective, gentle, funny -- virtually none of them have the anger and fire that 'Network' -- at nearly 40 years old -- has. I can't imagine our anger is specific just to the mechanics of the film industry, is it?

As filmmakers, don't we have a most powerful tool for reflecting our very justifiable anger? Why is our anger not being conveyed on film?