The Margins Of An Indie Web Serial Production Thoughts From Eric Shapiro
The Margins Of An Indie Web Serial Production
Thoughts From Eric Shapiro
But first a brief, personal commentary as an intro:
One of the productions that Eric Shapiro is known for, is writing and directing a short film adaptation of Jack Ketchum’s story, “Mail Order,” which was released as the premiere episode of Fangoria Online’s “Screamers” series of short films in March, 2013.
I know Eric as a gentleman, father, husband and scholar. Introduced by his equally talented and exceptional wife Rhoda. We used to train boxing and kickboxing together her and I.
Both of them always open to lend me their ear. I usually find myself manic with excitement about some new endeavor of mine. My energetic enthusiasm is always very well received.
These otherworldly abilities to endure such intense experiences are probably why their creative manifestations; embed such visceral and belief suspending surrealism. – HABA
“Optimism Is A Faith That Leads To Success” – Li Jun Fan
Thoughts From The Margins Of An Indie Web Serial Production:
by Eric Shapiro
Film-wise, right now, Francis Ford Coppola is my hero.
God knows what they’re telling kids in film school today. Maybe “Work hard enough and you’ll be assigned one of the more popular superheroes!”?
Nah, I’m sure more diverse points-of-view are available.
There’s probably a lot of excitement over digital technology, streaming, and the medium’s decreasing expensiveness. And they’re no doubt still heralding the greats even though the studios have turned their backs on any notion of creating art once and for all.
Kubrick’s career could not exist right now. He was kept in business at a studio level for creating major cultural contributions that weren’t always hits.
Same with Altman.
Neither could bat for the majors in 2013. Their films are too strange and chancy.
Paul Thomas Anderson’s trying to do what they did, but if his next movie’s not a hit, don’t expect anything new from him for a while. Breaking even with THE MASTER was already pushing it in this environment.
Scorsese’s more flexible: He’s taken on a great many subjects because his technique is what he’s most impassioned about. He can apply it to dramas, crime sagas, thrillers. He doesn’t have any agenda to assert other than expressionistically locating human truth in whatever story he’s telling.
But for this reason, half his films — the ones that aren’t phenomenal — have a polished, emotionally indifferent quality that makes me wish we heard less from him.
Fincher’s going the same way: The technique is colossal but the imprint of authorship comes and goes in accordance with the subject matter.
And then you’ve got homeboy Oliver Stone, who amazingly — due in large part to always coming in under budget and virtually always profiting — keeps orchestrating studio projects. Stone’s model is a persistence model: He wrote 15 screenplays before anyone ever paid attention to him.
When ALEXANDER turned a minor profit (it didn’t flop), he played nice and did his most populist film, WORLD TRADE CENTER. Then W. for very little money. Then the WALL STREET sequel, since sequels are smart business and the opportunity was there. Then SAVAGES, a crime film, since studios have swerved away from the dramas he loves.
He’ll persist until he’s gone, but he’s been surviving more than thriving for a while now, and he generates all his “momentum” on his own.
And I don’t want to get into Spielberg. The more I live, the less I trust him.
So for my money, Coppola is the ideal model for the young or student filmmaker of the now.
How he broke through is the most instructive part: THE GODFATHER films were no great passion for him. Indeed, their aesthetic dispassion and casualness reflect that. That very nonchalance is what makes the first two GODFATHERS masterpieces: He didn’t care!
I mean, of course he cared, but he cared in the way of a professional doing the best job he possibly could. To see him caring with all of his soul, one need reference APOCALYPSE NOW, along with many of his smaller, stranger films.
It’s the caring with all of his soul that makes him important. He was never happy at the studios. He learned, like many before him and many since, that making a studio film is almost always the same as making a detergent commercial.
Same stories over and over again. Same tone. Same worldview. Happy endings. Fighting for your final cut. Trying to stay in the race. So he quit. He walked away. He went into the wine and hotel businesses.
He now makes small films with Hollywood exiles in starring roles, zero financial fear, and the whole of his goddamn heart.
I love him. Or, you know — I love what he’s doing.
This is the man who got called crazy when he predicted correctly that all films would go digital.
The man who publicly criticizes Scorsese for drifting from his personal aesthetic by embracing big-budget spectacles (sure, Coppola’s envious, but he’s also correct).
The man who calls himself a student of cinema, and insists he’s not a master. On that last point, I’d probably disagree.
But there’s no doubt that the indie-spirited, anti-establishment, self-monetized, all-passion Coppola is the future of cinema.
He always has been.
About The Author:
Eric Shapiro is an American author of novels, short stories, and essays, as well as a feature filmmaker. –Wikipedia
HypnoAthletics University – Eric Shapiro
