How long should I commit to someone's feature film before moving on?

harmonica44 said:

Okay thanks.

I want to have an open mind, but at the same time, the feature I helped make, had too many close ups of just one character, and you couldn't see the other characters talking, and it was criticized for it, as well as that short film I did before was criticized for the same thing.

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Don't worry about being criticized. It's going to happen. Take the good with the bad... (I know you've heard this before).

My last project, outside of those who know me or know someone attached to the projects, I don't think anyone here would have enjoyed.It was a mess technically and creatively. Most people probably stopped watching after the first 2-3 minutes..and it was a 40 minute short Christmas film.

But I was still proud of it. We set a goal, we entertained some people and we learned from it.

This new project is more ambitious.It is still lacking in many ways but I think it shows improvement in areas.

And again we are meeting our personal goals and everyone attached to it has been very happy with the results. This is coming from a group of people who have zero experience in film. I bought a GH2 (Already had a G1 so figured I could reuse the lenses), another guy purchased Reaper and setup his laptop to record audio (Using a mic the church had lying around) and off we went.

I can't help you with your current courtroom idea but use what you have around you and adapt. I know what I would do in our little town of 20K people.

We pulled off a crowd scene by shooting two separate angles...and having our extras switch costume pieces (hats, jackets, tops, etc) around and standing by different people.

Get creative... let the challenges feed your hunger for creativity

Personally, I think it's unreasonable of them to expect you to base your life around a project with no deadlines. When I filmed my first feature over the summer, we gave our actors and crew a rigorous schedule and made the agreement that they would show up when we asked them to in exchange for us meeting our shooting deadline. We shot the whole feature in about three and a half weeks - nearly killed ourselves doing it, but there was no alternative because we had made a promise. People are busy. It's crazy to ask someone to dedicate themselves fully to one project without any promise of when it'll be done.

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harmonica44 said:

I want to do a script that has a few courtroom scenes. [...] I don't have access to a courtroom.

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So, put off the courtroom script until you are able to do it. This is part of 'writing within your means'. I could write a script that takes place on an alien planet, or in a spaceship, but if I don't have a feasible way to make those locations happen, the film's isn't going to happen.

Make something else in the meantime. Write a smaller script. Re-write it to take it out of the courtroom - are you simply trying to show evidence? Do it in an interrogation room, or do it without dialogue and by actually showing what happened.

In terms of actor availability, I've known low budget productions to only shoot weekends for months on end, I've known low budget productions to ask everybody to take 12-15 days off work and cram it all in, and I've known low budget productions to schedule around everybody's availabilities. It's difficult, but it's doable with the right Production team.
Schedule it so the fewest amount of actors have to take the fewest days off.

I know of a low budget production that shot nighttimes (i.e. after work), early mornings (before work) and weekends. They shot over a 28-day period and pulled off an entire feature (albeit, the Cinematography was very minimal lighting, but they still completed the film).

Or, pay your actors like a professional.

It's easy to tell yourself you can't do it. It's easy to come up with 2,000 reasons why you can't do something. But the more reasons you come up with, the less and less likely it is you'll actually do it.

Well basically I want the defendant to get off, and a video gets him off. A very scandalous video showing police corruption, that the press gets on their cameras and a lot of the plot is the police publicly smeared.

However the press are not allowed in an interrogation room, the same way they would be in a trial of a celebrity defendant. So the press would not get a hold of the video footage. Now you could say someone could send the video to the press, but the way the story goes, no one has the motivation or time to make a copy of it and send it, in the plot's timeline, for every twist and turn to happen the same way.

I could try to rewrite it so that it is in an interrogation room, but I already have a scene with the witnessed being interrogated by police. They subpoena the witnesses to appear in court. But would the prosecutor really give up on a big celebrity murder case, if the cops told him that the witnesses were not cooperating? The prosecutor would subpoena the witnesses to appear in court. He wouldn't just give up cause the police say they are not cooperating only, at least I don't think he would.

But even if the witnesses are not being cooperative, their is still physical evidence and I think that evidence would get allowed in trial, and the prosecutor would not throw away such an important case, just because he thinks the video is so bad, that it's not even worth trying the defendant on damning physical evidence.

harmonica44 said:

Now you could say someone could send the video to the press, but the way the story goes, no one has the motivation or time to make a copy of it and send it, in the plot's timeline, for every twist and turn to happen the same way.

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It doesn't take that long to copy a video file. It would cause much more chaos if the video was leaked directly to the press, at least IMO. It's not like you have to show the person making the copy and putting discs into envelopes.

If it absolutely has to be in a courtroom, then make a different film and in the meantime work on the logistics of building a set, or findign a courtroom to shoot in.

Realistically, all you need is a room - most of what constitutes a 'courtroom' can be set dressed.

How do you . . .?

Don't write scripts that call for locations you can't get free and always available.

Don't write scripts that call for many actors in the same scenes. Or many actors in every scenes.

jax_rox said:

It doesn't take that long to copy a video file. It would cause much more chaos if the video was leaked directly to the press, at least IMO. It's not like you have to show the person making the copy and putting discs into envelopes.

If it absolutely has to be in a courtroom, then make a different film and in the meantime work on the logistics of building a set, or findign a courtroom to shoot in.

Realistically, all you need is a room - most of what constitutes a 'courtroom' can be set dressed.

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Okay thanks. I was doing some thinking on it. Would the press be allowed to air evidence without it going to trial and the case being over with, first? Would they not want to if it means being held legally acountable? I mean if all you had to do was send evidence to the press to make someone look bad, then wouldn't more people do it, rather than turn it into the police? Also the person who leaks the video to the press, cannot be held accountable cause I need him to go free for the plot.

harmonica44 said:

Okay thanks. I was doing some thinking on it. Would the press be allowed to air evidence without it going to trial and the case being over with, first? Would they not want to if it means being held legally acountable? I mean if all you had to do was send evidence to the press to make someone look bad, then wouldn't more people do it, rather than turn it into the police? Also the person who leaks the video to the press, cannot be held accountable cause I need him to go free for the plot.

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Who cares it's just a film

Probably not but it does happen and news corporates get fined/asked to remove and apologise

That's true, but in some cases, wouldn't the person who aired it be charged with obstruction of justice, which is a felony? That's a big risk for a news reporter to take.

This is way out of left field but how about this situation to frame around your courtroom story:

Set it in the future. Come up with an interesting angle on how a court operates in the future. You could incorporate technology that allows someone to actually go back into the timeframe of the incident and have a virtual walk around the crime scene. You can show sci-fi elements without advanced special effects. You could also set it in the future but in a classroom environment where students are assessing a major court case that took place in the past (our present) and they are able to view the entire thing as if they're watching a movie with the ability to change camera angles (which would enable you to be very selective with the angles you film that scene with).

harmonica44 said:

That's true, but in some cases, wouldn't the person who aired it be charged with obstruction of justice, which is a felony? That's a big risk for a news reporter to take.

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In the US, reporters have been known (on quite a few occasions) to go to jail rather than identify a source.
So yes, maybe it's a risk (I don't quite follow your scenario...) but dedicated reporters do sometimes take major risks.

Okay thanks. What I mean is, is that if you take a police of evidence from a murder or something and smear it all of the TV, it is 'obstruction of justice', and you could be charged with a felony for doing so. So it is a big risk. That's what I mean. Thanks for the input.

Well anyway, I have to hand it to my friend though. She was willing to make a whole feature film without a proper DP, or PSM/boom op. She was able to round up a good amount of actors. Not sure how they got interested, maybe they just like the fact that it was a feature length and got excited. So she had a good mind set, willing to do it all on her own, even though she couldn't get the shots or cinematography she quite wanted, nor the sound she wanted. At first I thought she was cutting corners in the cinematography, shots and sound, but I see now that she had no choice perhaps and was willing to settle for what could be done, and what was available. So I salute her!