If most films were made that cheap with that bad of picture and even worse, sound quality, and using ADR even, it would be rejected by most film festivals. However El Mariachi went big, and boosted off Robert Rodriguez's career? How is that his film was the exemption to the rules? Did the producers just have really good international connections to get it shown in theatrical releases all over the world or what?
How did El Mariachi get so big with such poor quality?
- Thread starter harmonica44
- Start date
I wonder.. I looked at this list..
http://www.imdb.com/search/title?year=1992,1992&title_type=feature&sort=moviemeter,asc
its in the to 50 features of the year.. I think mostly it was an untapped market in the US. It is an interesting engaging story too.
http://www.imdb.com/search/title?year=1992,1992&title_type=feature&sort=moviemeter,asc
its in the to 50 features of the year.. I think mostly it was an untapped market in the US. It is an interesting engaging story too.
Most of Quentin Tarantino movies poke fun at the lack of technical expertise of the 70s and 80s. In one of his films I remember the film ripping off the reel randomly in the middle of the movie and then coming back on (was this on Grindhouse?)
Anyway, it's all artistic presentation and if it works, it works.
Anyway, it's all artistic presentation and if it works, it works.
Plus, you're looking at it through modern-day eyes. 20 years ago - when it was made - it was far more difficult to shoot a feature than it is in the post-digital video age. Although there were many equally talented filmmakers, few had the wherewithal to pull off a project of that magnitude. If El Mariachi were made today, it would have a far more difficult time finding distribution on that scale, I think, simply because the number of indie features being produced annually has increased tenfold, at minimum.
I found the story to be not bad to fairly good, but overall mediocre, and not what I'd call a great story. I mean as far as thrillers go, there are much better plots out there, with more surprises, twists and turns, and more characters and complexities. But yeah, I guess the digital age, has increased the standard.
What the guy said above you is pretty much the explanation. The only things I'd change are...
The statement I made bold above. At first glance, that seems the case. But, given what Rodriguez likes to do and his style, if it were made in this day and age I think he would've still gotten distribution much easier than most others.
If you ever get a chance to look at no-budget, micro-budget features now you'll see that while there are a LOT of them out there, 9.5 out of 10 are poorly executed, boring, or rehashed cliches. Horror is the worst of all. As well, I wouldn't dare try to do a thriller or drama on a low budget without attaching recognizable faces to the production. And, I think guys like Rodriguez understand the importance of doing something a bit more ambitious.
So, yeah, like Tarantino and Rodriguez said... there are a lot of people out there doing things, but that doesn't make them competition at all. Most of them are tiny ripples or waves, which makes it really easy for those doing ambitious projects with competent execution to get noticed by the right people.
You do need to do footwork, but nobody said it would be easy.
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I agree, horror is the worst of all. Couldn't thrillers do very well microbudget, if the plot was original enough?
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Oh, there's no doubt that you can have a great thriller on your hands. But, decide what you want to do with it before you even commence principal photography: if you're going festival route, then do it! If you're trying to break-even or get a decent distro deal and you aren't securing names... think twice.
But, you can do it very well for sure. It all comes down to your goals beyond just making a movie.
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If you spend 50K in hard funds and invest sweat equity of about 30K in labor, then you need to see a distribution deal for about 100K to break even after you pay for deliverables, errors and omissions, etc. That's not profiting, that's getting back what you spent.
Technically, 50K is 50K, so if you got 50K on a distro deal then you break even if you don't have to worry about thinks like assumption agreements, etc.
Breaking even is a pretty lofty goal in itself for guys like us, but manageable.
This also goes hand-in-hand on why I think he or Tarantino wouldn't have any issue breaking through the barrier today. It's about their tastes and interest. Rodriguez is pretty ambitious and he likes visual spectacle. It so happens that a broad paying audience does as well.
Tarantino's respect for traditional cinema and names would get him right back to where he is now. He would be interested in working with great names and that'd launch his career again.
If you see a movie and wonder, thought he production value was low, how did it get there? Think about the "tastes" the director has, the ambition, and the overall execution of tone and story. People pick up on that stuff pretty easily, and even when it lacks technically if the tone and taste is there, it makes up for it.
you got to remember 20 years ago this film actually was not bad looking. there was no HD back then and people were using tape camcorders and vhs were still a hot thing. this movie reminded me of the beastie boys sabatoge video. sometimes peopel are looking for a certain something and sometimes film makers make that.
The crystal clear answer is in this book.
#1. The original intent for RR was to sell this to the Spanish video market for $20,000 and make an even bigger sequel with that money.
#2. The film commissioner for the state of Texas was a friend of RR and recommended he see his buddy, an agent at ICM (International Creative Management), of the largest film agencies in the world (see Ari from Entourage for the type of agency we're talking about).
#3. He had signed a deal with one of the Spanish video companies for Mexico release of El Mariachi for only a tiny profit when his wife got ahold of him and told him that the guys at ICM wanted to meet with him.
#4. The well connected agent created "buzz" about the 23 year old filmmaker who made an action movie for $7,000 (at a time when HD and DSLR's were not in existence) and how to sell this to a studio, like COLUMBIA that used that marketing strategy to release the film during a booming home video era of 1991-1992.
So the moral of the story is, if you have an agent at ICM who has a marketing idea of how to sell your film to a major studio, you too can be Robert Rodriquez...
So even if a movie has sucky quality by today's standards, and still uses ADR, then it could still be distributed very well, if you have a deal going beforehand, before the distributor even sees it, from a newcomer?
it seems like you cannot make a new genre of movies or a new idea because they all have been done somewhat. you ever wonder why some shows are on tv? how some of these idiots movies make millions? the horror film trick r treat was a great story and one of the best halloween theme movies since maybe halloween in many people opinions, but they couldnt get it it theatures and it was done but they ended getting it released on dvd eventhough a lot of the horrors movies are a waste.
See PARANORMAL ACTIVITY.... if Steven Spielberg had not seen it and brokered the deal with Paramount, that would have been just another POV movie no one saw.
Hmmm I see. Is there anyway to get a movie deal brokered by a newcomer before it's even shot, just so long as the deal maker sees a script and work samples and all that stuff? Assuming the script was very original?
If you had an established production company with a producer with a track record of making money, then yes. Hardly any of those accept unsolicited submissions, so do not send a script or even a query without asking permission first.
I liked El Mariachi. And there is at least one brilliant scene IMO. When he's in the bath tub and she has the knife on him, and he starts singing. How many guys with the newest RED Misty Secret Sensor and 38 core Mac supercomputer could pull off a scene like that?
I'll submit that if you can create a scene like that, and get it in front of a decision maker, you're going to get a chance.
About the sound, didn't Hollywood pump a million dollars into the audio track? I don't remember the sound being bad.
I'll submit that if you can create a scene like that, and get it in front of a decision maker, you're going to get a chance.
About the sound, didn't Hollywood pump a million dollars into the audio track? I don't remember the sound being bad.