Film School with Werner Herzog and Other Filmmakers

Film School with Werner Herzog and Other Filmmakers

I have mixed emotions about a director who has on many occasions put the lives of his cast and crew at risk. I have mixed emotions about a director who is fond of hiring Klaus Kinski to carry more than one film. His daughter Nastassja would be another story, but Klaus was a talented actor who was under the best of circumstances a lunatic. 

Back to the subject of this digital film making post, Werner Herzog is offering you a chance to learn from the master. You can learn film making from him in a course that he offers. If he is one of your favorite film makers I would jump at the chance to learn from him if I were you. Hitchock use to teach film when he lived in LA. and I would have killed for a chance to sit in his classroom. 

 Let’s first have a look at who this film maker is. 




Now 10 questions for the famous film maker.

Next the trailer for his course. You can find a link to the course by clicking on the trailer.


 

 When I want a master class of film making I watch a great film. I visit the film makers who understood that film and art could walk hand in hand. Not every artist realizes that they are making art while it is happening, but there are a few who know it and still manage to do it well. Here is a glimpse at the work of one such film maker. The class can be found in his few films. Yasujirô Ozu was an amazing film maker who understood stillness and shot (for you camera buffs) almost totally with a 50mm lens. He chose this because this comes closes to the human eye.

 

Thank you for visiting. Now go out and find a great filmmaker and study them whether they offer you an actual course or a few films as a masterclass. Good luck and remember to share this post on your Google plus and to follow me there. 

GROWING AS A FILM MAKER, JAMES WAN

GROWING AS A FILM MAKER, James Wan
 A few weeks about I found myself at a screening for the film Conjuring 2. I did not want to be there because I did not love the first one and the sequel rule (sequels usual suck) was ringing in my head, but I went because it was free tickets. Well it turned out that I loved the sequel. It was a much better film that the first and I chalk this up to the fact that the filmmaker had improved since the first film.

 I give the filmmaker most of the credit because I thought that the first script was better than that of the sequel, but not nearly as well shot. Filmmakers like athletes should get better with practice. They should learn and grow. This thought made me consider doing this post. Let’s begin with Saw. He directed the short film version as a pitch for the feature. Something that many micro budget filmmakers have done. 

 





 Next came Insidious, a very effective horror film. I did not like the last act, but still a good film. 


I think that horror is like composing music. Hitchcock described suspense that way. He would imagine himself as a conductor and the audience his orchestra. There is a rhythm that a good horror movie must have. When it is there you do not notice it and when it is missing you find a thousand things wrong with it. For me the Conjuring has a great many good scenes, but lacks rhythm. While the sequel has nearly perfect rhythm.


  


  

 Thank you for visiting my blog. Please share this post and if the Conjuring 2 interested you as much as it did me take a few moments to check out my new ebook on the story behind the script, the Enfield Poltergeist. You can find it at itunes and Kobo and B&N, click image below. Good luck with your filmmaking.

HOLLYWOOD AND THE MICRO BUDGET PUZZLE

There are those in Hollywood (the Industry) who believe that they have figured out the concept of micro budget filmmaking.

 There are those who went to film schools and worked on big budget films who believe that they can drop down and play in this digital filmmakers world. A few filmmakers have mentioned to me that they are worried about an invasion from the big boys as if the Avengers are going to show up armed with Dslr cameras and Zoom recorders. I wish that they would. They would not last long out here on the frontier. You know, down here in the fields where we fight for our meals.

Before I continue I want you to take a look at a fantastic video that was posted on what a 200 million dollar budget looks likes.

 

 Can you imagine those pay checks? I am a screen writer and I do not think that the writer is worth that much money up front, especially if you wrote any of the last mega budget super hero films. I could produce and distribute five feature films with name actors for what the script supervisor gets paid. Then again all of us would love to hit it big with a micro budget film so that Hollywood would come knocking and throw a few million at us.

 Look at it this way, the industry list micro budget as 250,000 dollars. That is their floor.

Now let’s look at what is meant by low budget film making and then micro budget. I would like you to picture it this way. If a film shoot was a date, low budget is burgers at Five Guys, without the bacon or cheese and micro budget is grilled cheese sandwiches at your place, the bread is the dollar loaf for the dollar store and the cheese is that orange stuff that is 99 cents a pack in the supermarket. You know the cheese they do not even have to keep in the refrigerators. All real micro budget film makers know where to find this bread and cheese because we feed it to our cast and crew.

 



  

Bonus footage:::: Here is sort of a Ted talk for the producers out there. I love this advice and let us all remember that producers are people too and they are the ones with all the grey hairs.




Thank you for visiting my site and please take a few moments or better yet a few hours to share this post online. You can post it on facebook, you can add it to your Google plus you and even go twitter or pick up the phone, call someone and say hey I just read a great blog post. The guy who runs that blog is amazing and we should buy all of his ebooks on film making and if we can’t afford it let’s leave 5 star reviews on B&N and Amazon to convince others to buy them.