"Corrado" - A production blog

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10s said:
Hopefull Corrado holds a new fresh experience for us all. :)
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I highly doubt it will offer anything fresh. Remember that Corrado is supposed to be a movie that is not revolutionary in it's story or cinematography, rather it is supposed to demonstrate what can be accomplished on a modest budget while including some name talent.

I've never lost sight of the original goal which was direct to DVD distribution, not an Oscar, not winning at film festivals or "moving people". It is a product that will sell and allow me to make another film. Period.
 
Actually Daniel Myrick who wrote and directed Blair Witch has gone on to make over half a dozen direct to DVD movies. True none of them have had the success of Blair, but here are a few things he does have:

1. He is repped by Endeavor
2. He made money off of Blair
3. He continues to make movies and almost certainly money.
4. He's still one of the guys behind Blair.

I don't feel too badly for him - the dude is working away.
 
Adam I realize a fresh new experience is setting the bar up pretty high, but hey, it's worth a try.

If any of us can make a comfortable living making movies we've succeded.
 
taormina said:
Actually Daniel Myrick who wrote and directed Blair Witch has gone on to make over half a dozen direct to DVD movies. True none of them have had the success of Blair, but here are a few things he does have:

1. He is repped by Endeavor
2. He made money off of Blair
3. He continues to make movies and almost certainly money.
4. He's still one of the guys behind Blair.

I don't feel too badly for him - the dude is working away.
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True, but there's also a 7 year gap between Blair Witch and his first direct-to-DVD movie.
 
I know it. There are a lot of one hit wonders out there, but they are still wonders I suppose. M. Night Shyamalan is another that comes to mind - no matter how hard he tries or how much money he spends he cannot seem to recreate Sixth Sense.
 
taormina said:
I know it. There are a lot of one hit wonders out there, but they are still wonders I suppose. M. Night Shyamalan is another that comes to mind - no matter how hard he tries or how much money he spends he cannot seem to recreate Sixth Sense.
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he's a one hit wonder whose films have grossed $1.66 BILLION worldwide. no other person that writes and directs his own stories exclusively has been as successful.
 
The Sixth Sense was a hit because of the ending. We're not use to being lied to by the story teller, but we were lied to all the way through the story until the end when we found out the truth. It was refreshing to be lied to and tricked by the storyteller, not many are willing to do that to us. This is another example of the power of story. It was a decent traditional story structure until the end when we found out we've been had. And that was a huge surprise!

That's a tough act to follow because it toyed with fundamental structure, and there's only so much you can do. This type of toying also made Pulp Fiction a hit. Unfortunately the copy cats that show up after a hit tend to never really get it right or they have less impact because they use the same tricks and by then we've already seen it. It would be better if they wait 5 years, then maybe we'd be more impressed.

Fresh material is tough, .....especially with 5 thousand + years of stories already created.

My hat goes off to the Blair Witch team. Look at the numbers, that's a super tough, once in a life time, act to follow, even for the original makers.
 
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Zak Forsman said:
he's a one hit wonder whose films have grossed $1.66 BILLION worldwide. no other person that writes and directs his own stories exclusively has been as successful.
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James Cameron topped it with $1.8 billion in one movie, however you do have a very valid point none the less.
 
I saw Myrick's latest film "The Objective" at the Tribeca film festival recently. While it wasn't that bad, it wasn't that good either. Weak enough that I wonder if it'll get a theatrical release.

Which is not to say that I wish Mr. Myrick anything other than success...
 
10s said:
The Sixth Sense was a hit because of the ending.
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It's never as easy as that.

It had stellar performances by Willis and young Osment, a great plot twist with the little girl being poisoned by her mother, it was beautifully shot...

...and had that great surprise ending.

IMHO it was a truly great movie in many ways. Shyamalan's career has been riding on it ever since. Unfortunately each successive film seems to be worse thatn the one before, to the point where "Lady In The Water", the last one I saw, was just breathtakingly awful.

IMHO...
 
I erased the whole thing.LOL

Anyway, it's interesting to see a formula movie being created just to make money to be able to make another movie.

Then each of us can use that same formula to make the movie we want to make. Will the same forumla work for every type of film?

I think it can and this is why this thread is so popular. I think we all agree that Adam has been very methodical in the way he's made this movie and the way he's maintained this blog.

Congratulations. I continue to wish you success. For me it's been very valuable. Here's the lesson that I learned:

Find at least one name actor and get a bunch of distributors excited.
 
filmman said:
Find at least one name actor and get a bunch of distributors excited.
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Well you may have learned that from me but it definitely was not my idea. I just watched and observed.

I could be wrong, filmman, but I detect a whiff of condescension and incredulity in your posts. Again, I could be wrong, and I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt and explain further - a recap of the previous pages.

I have spent a bunch of time with distributors and production companies as of late and they all ask the same thing:

Who is in the movie???

I'm going to be brutally honest here....I basically call bullshit on those who say who is in the movie does not matter. It matters, whether foreign or domestic. I totally matters. It's almost all that matters.

Now you guys may not want to believe this or talk about the changing model, or how the system is flawed, and it may very well be. But it is what it is.

If you went off and made a movie and no one recognizable was in it, it can still be a good movie. Even a great one, but in today's "model" it will probably not get seen or will be bought for peanuts.

Disagree? Tell me why I am wrong. Please.

Because now, all I do while waiting for Corrado to be done is talk to distributors. And all they want to know is who is in the damn movie and what genre it is. That's it!

There are those of you who will poo poo what I just said, saying that your movies are meaningful, aren't formulas, are life changing, have a message...whatever the verbiage is. And that's cool, more power to you. The current distribution system rejects those kinds of movies.

Actually, that's not entirely true: it gives you a million to one chance that you could be the next Blair, Big Fat Greek Wedding, etc. etc. take your pick.

Do you realize that the distributors summarily dismissed my entire cast save for Tom and Johnny??? They didn't give a **** about my four sopranos guys, my guy from the hills have eyes and Frank Stallone. They didn't give a **** - almost as if they weren't there.

Honest question:

If Corrado can barely get distribution based on it's cast where does that leave better movies with no name talent in them????

I'll tell you where it leaves them - they have to be freaking amazing to get noticed. Amazing.

And I don't know about you guys, but I haven't made an amazing movie yet. In the meantime I'll stick with name talent.

Show me a life changing message bearing, festival winning, beautifully shot, tear jerking, soul searching masterpiece and I'll show you Dickhead 5 - on the shelves at video stores near you making bank and in prepro for Dickhead 6.

Of course that's tongue in cheek, but you get my point. There needs to be a little commercialism and name talent in every movie.
 
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pmark23 said:
Okay. Yada. Yada. Yada. Can we find out how Vegas is working-out for editing now?
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What can I say about it - it's an amazing program - I like it better than v7. It's a little faster to me and very powerful. I'm not using but a fraction of it's capability, but so far it's been real good and stable on Windows Vista.
 
taormina said:
Because now, all I do while waiting for Corrado to be done is talk to distributors. And all they want to know is who is in the damn movie and what genre it is. That's it!
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From Dov Simens' course: "All buyers or distributors want to know is who's in it and what's it about".

Makes perfect sense to me from a marketability standpoint.
 
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