Hollywood eyes $70 zombie movie wowing Cannes

Under $70 for a feature? That means he didn't even buy the crew bottled water, snacks, or gas money.

A$$ hole in my book.

I love the "indie-makes it big" stories, but this seems frugal beyond economical.
 
that's a rather large assumption, ryan. being a low budget filmmaker myself, we've been very successful at having sponsors donate meals, crafty, etc. and this film in particlular was crowdsourced with many donations, creative and otherwise, coming in from friends/collaborators, social networks and industry contacts. his latex and make-up fx were donated left-overs from Wolverine and that should be an indication of how well connected the filmmaker is. "Colin" was made sporadically over the course of 18 months. I know it's hard to comprehend, because we've all been trained to look at the studio model as the way its done. but there ARE other models where the project is shaped to conform to the strengths of your available resources and so part of pre-production becomes seeking out sponsorships/partnerships to replace out-of-pocket costs. we're doing it right now with Eloquent Graffiti... no one is going hungry and we're getting great food from LA restaurants. this sort of thing is even easier when you get outside of Los Angeles.
 
I second Kholi.

Why not just say "it cost us nothing"... why put a price on it if the price is $70? Logic tells me that's a gimmick right off the top.

The hardest thing about film making is accepting the fact that "the machine" is flex fuel... it can run on quality OR hype*... or any combination of the two.



*hype is a nice word for bullshi*.
 
Watched the trailer. What did they spend the other $65 on?

I keed, I keed. :)

I gotta say, as annoying as it is to see pure out and out BS about budgets like this, more power to the guy for taking control of marketing.

Hope it's good.
 
Zak, you are completely right about getting donated food and etc.

If he did get his crew donated food, gas, and water on someone else's dime (not to mention ALL other costs with the exception of a crowbar, tapes, and tea), I'll be the first to nominate him as not the best filmmaker, but as the best damn producer, UPM or whatever he wants.

From the start I pretty much figured the numbers were a stretch of logic to hype the film. Next year someone is going to have a 50$ movie in some festival elsewhere.
 
I'm going to make my next film for negative money! Everyone will pay me for their services.
 
I'm sure he told the crew the situation and that he wasn't investing anything. They bring their own water and are, certainly, happy to do it. Nothing assholish about it. One important thing here is that being 'eyed' by studios and getting 'noticed' at Cannes doesn't actually amount to much. Apparently his story was great, and if he invested in making it look well he stood a good chance of getting distribution. In this case, as was said, it's good marketing and now his name is out there for credibility on future projects. Which is always nice.
 
Batutta said:
I'm going to make my next film for negative money! Everyone will pay me for their services.
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you know, as crazy as it sounds, I bet someone is planning to overfund production costs (by pre-selling dvds or something) so that they can announce they made money shooting their film.

Casalen said:
I'm sure he told the crew the situation and that he wasn't investing anything. They bring their own water and are, certainly, happy to do it. Nothing assholish about it. One important thing here is that being 'eyed' by studios and getting 'noticed' at Cannes doesn't actually amount to much. Apparently his story was great, and if he invested in making it look well he stood a good chance of getting distribution. In this case, as was said, it's good marketing and now his name is out there for credibility on future projects. Which is always nice.
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yeah, he'll definitely get this distributed. his OTHER marketing gimmick (it's a story told from the Zombie's POV) is the big story on all the horror/gore movie sites. someone will move on this fast.
 
but i think what this proves, really, is that if you want to make a name for yourself, you need to give people a reason to write about you. i mean, you need a really good reason to shine a spotlight on a mediocre zombie flick with no stars. especially on the festival circuit where the filmmaker's story often more important than the story of their film. i'm sure this guy sunk a ton of money into a well-connected publicist.
 
Zak, interesting thoughts on this matter. I think his approach of having extremely professional makeup fx combined with shitty video (well below the top 15 or more of every single DVXFest for example).

I know you're being very helpful these days with blogs, posts, etc. Have you yet wrote about your approach to getting free food? That's one step I've yet to take and am considering it for my upcoming (first) feature.
 
I think if anything publicizing the $70 dollar budget does a diservice to our community. We all know well and good that the true costs of the film amount to much more than $70. Depreciation on equipment, people's time, the use of other's equipment, etc. are all costs, whether or not they are realized out of pocket. The $70 misleads others into believing that one can make a great flick from scratch for $70. If I produce a movie using 0 of my own $$ but I borrowed Fred's camera and Dave's grip truck and Joe and Bob drove 50 miles to perform in the film, the movie may have not cost ME anything, but it would not be fair for me to say that the movie itself didn't cost anything to make. It ended up costing somebody something somewhere....ok enough ranting :)
 
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shawneous said:
Zak, interesting thoughts on this matter. I think his approach of having extremely professional makeup fx combined with shi*ty video (well below the top 15 or more of every single DVXFest for example).

I know you're being very helpful these days with blogs, posts, etc. Have you yet wrote about your approach to getting free food? That's one step I've yet to take and am considering it for my upcoming (first) feature.
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my partner's wife is a very assertive young woman who seeks out sponsors and negotiates for a variety of corporate events. and when we need her, she uses those talents on our productions. She's very charming and personable and does not feel shame in asking you to give her stuff.
 
HCPROD said:
I think if anything publicizing the $70 dollar budget does a diservice to our community. We all know well and good that the true costs of the film amount to much more than $70. Depreciation on equipment, people's time, the use of other's equipment, etc. are all costs, whether or not they are realized out of pocket. The $70 misleads others into believing that one can make a great flick from scratch for $70. If I produce a movie using 0 of my own $$ but I borrowed Fred's camera and Dave's grip truck and Joe and Bob drove 50 miles to perform in the film, the movie may have not cost ME anything, but it would not be fair for me to say that the movie itself didn't cost anything to make. It ended up costing somebody something somewhere....ok enough ranting :)
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meanwhile, he just debuted his first feature at Cannes and we're on the internet finding ways to cut him down.

I don't think anyone is dumb enough to think the $70 gag is anything more than straight out-of-pocket expenses during production. just to submit to Cannes cost him more. and his publicist is probably in the ball park of $5,000 per week and/or has a major piece of the film.
 
Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
Under $70 for a feature? That means he didn't even buy the crew bottled water, snacks, or gas money.

A$$ hole in my book.

I love the "indie-makes it big" stories, but this seems frugal beyond economical.
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that's pretty ignorant of you. maybe if you spent less time on dvxuser/www.yourname.com you'd be able to make a feature for $70.
 
Zak Forsman said:
meanwhile, he just debuted his first feature at Cannes and we're on the internet finding ways to cut him down.
quote]

Definately not trying to cut him down. I think it's awesome that he is accomplishing something that alot of us hope we can do someday. I just hate the perception that it creates...I can hear it already..."Why is this short costing so much?"..."Didn't so and so make a hot feature that got distribution for $70"
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