The Logical Response Is To Be Bitter
And very bitter at that... but what is the step after that?
1
What’s wrong with this business?
Elena Saavedra Buckley has a great piece on Todd Solondz in the New Yorker this week. Maybe not so great in getting his next movie financed, but it does speak a great deal to the state of the world and culture. Todd’s plight is what is causing me to lose interest in cinema. Seriously. I want a world where he — and others like him — makes movies regularly. Something tells me I won’t get things as I want them to be….
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/todd-solondzs-unfulfilled-desires
2
Setting the record straight
The Guardian also had a piece on Todd, or rather HAPPINESS, and in it Todd singled out Bingham Ray, for making the film happen. Bingham was a great champion of indie film, but Todd’s celebration of his courage is not how I or my producing partner on the film, Christine Vachon, remember things happening. Once again, it had a hell of a lot more to do with the producers than anyone in this industry ever gives us credit for.
As I reminded Todd after I read his piece:
“I read the Guardian article… To be clear (about Bingham’s contribution), the first people I know of who believed in the script were Christine and I. That helped get Schamus & Linde to read and believe (they got behind it immediately). Linde got three international distributors to agree to license it at a rate that allowed October (the distributor) to consider funding Happiness because it would give them US for next to nothing. That business is what allowed Bingham to consider the film. And then he wanted to make your edit much shorter but we got him to let it go to Cannes as you wanted, as he didn’t anticipate that would lock your cut in.”
Todd apologized immediately.
I gave up the next year of my producing life to overseeing the distribution of the film. Christine also never stopped working on it. She found Bob Berney. We built a team around him that included Heta Paarte, who was my assistant at the time — but has gone to a career as head of marketing for both Focus Intl and Film Nation. Christine similarly kept on it for this recent Criterion release, which probably could never have happened without her help.
It’s producers who make the impossible happen, and everyone ignores our role. Don’t you love our business? Sigh…
HAPPINESS is one of my favorite films I have worked on and I have no regrets, thankfully. It is the one film I did that I have a poster up of — but it could be because it is the greatest movie poster EVER!
3
This Vs. That, Pragmatism Vs. Idealism
I think often how I am happy to have something that works, but what would the ideal look like? I think we get stopped by being trained to think pragmatically and not idealistically. If we first recognized our principles -- the foundation we stand on -- would we build it the way it is? Or are the flaws the design, where our disappointments create drive for something else? But we are stuck HERE, with less than what we could have, obsessing over the lack and how we’ve learned to live with it, if not outright love it.
4
Indie — or Culture For The People — needs its own lobby.
Amazon just joined the MPA. Nobody speaks for the citizens when it comes to art and culture. Do we really want a world where we can’t access anything other than the comfort food they they think we want? Do we really want a world where films are not allowed to speak truth to power? Where movies that take a different tact don’t have a platform where you can find them? Where they can earn revenue? Power consolidates and then obliterates what’s not one of them.
5
Time for some twisted holiday flix anyone?
What will a world dominated by corporate culture look like? How about non-stop Christmas movies?! You know you want that, right?
Luckily, whenever there is a business in one thing, you know you can take the idea and twist it to find another business. If we follow Hallmark’s lead (and Netflix’s) but give it a dose and maybe an axe, I think we’d be cooking with gas. Hallmark is good at what they do and they found a goldmine. They are releasing 47 Holiday Films this year!!!
But if I was 16 (and yes, in many ways I still am) and living with a family that put their shows on, I think I’d immediately want the nightmare version or at least the one that hints with innuendos at a much darker side of life. Wouldn’t you want to see the nasty and anti side of Christmas, Valentine’s, Mother’s, and Thanksgiving? Let’s give Todd Solondz, Emerald Fennel, John Waters, Zach Creeger, and Shinya Tsukamoto millions to disturb our complacency please.
6
What’s the price of not totally kissing the ass of the Princes and queens of our world?
No doubt millions. And maybe your faith and conviction? You read about how Prince’s family stalled out Ezra Edelman’s docu on the man that was a symbol? Add Oprah to the list of folks who are saying no after saying yes. Yup, she has shelved the doc done on her too. There are reports now that we’ve run out of celebrities to do movies on. About f’n time! Aren’t you bored by such films by now?
And what were these filmmakers thinking when they took the assignment? Did the fees they were taking cloud their judgement? They were always going to be played and manipulated, forced to deliver the honey without the bitters. Wasn’t that their subject’s intent from the get-go? Didn’t they read the memo? That was the gig.
Granted I might have enjoyed some complex revelations of our new gods, but could that ever really come to be when there are such controls in place? What world did the filmmakers think they were living in? Really? One where our icons give you free reign — or even limited as they say? Of course it’s not that. It is a shitty one, and now they perhaps see it a bit clearer.
And if you want a reminder of how we just get more and more of the same, here you go! Even Oprah & Prince diminish their value when they are grouped with so many lesser gods. Sure, our obsessive-mining of precious resources makes someone rich but it ruins the planet for the rest of us.
7
Yeah, The Business is pretty damn gross.
It’s old news now, but if you want to be sickened by how business is done in Hollywood, give the NYTimes’ story on how Bob Iger undermined his successor.
I wonder where I can move? What city has a low cost of living but access to culture?
8
Another reason to love San Francisco
Okay it does not have the low cost of living, but does anywhere in this world have a better free music festival than Hardly Strictly Bluegrass? It’s Oct 4 -6. You should go.
9
Next Week has a special treat in store for those that take action NOW.
Did you sign up for our free screening of Invisible Nation in Los Angeles this coming Tuesday 7P at UTA? Over 100 have. You should join them. Maybe the GSPs would see that there is an audience for films that speak truth to power.
I told you it is the most important film I’ve done, right? So what’s holding you back?
PS. See how hard it is to limit these links to just five or so?
Sometimes accepting that you're feeling kind of bitter is the only way to get through it. We can feel a lot of ugly emotions in this industry, but if we just deny them and clamp them down, then they never get addressed and we can't grow. It's nice to see someone acknowledging them.
This really hit home Ted. Why am I not more bitter? I'm working long hours on films that I love, with little to (mostly) no pay. And I love every minute of it. Also, I'm looking for actual paid work. When you see me tending bar somewhere....maybe the bitterness will kick in?