Latest / Cinema Yūgen / Unleashing Creativity: Jeff Bollow on the Future of Screenwriting and Self-Published Cinema
Transcript
- 0:00G'day. That's right, it's that time again.
- 0:03Time for Cinema Yogan. I'll see you next time.
- 0:07Music.
- 0:20Yes, welcome back Yoganites. In this episode, I'm very happy to have Jeff Bolo,
- 0:26an actor, writer, director, producer, author, public speaker and film festival
- 0:31organiser is the author of Writing Fast, How to Write Anything with Lightning Speed,
- 0:37the producer and the director of the Atom Award winning Making Fantastic Short
- 0:42Films and the founder of Australia's Screenplay Development Centre in May 2015.
- 0:51He also delivered a TED Talk to expand your imagination exponentially.
- 0:58He is an incredible speaker. He is full of great words of wisdom.
- 1:04I have, since watching him and listening to him, I've wanted to bring him on the show and talk shop.
- 1:11So without further ado, here he is. The fastest gun in the West when it comes
- 1:17to writing screenplays.
- 1:18Plays fast the man of the moment the mad dog who will park your car he is jeff bollo.
- 1:29Thank you very much happy to be here mate i've been like i've said been checking
- 1:32out your videos for some time it's great to see like you look and sound exactly
- 1:36like you do in them in the movies it's kind of cool hey let's start with the
- 1:40million dollar question the million dollar question this,
- 1:43hey yo mad dog you want to park that there you
- 1:48go it's a it's it's an og it's an og
- 1:51callback there you go so you gotta
- 1:54say it and hey yo mad
- 1:56dog no that's that's not my line my line is uh park it
- 1:59yourself metallica breath beautiful thing
- 2:03that was exactly what i was hoping for park it
- 2:06yourself metallica breath i feel like i should get i
- 2:09feel like i should like put get myself on cameo or something and
- 2:12yeah i'm surprised you don't do those like comic
- 2:15cons and sign autographs and take pictures and
- 2:18stuff with people yeah i i've i've kind
- 2:21of moved in a different direction since then that's cool
- 2:24no it was it was great hey do you know it's six degrees
- 2:27of of of don't tell mom the babysitter's dead
- 2:30the friend i was talking to you about who sent me his book sylvan dupree who's
- 2:34a conceptual illustrator for the movies who worked ridley scott and lots of
- 2:38tim burton lots of people he recently put out a book los angeles which is you
- 2:44know his his reservations and thoughts of his career plus samples and all sort
- 2:47of stuff his first storyboarding gig.
- 2:51Was don't tell mom the babysitter's dead is that right yeah
- 2:54wow there you go that was his first storyboarding gig
- 2:57i mostly i mostly knew the actors
- 3:01and the crew that were that were sort of immediately shooting
- 3:04that thing right yeah that was kind of who i worked with i didn't really work
- 3:08too yeah no no i wouldn't expect you to bump into the storyboard yeah on the
- 3:12set but uh so there you go small world the baby always seems to be a small room
- 3:18anyway jeff mate Ed, I've been enjoying your videos.
- 3:23I'll say the links will be in the description to Fast Screenplay,
- 3:27YouTube channel, all that good stuff.
- 3:30You talk about so much that I think is really important. We can't talk about it all in 30 minutes.
- 3:36So I just sort of went through those videos, which I told you that I thought
- 3:41were some good points in,
- 3:42and I've just kind of written down the points that I think
- 3:45that are very important for anyone
- 3:49listening who really wants to get into this
- 3:51and is serious about writing screenplays and
- 3:54just as a quick interjection there if you are
- 3:57interested and you are serious you should absolutely do
- 4:00it because there is literally unlimited opportunity in the world of screenwriting
- 4:05people just do they have the they have it entirely backwards so people are thinking
- 4:10it's it's a hard thing to get into and it's very limited and it's very niche
- 4:13and that that's just all changing today So if you have any inkling about it,
- 4:19definitely jump into it. But sorry to interrupt.
- 4:21You're right. No, which leads perfectly into the first point,
- 4:25which you brought up in a video, toxic negativity.
- 4:28Which is, you know, this perceived notion that there is only one way in that
- 4:34you have to hit the high ground, that you have to get it on the green in one shot.
- 4:42And so it's just a putt to the finish. You have to get an agent,
- 4:46you have to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
- 4:49And so as you say, the old method, the new methods coming in.
- 4:55This has kept a lot of people back, and I still know a few screenwriters personally,
- 5:00that it's still holding back because they don't see the value of,
- 5:04like, to get to the top of the building, you get on the ground floor.
- 5:08Look, I started this, obviously, you're quoting the movie from how many years ago now, right?
- 5:14Yeah, yeah. I started a very long time ago in this industry.
- 5:18And at the time, it was pre-internet.
- 5:20It was pre-indie revolution. It was certainly pre-phones and pre-AI, pre-all that stuff.
- 5:29And so that's really the paradigm that we tend to still look at the screenwriting
- 5:35realm, that prism we look at it through. Right.
- 5:39And I think because we still think of it that way, all of the kind of the classic
- 5:44books about screenwriting are all written from that era.
- 5:48It's all kind of the lore of the history of it.
- 5:51It just makes us it just makes us think all wrong about what this craft is and
- 5:57what it is today and what it is moving forward and and why you'd want to do
- 6:02it and how you would break it.
- 6:03Like everything, everything has changed.
- 6:06It's back in the day.
- 6:09You know, it was, it was a very few people or companies that would be making
- 6:14these projects. And there would be all these people that wanted to write for those studios.
- 6:20And so they would all make these spec scripts. They would all send them in and
- 6:25it would be these giant slush piles.
- 6:26I remember, I literally remember offices with stacks and stacks of hard copy screenplays.
- 6:32Right. And, And so the way to break through in that environment is very different
- 6:39to a day where now you can go make your own indie short film for no money at all,
- 6:45demonstrate that you not only have a voice and a vision and a perspective and
- 6:50something to say and an interesting idea.
- 6:52You can demonstrate all that all on your own, such that you break through using
- 6:57a much more compelling way to grab people.
- 7:00And then they want to see your spec screenplay, right? So it's just a completely
- 7:06different, it's a different framework.
- 7:08And the toxic negativity comes from kind of hanging on to that old model and
- 7:14imagining that, you know, I still hear people in my YouTube comments talking
- 7:19about, it's all about who you know.
- 7:21It's the, you got to be related to Spielberg or something like that.
- 7:25It's like, what are you talking about?
- 7:26You could go make a movie right now and put it on YouTube for free right now.
- 7:31Like you don't need anybody's permission to do this anymore.
- 7:33So it's all, it, it has become about your merit.
- 7:38It has become about your skill and, and are you able to tell great stories,
- 7:43tell them effectively and connect with audiences.
- 7:44And so, yeah, it's just, it's just a completely different way to go about it today.
- 7:49And I think if we, if we focus on the new way, then it's,
- 7:54it's like wide open skies in front of us versus if we hang on to the old way,
- 7:58it makes us second guess ourselves in ways that are ultimately damaging to the
- 8:03thing that we're trying to, to achieve.
- 8:06Total, which leads into the next point that you said, the, the,
- 8:09the classic, the three things, skills, proof, and opportunity.
- 8:14Now, skills are something that you, you know, what, what do they say?
- 8:18Success equals what is it preparation and timing exactly preparation is the
- 8:25key if you you can't i mean i i.
- 8:29Ten years ago, I couldn't go to a director, hey, when he says to me,
- 8:32hey, when can I have the pages? When can I have the first draft?
- 8:37I wouldn't have been able to say with confidence, well, give me a week.
- 8:41You know, give me a week. Right, right. Something like that.
- 8:44Right? Because you don't yet know how fast you can put out. Exactly.
- 8:48Because, and we'll get into this in a minute, but these are also a couple of
- 8:54things that if you come through the conventional method or, you know,
- 8:57you come out of film school, or what they don't teach you is how to go out and get a job.
- 9:01Go out and show someone you know how to do a job by getting a job that you can't
- 9:05get a job because you haven't been yet able to perceive that you can do the
- 9:09job, if that makes any sense at all. Sure, yeah.
- 9:12Look, the film industry is all catch-22s.
- 9:16It's everywhere you turn, it's catch-22s. You can't get your first acting gig
- 9:19until you can demonstrate that you've had acting gigs in the past.
- 9:23You can't get your first writing gig until you've been produced somewhere.
- 9:27Right you can't it's it's forever a catch-22
- 9:30and so what what the industry has
- 9:33always been about is prove yourself find some creative way to prove yourself
- 9:39sure and then get noticed by coming at it from a different angle than we expected
- 9:45like that that's the way to demonstrate your creativity and get noticed and
- 9:50you create opportunity through that as you say by creating.
- 9:54Value in what you could do by saying, well, it's not going to take me a month
- 9:57to come up with the, you know, the outline, a first draft and so on.
- 10:02It's going to take me 10 days or a week.
- 10:05You know, I've done it in a weekend. Like my first, for instance,
- 10:08my one of the, well, the first movie I had officially released.
- 10:14Which has just been released yesterday, actually. I got that gig because I read
- 10:20in a post the guy said that the fastest he'd ever written a script was five days.
- 10:26And so when he approached me with the opportunity, after I told him I was a
- 10:31writer and I demonstrated my abilities, as you say,
- 10:37I said, well, this was a Friday afternoon.
- 10:41And I said, well, if I can get you the script Monday, what do you think about that?
- 10:45And he says, well, if you can do that, that would be great.
- 10:51And thus I went on to write eight more scripts with him and get some more movies out.
- 10:56And I've just done similar again with another director this year.
- 10:59I've done eight gigs in a row with this guy who's developing stuff to make next year.
- 11:05So, yeah, look, the quicker you can put the pieces together because it's a lot
- 11:11like playing with action figures back in the day.
- 11:13If you're one of these kids, you used to play with your action figures in the sandpit.
- 11:16Sometimes there were Transformers, He-Man, G.I. Joes, all working together, but it wasn't about G.I.
- 11:23Joes or Transformers. You were creating other worlds, and these characters had
- 11:27different names and they interacted in different ways.
- 11:30So it's like the director giving you a bunch of their toys that are kind of
- 11:33random. There's this vehicle, these characters, this playset, and they say, have at it.
- 11:38So look, the, the reason for being fast, the reason to develop the,
- 11:46the skill of speed is not because we just want to rush something onto the, no, no,
- 11:52no, no rush rush is no good for anybody.
- 11:56What we need is quality at speed, right?
- 12:00Quality at the, but the reason we want that is because in order to bring a big
- 12:05complex project like a film together, there are an infinite array of variables.
- 12:09There are so many different moving parts, right? And so if we're at that place
- 12:14where the pieces have kind of come together, we need to strike while the iron's
- 12:18hot. We need to take action now.
- 12:20And so the reason to be able to create quality at speed is so that we can take
- 12:25advantage of all these shifting opportunities that we're here for.
- 12:29I think a lot of people, you know, I wrote a book 20 years ago when I was in
- 12:33Australia, in fact, that was called writing fast, how to write anything with lightning speed.
- 12:38And the idea behind it is I created this fast acronym.
- 12:43So fast is stands for focus, apply, strengthen, tweak F A S T,
- 12:48which are the four key phases of the writing process.
- 12:51The first phase, you focus all your stray ideas into a story plan.
- 12:55The apply phase, you apply that to the, to the page, write your first draft
- 12:59as fast as you can, basically.
- 13:00Then you strengthen it. You rewrite until it's solid the story you wanted to
- 13:05tell and then you tweak polish the words the t tweak is you polish the words
- 13:10into a page turner reader experience because at the end of the day.
- 13:13Nobody's going to ever care how fast you wrote the script what they're going
- 13:17to care about is how fast that script reads because a fast read is a page turner
- 13:22a page turner is something that is engaging and compelling for the audience so.
- 13:27When we think about speed, we have to make sure that we're thinking about it
- 13:31in the right, in the full context.
- 13:33Cause it's not just about who can, who can fill a hundred pages quickly because,
- 13:38and I think this is a problem that newer writers get blinded by.
- 13:42Cause if I can just write really quickly, well then I can take advantage of
- 13:46these opportunities or I can kind of get past the stuff I don't really want
- 13:51to be doing, which is the writing and do the stuff that I do want to be doing,
- 13:54which is making the movie and shooting stuff and whatever.
- 13:57Yeah. But if you rush it, you end up making more problems for yourself in production
- 14:04and post-production because you're trying to kind of take something as weak
- 14:08and flimsy and thin and not very good and, and turn it into something of quality,
- 14:14which is much, much harder to do. Totally.
- 14:16And to take something that's great, like a screenplay that's really good and
- 14:21turn that into a pile of crap because that happens all the time.
- 14:25Yeah, no, no, no, I agree with you. And I don't, when I say I write a script
- 14:29in the week, I don't, I don't cut corners either.
- 14:32I write, I've got my pads still.
- 14:35I film four days in the pad, three days at the keyboard.
- 14:41Right. There you go. Sure. That's my, that's my, that's my, my,
- 14:45my stone age method here.
- 14:48But no, cause I believe in what Tony Gilroy said.
- 14:51I like to make mistakes on the page before I put on my suit,
- 14:54which is, is typing scripts. So typing the script is like the last,
- 14:59thing because typing it doesn't take that much time at all see i actually think
- 15:05i actually think typing it is the second thing and the second before so the
- 15:09the one the the challenge that
- 15:10i have always faced because look i i don't know if you know my my background
- 15:14in the screen writing thing but i taught i have now taught screenwriting for
- 15:18like 25 years and i have now.
- 15:21Probably interacted with somewhere between 15 and 20 000
- 15:24writers all around the world and and the
- 15:27the the problem overwhelmingly is
- 15:31that people are only concerned with taking the idea from their head
- 15:34and putting it onto the page that's that's where
- 15:37that's where their concern ends yes but where their concern should be focused
- 15:41is from that from the page into their reader's brain yes right because at the
- 15:49end of the day what what i put on the page that's an act of creativity That's
- 15:53me putting something out there.
- 15:54That doesn't mean it's going to land in any way resonant with someone else. Right.
- 16:01If you go to see a comedy or horror film, you go to laugh or to get scared.
- 16:06Right. You go for the experience.
- 16:08You, that is you as an audience member are, are wanting that experience.
- 16:13That's an outside inward transaction, right?
- 16:17You want some, you want to experience something. it's
- 16:21not about the filmmaker it's not
- 16:23about their experience or their journey it's about
- 16:26yours and so as as filmmakers or writers or creatives we need to always remember
- 16:31that as we're as we're designing the thing so just kind of going back to your
- 16:35point the the typing of it is you putting it on the page right whereas whereas
- 16:43what i would want your listeners to to,
- 16:46to think of is that if we,
- 16:49if we always kind of work from that vantage point of,
- 16:53of what do the, what do these words on the page give to the reader?
- 16:57We're going to up our game every time. Yeah.
- 17:01Yeah, no, totally. And I, I mean, I, I always say to other people who ask me
- 17:06for advice, I say I write the movies that I would watch.
- 17:09For sure. I never, even, even if it's a, and I wrote a lot of low budget films,
- 17:14real, I mean, real micro-budget, probably more correctly termed.
- 17:19But that's where everybody should start. Yeah, that doesn't forego the fact
- 17:26that you don't treat it like it's a movie that you – I treat them all like a movie I would watch.
- 17:32I can't put something down that I wouldn't sit through.
- 17:35Well, so one of the things that I, one of the things that I came up with a couple
- 17:39of years ago is this, what I call the breakthrough strategy.
- 17:41And the breakthrough strategy is that in order to work at the,
- 17:45at the maybe quote unquote higher levels of the industry, the big studios,
- 17:50or even the bigger budget, low budgets or whatever.
- 17:53If you make an independent film, a micro budget feature that is for a micro
- 18:00budget feature, you're extraordinary.
- 18:02That's going to make the people at that next budget level up go,
- 18:06Ooh, who's that person? I want to work with them.
- 18:09And they, they pull you up. So we think of breaking through,
- 18:13we think of getting noticed or creating something that the industry or something like that. Yeah.
- 18:20We're imagining that being something we are doing. we're
- 18:23pushing into that direction but if instead we're we're
- 18:26creating something that is so strong and powerful at
- 18:29this lower budget that's the secret right
- 18:33because then we get plucked up because i'll tell you something the
- 18:36people at the medium level and then even also the people at the top level
- 18:39yeah they they struggle to find quality
- 18:42it is i cannot put into words how hard
- 18:45it is to find extraordinary material this
- 18:48is the overwhelming the overwhelming stuff that
- 18:52is written is written for that creative
- 18:56impulse it's not written for the
- 18:59audience impulse right so it's really hard for
- 19:02people to find the quality writing and so
- 19:05they're looking for people to pluck and pull
- 19:09up to their level right does that make sense yeah no
- 19:12totally and and i i think
- 19:15that as you were saying in another video
- 19:18about that negativity the the maintaining
- 19:22the notion that success only
- 19:26equals you know you're right up in variety and
- 19:29you've just landed the highest amount of money for a.
- 19:33Spec script ever written incidentally i've
- 19:37spoken to the man who was the co-author of one of those scripts yeah
- 19:40bill marsilli who co-wrote deja
- 19:43vu with ted rossio i think
- 19:46they've still got the record i'm not sure probably because those are because
- 19:50those kinds of paydays tend not to happen on spec scripts anymore and they the
- 19:55deals are usually structured differently in the kind of the way the payouts
- 19:58happen so it's pretty rare in in line with what you're saying though if if that's if that's.
- 20:04The only success that you see
- 20:07or you're going to accept, you might go blue in the face waiting for it.
- 20:12Well, some of those things are out of your control. One of the key insights
- 20:16that I came across along the way, simply because I come at this as an independent
- 20:20producer who, while I was in Australia, could not find material to produce.
- 20:25I looked through hundreds of films, scripts, submissions, eventually thousands
- 20:29of them, eventually spread my spread it to go all around the world, eventually 30,000.
- 20:35Like I could not find material to produce the, the,
- 20:39the, the reality is the stories that you, if, if your objective is to have this
- 20:48one passion project that you've written be made by that filmmaker,
- 20:53there's so much there that's out of your control.
- 20:56The, the thing that I identified was that the key to making a sale,
- 21:00to making a, to, to getting a deal is it's in one word alignment.
- 21:06You, your project has to be aligned with the immediate needs and desires of at least one producer.
- 21:13Yes. And if it is that project can get a yes.
- 21:18Now, if you're going to make it yourself, obviously that's a different story,
- 21:20but if it's, if you're going to,
- 21:22if you're going to write to a cell yes you
- 21:25all of those all of the all of the variables have to line up at the same time
- 21:31at the same place i could love a script that you wrote but not be in a position
- 21:35to make it right now exactly and so then we're not aligned so that's a no right
- 21:40or or an indefinite maybe.
- 21:43Which is not now but nobody wants to offend anybody when will then be now soon
- 21:50exactly so So the challenge that we have as writers is we want to understand
- 21:58that alignment is necessary for the deal,
- 22:00but alignment is in many cases largely out of your control.
- 22:05So you can't have your ego or emotions tied to that.
- 22:11You can't have your strategic career ambitions tied to that because if you do,
- 22:16you're going to be disappointed every time. because the odds of all of the things
- 22:20aligning at the same moment are very unlikely.
- 22:23You said you were writing for the writing with this producer and making these different projects.
- 22:29That's the way it typically happens is where you meet a producer and the two
- 22:34of you are in sync creatively.
- 22:35They like some other thing that you've written and now you're going to work
- 22:39together on a project, right?
- 22:41So how do you get yourself into that position?
- 22:43You get yourself into that position by developing that skill,
- 22:46being ready for that moment so that you can take advantage of that and demonstrate
- 22:52to that person that you have the skill, not just to be able to create something
- 22:55great, but to be able to create something that is in alignment with them.
- 22:58Exactly. And increasing your value by doing it,
- 23:02as as quickly as you know possible rather than rather than take rather than
- 23:07take a month take 10 days or something like that imagine you have you're in
- 23:11that pitch meeting and they throw out an idea and you go yeah you could do this
- 23:14and blah blah blah and they go wow that's amazing how long is it going to take
- 23:17you to get me a first draft and go give me nine months.
- 23:21Well i mean it's i mean because i mean i approached it like most screenwriters
- 23:25do because you've been writing for so long crawling across the desert and then
- 23:30all of a sudden you get offered a glass of water and what are you going to say
- 23:33how fast mate i'll do it tonight,
- 23:38oh well but if you if you don't have the skill to be able to though then guess
- 23:42what that's true you gotta you while you're crawling you should be working you
- 23:47know you shouldn't just be focused on the glass of water you should be focused
- 23:50on on you know and this is why it's so it's so important for writers to let go.
- 23:56I, the, the, the two words that I keep coming back to is let go.
- 24:00You have all these ideas and ambitions and targets and whatever,
- 24:03and where your actual genuine, authentic creative voice comes from is your creative
- 24:10subconscious, not your logic brain trying to figure everything out.
- 24:13So we want to get to the point where we can create more or less intuitively.
- 24:17Yes. And when you can let go and, and, and create quality at speed,
- 24:23that's where, that's where the the stars
- 24:26align and you can and you're able to take advantage of those kinds of people
- 24:29have thought i've been weird in the past when i've talked about you know spoke to
- 24:31students and stuff about writing and that i
- 24:35said thinking is the enemy of writing and they all go well but when you're writing
- 24:38you're thinking i know you're using your imagination which is different from
- 24:42thinking right someone has this idea this age-old idea of the muse and like
- 24:48the flow right and tapping into the flow and, and, and letting it go.
- 24:52The problem is that when a new writer comes along and they don't understand
- 24:55all the dynamics at play, they don't understand the nuances of setup and payoff
- 25:00and how to, how to build dramatic tension and all these kinds of things,
- 25:03then they just, they let go.
- 25:06They tap into the flow, but it's this, this stream of consciousness writing
- 25:09that sends them off on all these meandering directions.
- 25:12Whereas if you, as you get, as you improve your
- 25:14craft you get better at knowing how
- 25:17to kind of shape the banks of the river so that when
- 25:20you do let it tap into that creative flow it goes in a very specific targeted
- 25:25direction which ultimately is alignment yes totally which leads um which leads
- 25:31to sort of my my last point and i think the most interesting one that you brought
- 25:36up in in one of your most recent videos.
- 25:39And and to lead into that i i'm,
- 25:42I did the screenplay thing for 10 years the old way, the old official way,
- 25:48and we're getting nowhere.
- 25:49And one day I was crying in a beard to a friend. He says, well,
- 25:52just like you say, you've got these ideas, you've got these stories.
- 25:54Why do they have to be scripts?
- 25:56And I don't know why I never thought of it before, so I started writing books, right?
- 26:03So I tried the traditional way of the book thing for three years,
- 26:07and then I stumbled across indie publishing.
- 26:10And there was a little there was a little window there
- 26:13in the 2010s when create space was separate from
- 26:15amazon and this allowed anybody to to
- 26:20format do the cover do it and put
- 26:22out a book right anyone who ever thought that they want to be
- 26:25a writer and publish a book whatever genre they
- 26:28could do it did create space allowed that and they
- 26:31could make money from amazon doing yeah
- 26:35so and a lot of people thought well indie publishing isn't
- 26:39real publishing look anyone any any
- 26:42person's going to offer you a publishing contract i
- 26:45consider it you know whatever why does it
- 26:48have to who really cares who the publisher is if
- 26:51the story is any good that's going to be the you know
- 26:54the secret source it's not going to be oh this is published from you
- 26:57know cunning's and cannot it's got to be classic but so
- 27:02i got in to indie books and through indie books
- 27:05indie film and thus achieved you
- 27:08know my goals okay which is moving coming in which is ultimately if you're congratulations
- 27:14get in the movie business you that's what you want i mean it doesn't matter
- 27:18if it's a low budget movie it's a movie that's what we that's what we fell in
- 27:23love with as kids you talked about in this movie self.
- 27:27-published cinema is coming and I think it's the possibility and.
- 27:33Yeah. I think the, so what we learned from self-publishing is that self-publishing
- 27:39was initially kind of this like bastard child that was like,
- 27:44like everybody looks sideways at it.
- 27:46And then just gradually over time, we get used to the idea that there are traditional
- 27:51publishers and then there are self-publishers.
- 27:52And it really doesn't, it doesn't matter at the end of the day,
- 27:55that the quality of the book is good.
- 27:57If, if the writing is good, if they're compelling ideas, I'm,
- 28:00I'm buying a book. I don't, I don't care who the publisher is.
- 28:05Right. So, so it, it all, it comes back to a meritocracy.
- 28:09It comes back to how good is the, is the art is the thing that's been created.
- 28:14And that ultimately is what's going to happen now with, with AI.
- 28:19So for a little bit of context here, you know, I come at this from an indie film perspective.
- 28:23And so from, from an indie film perspective since the
- 28:2790s i mean i back in the 90s when sex lies and videotape
- 28:30came along and you know all these little clerks and and all
- 28:33these little like tiny little yeah el mariachi all
- 28:36these little tiny films came along and kind of just changed the
- 28:39how we think about indie film that you could
- 28:42have easy riders of their time yeah you could
- 28:45have these little uh these little tiny little budget really compelling
- 28:48interesting and engaging fun enjoyable films and
- 28:51so i was always drawn to that i worked briefly for a guy named roger corman
- 28:54who was known as the king of the b films and so
- 28:57god bless he he passed recently and he's he i mean he his it was just like this
- 29:03factory of little low budget like exploitation films and whatever is a great
- 29:08place to work as a young guy and so when i got to australia my whole kind of
- 29:11aim was to make a little studio video that would do,
- 29:16I had sort of higher creative ambitions.
- 29:19I wanted to make, you know, more mainstream films and more kind of artistic.
- 29:25Exactly. But the.
- 29:27So that's the angle that I came at it from. So what I've known all along is
- 29:33that all you have to do is go down to the camera shop, rent your little Aeroflex
- 29:37camera, buy some 35 millimeter film,
- 29:40go shoot it, go shoot the film,
- 29:43edit it on your little flatbed in the back office or whatever, and cut it together.
- 29:48I know that I'm using language that probably the younger audiences are like,
- 29:52what are all these things this old man is talking about?
- 29:54But nowadays it's all digital, Right now you just go get a, get a digital camera.
- 29:59You go shoot HD, you go edit it on your, even Adobe premiere or Da Vinci or something.
- 30:04You're, you're, you're, it's all non-linear editing. It's all super easy and simple.
- 30:08The point is the tools have been in our hands to be able to do low budget and
- 30:13independent projects all this time or literally 20, 30 years already.
- 30:18And so the, when I look at the AI text to video generative stuff.
- 30:26Sora, runway, these kinds of tools, I see that we're going to be taking yet
- 30:33one more layer away from the need, the expense,
- 30:38the logistics, the resources to put together indie film.
- 30:41Yes there's a lot of people out there who are freaking out because well what
- 30:45happens to the grips what happens to the you know you know what's gonna happen
- 30:49the group's gonna go make his own film and it's gonna be awesome right like
- 30:52the grip is gonna make a million bucks as a filmmaker because he didn't get
- 30:56into it necessarily just to be a grip he's got stories inside him too so.
- 31:01The the the way that i look at this this sort of ai revolution that's happening is.
- 31:06AI is trained on all this data.
- 31:09And so it understands a lot of things. It finds a lot of patterns that can help create stuff.
- 31:14But the one thing that it does not have, that it will never have is your unique
- 31:19window on the world, your angle on it.
- 31:22And it's your angle on it that gives you an imagination that no one else will
- 31:25ever have that gives you stories only you can tell.
- 31:29Now, take this powerful new technology and say, I want a story that looks like
- 31:34this. And it makes that generative video for you.
- 31:38And you say, no, hang on a second. I don't want that character to go here.
- 31:41I want him to come back from this angle. I want him to stop and have this smirk.
- 31:44And he turns around and he says this line, right?
- 31:47And it will generate that stuff for you.
- 31:50It's not there yet, by the way, as we record this, it's not,
- 31:53it's not there yet, but that's kind of what's coming.
- 31:56And so what will, what I believe is about to happen is self-published cinema
- 32:01in the sense that you all by yourself will be able to make something that is
- 32:07cinema quality without anyone else's involvement.
- 32:12If you didn't want it now, you can certainly team up with small groups of people,
- 32:16large groups of people that will still have Hollywood style films.
- 32:19I believe, because that's just a different way of telling a story.
- 32:24But what it does for independent filmmakers is it just gives us this extraordinary
- 32:29new palette, this new tool set to go off in whole new directions at whole new
- 32:35levels of quality and opportunity.
- 32:37So what the challenge then becomes is now that everyone can do it, like how do we stand out?
- 32:45How do we build an audience? How do we get noticed?
- 32:47How do we make this an economically self-sustaining thing? And so I'm kind of
- 32:52focused in that direction at the moment with my micromogul stuff.
- 32:56I started teaching people how to use AI in my screenwriting accelerator thing.
- 33:02I still maintain though that the skillset that you need more than any other
- 33:06is the ability to tell your own unique original stories at speed.
- 33:10So speed plus quality, the fast screenplay stuff.
- 33:13And so to me, it's like, I cannot even put into words how excited I am about
- 33:19this era and what is unfolding in front of us.
- 33:22Because as, as someone who has dreamt about movies, made movies,
- 33:26been involved in movies, wanted to be involved, just, I want to make a thousand films.
- 33:30I want to work with a thousand filmmakers to be, to build a studio that makes
- 33:35lots and lots of films and, and just the, all the tools and technology is here
- 33:41for us now and, and coming online soon.
- 33:43And so what I think people need to be doing is, is.
- 33:47Kind of preparing for what that future looks like
- 33:50because that is bound to change the nature
- 33:53of the industry itself it can't help but
- 33:56but i think it only opens up great things i don't think it's anything for us
- 34:00to be scared about the the way that it has been done is going to change uh it's
- 34:07going to be radically impacted but what what replaces it is even more exciting
- 34:13and has even more opportunity.
- 34:15Totally. And it's kind of a little bit like Termot the Frog once said,
- 34:20you know, I found a dog and a bear and a chicken and a whatchamacallit,
- 34:23and they all have the same dream. And that kind of dream gets better the more
- 34:27people you share it with, Jeff.
- 34:28And I think it's been wonderful to talk to you this morning.
- 34:31And I think you are full of a lot of wise words.
- 34:35And all the links will be in the description. So don't just listen to us talking here.
- 34:40Jeff has a war chest, a veritable war chest of wisdom, Jeff.
- 34:44And I thank you for sharing a little bit with us.
- 34:47Well, I appreciate your time and I appreciate your listeners' time as well.
- 34:50So thanks for having me here and I look forward to doing it again.
- 34:54Yes, Jeff, great bloke. Lots of wisdom to be had.
- 34:59Screenwriters out there, aspiring screenwriters, especially if
- 35:02you're thinking about undertaking this wild journey
- 35:06into the movie business and you have many movies
- 35:09in your head which you want to see come to life and
- 35:12maybe get paid to write a few you can
- 35:15do it too check out the links in the description and
- 35:18please listen to what jeff has to say he's he's a
- 35:21very very very positive man a very wise man he's got a lot to offer check it
- 35:28out links in the description ladies and gentlemen go there now jeff bollo check
- 35:34him out check out those links and as always my little Eugenites,
- 35:40thank you for listening to us on Spotify or wherever you choose to listen to
- 35:45your favourite podcasts.
- 35:46I'm Kent Hill and until next time, you've been listening to Cinema!
- 35:51Music.