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How to Make a Feature Film with No Money and No Car
420 students
What you'll learn
- Learn from my experience of making a low-cost feature film that won awards.
- Understand the key drivers that add complexity and cost to films and how to work around them.
- Know how to build teams that will support your success.
- Understand the process flow of getting a film from the idea stage through completion, into festivals and distribution.
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Course content
18 sections • 44 lectures • 1h 56m total length
Requirements
- You should already be able to make a simple, small film, even on your phone.
- You should have a sense of how storytelling works in films.
- You should either be able to do most of the technical aspects of filmmaking (writing a script, operating a camera, offloading files, editing footage), be willing to learn them through self-study or other means, or know people you can work with who know these technical details.
Description
In a world of advice telling you all the bad mistakes you can make, and that there's only one right way to do things, I'm here to tell you that you can go ahead and make a feature-length film, just because you want to. You don't need to go to film school in any traditional sense of the word, though there is always plenty to learn. Nor do you have to define your target audience, raise money, have a festival plan, a distribution plan, a marketing plan or an overall business plan worked out. Those are all great things, don't get me wrong, but they are also the things that tend to scare people away and keep them from reaching for their dream. If you can craft a simple, heartfelt story, and gather a few friends together, you can safely and successfully pull together a feature-length film that you can be proud of, that can go on to play in festivals, win awards, be seen around the world and make people happy. I know this because I have done it.
This course is designed for people who have a basic understanding and experience in making short films or video clips, but who may be looking at feature-length films - the "Mount Everest of filmmaking" - with some completely understandable fear and self-doubt. I'm here to share my experience and insights from having learned filmmaking through hands-on experimentation, self-directed study, trial and error, as well as from many mentors along the way. In midlife, I made a radical career change into acting, and then grew into the role of writer-director. I have made many short films as well as the features "It's About Love" and "Fat Punk" which were both made on shoestring budgets and went on to win multiple awards.
This course is built on the premise that if I can do it, then so can you. There are certain things you can do to drive costs, hassles and risks out of your longer film projects, and working alongside this course and your own thinking and planning, you will be able to come up with a formula that will let you walk to set and have fun making a feature-length film that you can be proud of for as little money as you care to spend!
Who this course is for:
- Anyone who wants to make the leap from making short films to feature-length films.
- Anyone with no money, car, or other resources who is tired of being frozen out of the feature filmmaker club.
- Anyone who could use some encouragement and a boost in their filmmaking self-confidence.
- Anyone who wants to take a fun, low-cost adventure in making a simple feature film.
- Anyone who, like me, didn't go to a traditional film shool but still wants to make film art.
- Anyone who wants to break out of a life or career rut and try something totally different and creative for fun.