Yesterday producer Ted Hope (@tedhope.fanpage on Facebook) gave a nice shout-out to this blog, so I thought I’d use that to wrangle together 10 Hope-centric quotes from various places. Many are from his Hope for Filmbook.
His blog Hope for Film—with a focus on the business side of filmmaking—is still online, but not updated anymore because he’s too busy with his role at Amazon. But he’s active on his Facebook fan page so check that out for his wisdom, inspiration, filmmaking experiences and film recommendations.
And if you want short Ted (Hope) Talk, here you go:
I know there is a lot of noise and distractions out there— in regard to finding filmmaking information and inspiration—but I’m enjoying producer Ted Hope’s Facebook posts recently. Here’s just a short excerpt from yesterday’s post.
“To make a great film, you generally have to make a good one first — and to make the good one, you have to make a not-so-good one even before that. Sure, the exceptions come out of the gate strong, but that is not most of us, and certainly not the ones who have to run the long distance race.” Ted Hope, Amazon Studios
Facebook post 8/20/18
P.S. The best example of that is Quentin Tarantino. His first feature film was not Reservoir Dogs—that was his first completed feature film. Before that he spent three to eight years (reports vary) shooting and editing My Best Friend’s Birthday which was never completed. Along with watching movies, Tarantino considers that his film school. It’s estimated that he spent $5,000 on My Best Friend’s Wedding—which makes for a pretty inexpensive film school.
“Growing up in Ohio was just planning to get out.”
Filmmaker Jim Jarmusch (who grew up in Akron)
At the end of Ted Hope’s book Hope for Film he has an appendix that lists 141 Problems and Opportunities for the Independent World. The list flowed from a blog post he wrote back in 2010. You can find the entire list here, but I’m just going to highlight one problem today.
124. Artists cannot afford to live in our cultural centers. It’s a real Catch-22. Artists make cultural centers, but these places become too pricey for their creators to live in. If you are in the middle class, you can only afford 14 percent of the currently available homes in San Francisco. The number drops to only 2.5 percent in New York City. I love both cities, but can’t see my future in either of them as a result. And I don’t really want to move to Akron, Ohio, either (no offense intended, Akron!). Ted Hope Hope for Film: From the Frontline of the Independent Cinema Revolutions (p. 285)
If you don’t have wealthy parents or a trust fund to support you for a few years until you get some traction in New York or L.A. what is one to do? Many articles over the years have talked about the struggle of creative people trying to pay their bills in the big cities. And if you tack on a large film school debt, forgetaboutit.
It makes me wonder where people like Jim Jarmusch (Stranger than Paradise) would go today if they were starting out in 2018 instead of the 1970s.
I started writing this blog in 2008 after seeing Diablo Cody’s Juno and learning that she went to school in Iowa City and wrote the Juno screenplay in the suburbs of Minneapolis. She went on to move to L.A. and win an Oscar for that script. A Midwest success story.
As of this weekend, we have another Midwest success story. And, yes, one also with Iowa roots.
‘A Quiet Place’ Delivers a Not So Quiet $50 Million Opening Box Office Mojo headline
April 8, 2018
The original screenplay for The Quiet Place was written by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods. After the script sold to Paramount in 2016, John Kraninski came on board to further develop the script, and direct and star in the finished version that this past weekend finished at top of the box office.
So which “cultural center” did these guys develop their filmmaking chops? I’m glad you asked.
“Scott Beck and Bryan Woods are two screenwriters you may not have heard of yet but surely will very soon. Scott and Bryan first met as sixth-graders in their hometown of Bettendorf, Iowa. After discovering a shared interest in cinema, the duo began making stop-motion movies together with their Star Wars action figures. This collaboration continued into high school, where they directed numerous shorts and their first feature films.” Mike Sargent Script mag
Like Diablo Cody they also attended the University of Iowa, which is where they first came up with the idea for The Quiet Place. Just this morning both Woods and Beck were back in Iowa City giving a talk on “Exploring Careers in Cinema.”
They’re based in L.A. now but made their first short films and Nightlight (2015) back in Iowa.
Of course, this doesn’t exactly address Ted Hope’s question that I started off this blog addressing. But the drum I’ve been hitting for the past decade is there are filmmakers rising up all over the world finding support and inspiration from their communities.
In lectures, I often beg people to do one thing— one simple thing— that I truly believe can change our world: Do at least one thing to help or promote another person and his or her work. That chain of support is the key to a sustainable diverse culture. We must shed the hierarchy that we have imposed upon ourselves. At public events, I am always surprised that audience members don’t introduce themselves when asking questions: It would put us all on common ground.
Filmmakers often make the common mistake of thinking they are all in competition with each other. It is not a zero-sum game. When I was just starting out, it took me a long time to realize that when I was applying for a job (as an assistant director or a line producer), the challenge wasn’t to beat someone else out for the job, but to find the best fit. Now I try to share what I have learned with others, and their responses, in turn, sharpen my focus. When a friend’s business improves, so do my opportunities. I try to introduce the people I like to the people who I know can help them. Sometimes, their success eclipses mine, and that is fantastic. I have had the joy of mentoring many individuals, watching my assistants like Anthony Bregman, Glen Basner, and others rise up the ladder and contribute to the improvement of others’ work. Community building is in all of our interests. Helping others rarely hurts anyone, particularly yourself. Ted Hope Hope for Film: From the Frontline of the Independent Cinema Revolutions (pp. 212-213). Soft Skull Press. Kindle Edition.
So the person I’m going to be promoting is Ted Hope. He’s been pretty prolific online writing about the past, present, and future of filmmaking so I’ll ride that wave for a while.
“You are about to enter an industry that’s filled with narcissistic, egotistical, misanthropic liars and cheats. You’d better find a safe harbor of people you trust. Being an artist is exhausting and nobody appreciates your work to the degree that you want them to… unless you have people around you that say I hear you, I see you, we are in this together, I’m going to help lift you up.”
Ted Hope
Speaking to students at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts Amazon Studios’ Ted Hope shares principles of artistic success
1. The protagonist: Center the story around an everyday person, someone the audience can identify with (not a wealthy or an evil type).
2. The plot: The protagonist needs to go through a serious arc, suffer hardship, and then come to some understanding that the audience didn’t expect.
3. Be bold: Show risk-taking in the filmmaking. Make it feel like it may all fall apart, but then save it at the last moment: People should say, “It’s bold.”
4. Be disciplined: If you can’t be bold, be disciplined. If it doesn’t fit the form, cut it out.
5. Own your aesthetic: Embrace, even flaunt, your aesthetic and the limits of your aesthetic. Don’t be ashamed of your limitations. Own your choices.
6. Engage bigger issues: The story has to be bigger than the movie itself and should deal with issues of either class conflict, gender conflict, sexual conflict, or other political issues. How do you comment on the world at large while still examining the minute and particular?
7. Cast: You need to cast a few stars or soon-to-be stars, so it should be an ensemble piece that covers generational conflict. You have the old-name actor you’re bringing back and the up-and-comer whom no one had seen yet, along with actors who can move from TV into feature films.
8. Shock value: It needs some moment of audacity, the kind of thing that people will talk about and that might even shock the uninitiated.
9. The right mix: Have a sense of humor about great tragedy— or find the tragedy in the hilarious. Embrace the cocktail; make it at least feel fresh.
10. Leave them wanting more: Shorter is better; 90 minutes is the new 120 (today, 80 is the new 90). No one ever says, “I wish it had been longer” when they leave the theater.
On Monday I drove by The Roxy Theater in Missoula. Montana where I was able to take a few shots before the early evening sun was hidden by a large cloud.
