Is Film School Necessary? Top Indie Filmmakers Respond
By
Paula Bernstein
|
Indiewire
December 20, 2014 at 9:30AM
Film school isn't cheap. Is it worth it?
Dawn Porter
Given the increasing costs of tuition and the decreasing costs of film production, does it make more sense to spend money on making a movie rather than studying filmmaking? We reached out to some of our favorite indie directors to ask them whether they went to film school and whether it was essential (or at least helpful) to their subsequent careers.
Here are their responses:
"Films really are about living life, and that part doesn't happen inside a film school." - Ana Lily Amirpour
I've already been quoted saying that "filmmaking is like sex, there's no one way to do it, and the only way to learn it is by doing it." I think that's true. I also think a place dedicated to helping artists make art is a good place and can be a tool. I went to film school for screenwriting at UCLA. It gave me a reason to move to L.A., and I met several great friends there, including Alex O Flinn, who is now my editor, and I wrote five feature length screenplays in two years. But I never expected film school to teach me how to make films or tell a story, because I believe you can't teach that.
I think film school is a tool, and a tool by itself is useless. A tool needs many other things in order for it to have a purpose, it's there to create something else. There are so many tools. You can watch movies, you can read scripts from your favorite movies, watch bonus features of your favorite directors and see how they do things, get a camera and try filming things, you can travel the world, read books, listen to music. Use everything and anything to put yourself in the place where you feel creative and fascinated by what you're doing and by life. Films really are about living life, and that part doesn't happen inside a film school. Herzog said it best: "A boxer in Africa would be better trained as a filmmaker than if he graduated from one of the 'best' film schools in the world."
"112 Weddings"
I'm sure film school is helpful for many, I just know it would have been my ruination.
As the last of three children spaced four years apart, my parents couldn't afford film school tuition, and being forced to pay back huge student loans is the last thing an aspiring filmmaker should face.
Also, I think I intuitively understood I wasn't ready to make films at that young an age. I didn't want to find out that I wasn't nearly as good as I desperately wanted to be. I would have been way too vulnerable to criticism.
"I'm sure film school is helpful for many, I just know it would have been my ruination." - Doug Block
So instead I went to a state school at Cornell, which didn't have a
film program but had Cornell Cinema, probably the finest exhibition
program in the country. I went to movies every night and that was my
film school. My teachers were Welles and Bergman and Truffaut and Buster
Keaton and the writings of Pauline Kael.And for me it's been a headlong love affair with movies ever since.
Marshall Curry
"There's no substitute for going out and spending hundreds of hours trying to make a film." - Marshall Curry
I didn't go to film school -- I studied comparative religion on
college -- and I was working at an Internet company when I decided I
wanted to make a documentary film. I had saved up some money and
realized I could either go to film school or just spend that same money
and time trying to make a film, so that's what I did. I got a camera and
spent months shooting with it, studying my footage and trying to figure
out how not to make the same mistakes twice. Then I took a weekend
course in Final Cut and spent the next year sitting in my apartment day
after day, learning how to edit by trial and error. The result of that
exercise was my first film "Street Fight."I am sure that there are lots of things that I could have learned in film school, and sometimes I'm jealous of my friends who went. I know I beat my head against problems that someone could have simply explained to me in school. And there are probably holes in my film education. But ultimately, whether you go to film school or not, there's no substitute for going out and spending hundreds of hours trying to make a film.
READ MORE: The 25 Best Film Schools in America
Robert Machoian ("Forty Years from Yesterday"):
"If
you want your mind expanded, and want to look at film in a deeper way
then Hollywood, then yes, film school is good." - Robert Machoian
This is a hard one: The short answer is yes, if you look at all the
major players and smaller players, many went to film school. Can someone
not go to film school and still build a career without it? Yes,
definitely. I went to film school. Why? Because I already was married
and I couldn't afford to go down to L.A. and try and make it. Also, I
wasn't aspiring to make "Bad Boys 3," or make a $100 million in a
weekend as a filmmaker. I think if you want your mind expanded, and want
to look at film in a deeper way then Hollywood, then yes, film school
is good. For those wanting to make the next big films, then NYU, USC,
UCLA are the schools you need to get yourself into. The smaller schools
are for people who want to be in control of their careers as they grow.Aaron Katz ("Land Ho!"):
For me, attending University of North Carolina School of the Arts was important in two ways. First, it gave me a good practical idea, technically I mean, of how to make a movie. The school was pretty conservative about the approach to production, which gave us a good sense of the way things are traditionally supposed to be done. I've often departed from the way we learned to do things in school, but having that foundation has informed my choices in a way that I've found very useful. The second, and most important thing, was meeting many of the people who have become my longtime collaborators.
Dawn Porter ("Gideon's Army"):
I didn't attend film school, although I thought about it many times. In hindsight, I know now that I had great training on all the essential elements of filmmaking and more from my past life as a lawyer and then working for ABC News. As a lawyer, I learned to write, to tell a good story in a clear and simple manner. But my real education came from working alongside the many talented journalists at ABC. I saw how pieces were scripted, edited and refined. I read hundreds if not thousands of interviews in the five and a half years on the job and I saw how the best interviewers got their subjects to open up. Of course, I saw the importance of good shooting and editing, the importance of not rushing and allowing a story to unfold. But the single most important thing I learned was how important it is in non-fiction to let the situation speak for itself. I spend a lot of time thinking about how to remove myself from the film, even when I have a strong point of view. I like the audience to make its own decisions about the characters and if i do my job correctly the film allows the audience to create its own connection with the characters.
"A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night"
I never went to film school. I went from doing a whole bunch of theater, writing, and standup to making a feature film with not a single YouTube video in between. It was a crazy move but all that other arts experience certainly helped with the essentials of storytelling. So if you have experience in storytelling and even more basic than that, if you have experience entertaining people, you'll have that part of film school covered.
What I always wish I had more of is more technical know-how and quite frankly, more jargon. I'm finishing up my fourth film and I'm still like, "I want a two-shot -- no, wait, I mean a double shot -- no wait, what's it called?" It's hard looking cool when you never learned the words. But DPs always seem to get what I'm talking about so in some ways, who cares if I don't know the right words?
But one thing film school does not give you is an understanding of how audiences will respond to your work. I feel like that's missing from a lot of folks that have the deep film-school-straight-into-production type experience. But don't worry, just do some standup, fail miserably, and then you'll figure out the spectrum of audience reactions and what it is they want.
Tom Dolby ("Last Weekend"):I didn't attend film school, though I did take a lot of film theory classes in college. I think film school is great if you have the time and inclination (and money). But mostly, I believe the best way to learn how to make a film is, quite simply, to make a film. Not only will you have made something that can be a calling card, but you'll meet your first set of real-world collaborators -- it's an invaluable experience that I’m not sure can be properly gained in the classroom.
Tribeca
Elisabeth Moss and Jason Schwartzman in "Listen Up Philip"
I fear that reducing the argument to binary questions like whether film school "is" or "isn't" helpful is a bit reductive. Anything can be helpful to one person and useless to another. I think that beyond a doubt giving people who think they are or may be interested in filmmaking a few years to have the luxury of just "being a student" where you have nothing else to do is absolutely a great position to be in. Whether or not people chose to take advantage of having years to "want to make films" without "having to actually have a real life, a job, or real responsibilities" is up to them. For me, it was a great time to balance class with discovering repertory cinema as well as augmenting my education with a job at a video store. If I treated film school the way most people treat regular school (the obligation you have to endure in order to live the fun life of a student with friends, parties, no real commitments, etc.), I probably to this day would never have made a film. I would just have a degree.
I attended the State University of New York at Purchase Filmmaking program from 1980 to 1984 (undergraduate). It was an affordable art school created for lower middle class families supported with robust state-guaranteed student loans. It was the best thing that could ever have happened to me. (I wrote my last monthly student loan check of $185 sometime in the year after I made my second feature film, "Trust" -- so, sometime in 1992 -- seven years after graduating.)
Learning the various crafts associated with filmmaking at that time was the basis of our day-to-day work. But our teachers were concerned that we have other interests other than filmmaking. Our creative work was aimed at helping us discover for ourselves our own interests and the appropriate voice in which to express them.
"The pain and the suffering, the compromises and the degradation… that will happen afterwards anyway." - Hal Hartley
I think education is important and worthwhile. Any education. These days, when the techniques of filmmaking can be acquired so easily on a laptop and with inexpensive cameras, I don't think film school is so important for that alone. (Access to equipment was important back in the '80s.)
But young people should have an opportunity to develop their craft for a while outside the rat race -- to develop as people and discover their real interests and sensibilities without the pressure to succeed as a commodity -- to be somewhere they are allowed to attempt and fail! Because that's how you learn things. A safe haven. Just for a while. The pain and the suffering, the compromises and the degradation…that will happen afterwards, anyway.
And, of course, there's always the chance to study and work surrounded by well-intentioned and informed older people who have greater experience of things…
It took me years to get over the feeling that I had somehow gotten away with murder for being allowed to have an affordable education like that.
Is film school essential or even helpful to aspiring indie filmmakers?
I didn't go that route. I decided I had enough theoretical learning and wanted to be hands on. The problem with this approach is that you start at the bottom doing things that you may feel you're overqualified to do after four years of higher education.
"Do you know how to collate?" was the type of question I was often asked on my first film jobs when I was hoping for: "would you like to take over the shoot?"
But unless you have a family fortune and can convince daddy to finance your first film, you will probably also be doing the same grunt jobs I did but doing it after four years of film school and now with student loans. But the opportunity to play around and make films for three to four years without the scrutiny of the "real" world may have great value in itself. It may build you confidence and give you the opportunity to explore and make mistakes in a private arena. I have not seen many good student films, but I've seen incredible films from directors after they graduated from film school.
12 Things I Learned at Werner Herzog's Rogue Film School
By
Marie-Françoise Theodore
|
Indiewire
September 24, 2014 at 4:13PM
Here's what it's like to attend "film school" with Werner Herzog.
Werner Herzog
Werner Herzog's Rogue Film School
"Facts do not constitute truth." - Werner Herzog
Our work, his "Rogues" as he affectionally called us, was as distinct
as we were: A quantum physicist and first-time filmmaker was making a
film about something that is invisible but makes existence possible (how
do you make the invisible visible?), another person was working on a
film about an indigenous language in Canada that dying out along with
its last speakers, then there was a creepy love story between a man and a
corpse, and finally, an engrossing Hollywood-style thriller/horror
movie.READ MORE: An Appreciation of Werner Herzog's "Bad Lieutenant"
Far from being surrounded by well-off dilettantes who could afford to pay the tuition (the cost of the 4-day seminar is $1500), I found my fellow participants to be serious-minded, talented documentary and narrative filmmakers, some of whom (like myself) had made great sacrifices to attend. Luckily, I benefitted from friends and strangers who generously gave to my successful online crowdfunding campaign and I only had to travel up the road, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to attend.
Werner Herzog's "Fitzcarraldo"
I first encountered Werner's work while working at Channel 4 in London and watching TV at my desk when "Fitzcarraldo" came on. The volume was on mute and I although had no idea what the story was, I became riveted by the images on the screen. Before that moment, I had no idea who Werner Herzog was, but from that moment on I was captivated and have been ever since.
"The Rogue Film School is not for the faint-hearted." - Werner Herzog
I applied to the film school without ever thinking I had a chance at
being selected. My work is not the usual Hollywood fare, but then again,
that's not necessarily what interests Herzog. What gave me the temerity
to apply was this quote on the front page of the Rogue Film School website."The Rogue Film School is not for the faint-hearted. It is for those who have travelled on foot, who have worked as bouncers in sex clubs or as wardens in a lunatic asylum, for those who are willing to learn about lock picking or forging shooting permits in countries not favoring their projects. In short: for those who have a sense of poetry. For those who are pilgrims. For those who can tell a story to four year old children and hold their attention. For those who have a fire burning within. For those who have a dream." -- Werner Herzog
I read it and thought "Yep, thats me!" Amazingly, I was accepted.
Werner Herzog's "Guerilla Film School"
"You!" he called to me. I stopped and adjusted my eyes to the small group of people by the door now all staring at me. "You must be…" He then glanced down at his clipboard which I noticed had neat columns of our names along with notes about our films. He pronounced my name with his distinctive German accented English. "Marie-Françoise... yes, I remember your film. Very good. You are one of the only ones with a BIG story. It's very important. We should show it."
When Werner addresses you, you have his undivided attention, a rarity in most encounters I've found in life, much less in L.A. He then gave me what felt like an on-the-spot psychic reading. I had no idea what he was fucking talking about. I could only nod my head in stunned silence.
During the seminar, we watched a few of the great films from the participants. When I thought he had forgotten about mine, I felt slightly relieved. It was a surreal moment when, on the last day of the film school, he screened my award-winning short "rebel in the soul" in its entirety and not just the five minute clip that I expected. Although I knew he had watched it previously (Werner watches all the submitted film clips personally), while sitting there in the presence of Werner and the other amazing filmmakers while it screened, I felt a mixture of extreme pride and nerve-wracking humility.
Lena Herzog
Werner Herzog's "Grizzly Man"
"I am a product of my failures." - Werner Herzog
What most impressed us was Werner's passionate mission to cultivate a
sense of urgency in lighting a fire under our asses to make films that
have big stories and convey a sense of poetry, wonder and awe. He wanted
us to write, film and edit as if we were on death row and they were
coming to strap us to the gurney. There is no time to waste on fear or
self-doubt. You're about to die. It takes a ridiculous amount of courage
and inner fortitude to follow your instincts. It's not for the faint of
heart. Be up to the task.It was an immersive seminar that lit creative juices and left me burning to take the next step in my filmmaking journey. There's no way I can encapsulate all that I absorbed in those intense, too brief 4 days, but the experience reinvigorated and changed my artistic practice forever. I recommend that you go go and experience it for yourself. In the meantime, here's a list of my personal favorite commandments that landed on our heads from on high:
1. READ. READ. READ. READ. READ.
And then READ SOME MORE. Compulsive reader that I am, it was music to my ears when Werner commanded us to "Read. Read. Read. Read." He had put us to work weeks before the seminar with a slew of books on the reading list that included poetry, Hemingway and nonfiction that was delicious to behold (The Warren Report was surprisingly engrossing). READ LITERATURE. READ POETRY. Not books on making films or scriptwriting. Throw out formulas, where on page 7 this has to happen and on page 10 the protagonist has to say that, let go of Aristotle ("Aristotle is not that good for screenplays") and get fucking rid of that cat and tell the STORY. Don't know how to tell a story? READ A BOOK. Read in different languages from different periods. This confirmed my personal decision made long ago to extend my reading beyond the Eurocentric and to learn to speak Haitian Kréyòl.2. Write Quickly.
"It takes me 5 days to write a screenplay," said Werner. "If you're spending more than two weeks on it something's wrong." Rats, not so happy about this one. So that screenplay I've been working on for…uh, YEARS… that's not normal? I was curious about his writing habits and yeah, I was the one asking all those questions about Werner's ability to write so quickly, a skill that I hoped to emulate. He was bluntly honest in saying, sorry, he couldn't help me and that I would have to figure it out for myself. He said that he doesn't sit down to write until the story comes full blown into his mind and is bursting to come out. He essentially dictates what is in his head. But he realized that what worked for him wouldn't necessarily work for anybody else. Plus he didn't want little Werner's running around. Really? Then he took pity on what I am assuming was my dejected face, relented and gave me a secret that I now share with you (shhh...come closer): four or five days before he begins writing, to warm up, he only reads poetry.3. Get Paid.
"The director has to be paid for their work. Never use your own money," said Werner. Well, unless you really really have to. But if you plan and negotiate your terms right you shouldn't have to. Werner had a special guest director speak with us about his process of getting his film made. I felt for him when he explained a situation that involved an unexpected post-production expense and then having to use his own funds to complete the movie. Werner flatly stated the situation should never have happened. He wasn't chastising him as much as giving us the know-how and tools to avoid those circumstances, if at all possible. But sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.
"Hold firm to your vision but don't be a tyrant on set." - Werner Herzog
4. Don't Be Afraid of Failure.
"I am a product of my failures," said Werner, who later added: "The film set is a no cry zone." Everybody laughed at this one. It hit me in the sweet spot because although from the outside Werner gives the impression of unimpeded success (on his terms) he also embraces failure and isn't afraid of it. As creators, we're going to get it wrong, often. But that's to be expected. It's better to fail doing the right thing rather than succeed at doing the wrong thing - just don't cry about it on set.5. Dive Deep.
"Go to the deepest level possible as quickly as possible. Take them to the highest level and do not allow them to come down," said Werner. Just start the movie. No beating around the bush. Dive deep into the heart and stay there.6. Defend Your Vision.
"Hold firm to your vision but don't be a tyrant on set," said Werner, noting that when you have a clear vision, you must be prepared to defend it. If someone criticizes your idea, come up with a coherent argument. Be flexible, but remember that sometimes you may have to convince others to go along with your clear vision. Make decisions on set and stand by them without being bossy.
Werner Herzog's "Cave of Forgotten Dreams"
7. Educate Yourself in the Business.
"Be self-reliant, not independent," Werner told us. He advised us to earn basic legal concepts, know your budget and raise your financing. Also, don't hire an attorney until you already have an agreement in the works. "Never allow an attorney to negotiate for you," he said.8. Keep Track of the Money.
"Look at the cash flow" and "know the price of the camel" were just two of Werner's financial tips. Every night after shooting, Werner said, he counts the money. He's a firm believer in knowing where the money is going and how much. This gives new meaning to balancing your check book. I'm guessing it helps avoid dealing with #3.9. "If you don't have a deal in two days, you won't have a deal in two years" - Werner Herzog
'Nuff said.10. Create Your Own Truth.
"Facts do not constitute truth," Werner reminded us. He advised us to "construct a reality that illuminates the truth" more than stating a simple fact which tells you nothing about the inner emotional world.
Fandor
"Aguirre: the Wrath of God"
11. Travel on Foot.
"Tourism is sin. Traveling on foot is virtue," said Werner, who urged us to see life close-up on the ground level. Right now, one of the Rogues in my class is traveling by foot to Bristol via the English/Welsh border. I've been on several pilgrimages in my life to many different places, all I realized, on foot. There is something to experiencing life from this vantage point that is both visceral and life-affirming. There's probably good reason why many religions and cultures have some aspect of going on a pilgrimage or quest to mark going from one level of consciousness to another.12. Do it.
Most of all, Werner told us to just go ahead and DO IT. He said we should never doubt our own significance. He said that he needed to make money so he can continue to make films, but they have to be about topics that he feels are significant. The duty of the filmmaker is to instill a sense of awe and wonder in the audience. Don't let bureaucrats or gatekeepers stop you. Take what you have, take the next step whatever it may be and MAKE YOUR MOVIE.READ MORE: Fandor Gets 16 Werner Herzog Films in Exclusive Deal
