Film Courage: How does a filmmaker decide what kind of short film to make?
Kim Adelman, Author/Filmmaker/Instructor: You should definitely make something that you want to
make. I always say and this is for shorts and for features you know when people say well what makes
a good film I always say there's three things the very first thing is something you want to make
for shorts and for features you shouldn't make something you don't want to make
you're going to be the prime driver of this and you're going to live with this for the rest of
your career so don't think you know horror films are very popular so I should make a horror film
it's like no if that's not who you are or what you want to do this is the short film is your
chance to do what you want to do so don't sell out because you think you should do that no do
something you really want to do so the first thing is make something you really want to make
then the second part is just make something that other people want to make so if you can't convince
anyone to star in your short or help you to help you know direct it and or produce it or act in it
or you know even crew on it if people aren't so excited to help you on it that might be your
first clue that this is not something really is ready to be made at this period of time
or maybe you don't have enough money to make it I know a lot of people have written short scripts
and you look at you're like well do you have twenty thousand dollars because if you don't have
that I don't think you're going to be able to make this film again we're so used to seeing features
that do all these incredible things that we it's hard for us to realize well yeah that has budgets
of you know millions and millions of dollars so if you wanted to do something that was kind of
like that but only two mil two minutes long still you're gonna need a million dollars so you know do
you have a million dollars you got to scale back and do what you can actually physically do for a
short film so something you want to make something others want to make and is makable and then lastly
this is the part that you can ignore not ignore but something that other people want to see
so you know just because you want to make it and your friends want to make it it could be
that you know you're not getting into festivals because it's just not a film that people really
want to see so I always say there's a lot of people make short films about Alzheimer's and
I'm always like oh another Alzheimer's short it's a story that they really felt like they wanted to
tell and there's a lot of older actors who love to do that film too and you can get great actors
and great drama in the story and it really could be moving but we've seen that short over and over
and over again and you know in a submission of like 20 short films two of them will be
all cyber shorts and you're just like we've seen it the audience has seen it it's just overdone
so you know there are certain things that are just overdone it used to be for a while zombie shorts
like everybody was making zombie shorts I think because the makeup was easy to do or accessible
and again there's inherent drama in zombies right and maybe that's something people really
want to do they're like I want to direct the walking dead so I'm going to make a zombie short
and you know having said that there's some zombie shorts that I absolutely adore and people did
crazy things with it like zombie prom and there's a great one called I Love You Sarah Jane
so there's something I love is zombie shorts but there's been a lot of zombie shorts so you know
yours has to be different so that people don't be like that's another zombie short sure and what was
the feature of alzheimer's feature was it away from her oh wasn't it alice was one too there's
been a lot yeah there's been some great features but yeah I get it for short it might be yeah but
even now if you tried to make another feature of that people be like haven't we seen that 100
times already sure sure there's certain topics that are just you know you could argue universal
and always of interest and again your specific version of it would make it specific and not so
universal you know everybody has a different kind of story with it so in the same way there's lots
of different ways you can do zombie shorts so not talking you out of it I'm just saying by the way
there's a lot of that however again like coming of age aren't there a million coming-of-age stories
and each one is different and unique so you should tell your own coming-of-age story that you really
want to tell and quite often students do because like what living have they done coming of age is
all the living they've really done so go ahead and make a coming-of-age story and I'm sure it'll be
you know very moving and touching and something you wanted to make and others wanted to make
there just might be a point where people don't necessarily want to see it because like
we've seen a lot of community shorts sure or or about like a family member but I know there was
there's been a few where there was one about a guy whose dad was a musician and he kind of gave it up
to raise his kids and there was a part of him that felt very resentful about that and it was a great
look at how this guy never really got to connect with his dad because his dad always felt like I
gave up my art for you and and it was the way it was done was was I mean you had tears in your eyes
I love moving short you know so as much as i'll try to talk filmmakers out of something like I
don't know don't do it we don't benefit if it's moving I don't care if I've seen a million of them
before I want to be moved and I want to be touched and I want to hear a story that the filmmaker had
to tell despite 100 people telling them don't do it there have been too many of them or whatever if
you have something passionate you want to say and do then it'll translate onto screen and we'll see
it and be like wow even though we said oh we've got a million of them we're only going to show
one we're going to show yours because yours was so fabulous sure and but then there's a
danger and you could do it oh my uncle joe's just great and everyone's like sure he's a sweet guy
but what's where's the arc here you know so that there is you know I get my big pet peeve's endings
that so many people and this what turns what was sketches a lot too that there's just no ending
and with short films we really are critical about the ending quite often there's a big terrific
twist at the end that takes you completely just by surprise and everything you've seen before
you now reevaluate and those ten shorts tend to do great because we're not expecting that but
no matter what there has to be reason that your short ends at that time and that ending has to
feel satisfying to the viewers so you know I think that's where a lot of people fail too is that just
peter's out there's no real ending there's no last statement or anything like that it's just like and
it's over maybe because they ran out of money or because the ending didn't work and they just
kind of cut back till they found something they thought could potentially work but ending is so
important what if someone can't decide whether to make a short film a feature film or a TV pilot so
TV pilots I don't really have much to say on that front because it's not my specialty and it's also
tricky in this world I mean I think you could make something that other people will say oh that could
actually work as a pilot for concept for a TV show so it wasn't like a 22 minute or 42 minute full-on
legitimate pilot you know which again people are used to expensive stuff on TV so if you have those
you have those millions sitting around so you can make a pilot that looks like a real pilot
go for it but you can do a part of it or a little segment of it or a trailer of it to
give people an idea of what it could potentially be but for a short film or for a feature film
you know you can you can go ahead and make it right nobody's gonna stop you from doing
it and I shouldn't be just say don't do a TV pilot if you know how to do it go for it do it
again nobody stops you and that's what's so fabulous it's like if you want to do it and you
think you know how to do it go for it totally make it but I always say too people can tell people can
tell from like watching two minutes of a 20 minute long film this person is storytelling this person
knows what they're doing and they'll often say I don't need to see the whole film I can see that
they know you know how to work with actors how to deliver moving moments etc and that can show
people okay now they're ready to make that bigger piece so don't feel like you have to do the full
length thing to have people appreciate what your talent is or see that there's talent to make you
take the next step of you know you don't have to make a low budget feature to get hired to make a
feature there are many people who've gotten hired to make a feature based on a short film or just
based on their script by themselves you know by itself that they can be a director for it you know
I do believe in low budget filmmaking and there's a great up no again no one will stop you and that
you can make amazing things with a low budget film but I always think it kind of comes back to money
too you know no matter how cheap you try to do it low budget filmmaking for feature that's a lot of
money you know it's even if you're skipping by with thousands it's like do you have thousands
you can make a car or you could buy a brand new car or you could make a feature film that
and people aren't used to seeing so cheap feature films too that's what's also really difficult
they're used to more expensive films so sometimes they don't see the value of what you're making
when you've done it so incredibly cheap I would say you know a short film that was really short
but shows your talent and shows what you want to do is more worth your time and effort and money
and so you know again I don't think you can make a short film for no money whatsoever you can make
a short film for 500 you can make a short film for a couple of thousand dollars quite often I
teach and some of my students underestimate how much money they have to put into it
especially about posts now when you're a film student you can often get things to
help you with post but the difference between something that you just shot on your iphone
with no post and something that you do proper post on world of difference so you know people
underestimate the money that you need for post production and then they offer underestimate
the amount of money you need if you're going to send your film off on the festival circuit
that's also not free so all of a sudden it's like let's say you had five thousand dollars which I
would love to have five thousand dollars to spend on my art you know I’d rather you make a short
film for three thousand dollars including all your posts and save two thousand dollars to send it off
on the festival circuits where you can actually go and attend these festivals and you know because
they're not going to pay you to if the festival's not your back door they're not going to pay to fly
you out or put you up but you may want to do that and then you know you need money to do that so
I would highly recommend when you're budgeting put money for post and put money money for festivals
if that's something you want to do what if someone says i'll do my own post a lot of
people do think they can do their own post because you know that's the miracle of the
the computer now that so many elements are there and you can in the same way you can write your
own script or shoot your own script but I always say like it's a world of difference if you have
somebody shoot it be a dp for you so why wouldn't you also have somebody edit for you and be there
give their skills for that and why wouldn't you have somebody do their post-production sound
because it's amazing how much post-production sound can add to the production value of your film
sound is everything people will forgive things that don't look that great
but if the sound is good it brings it up incredibly and makes it so much more professional
and a lot of people want to help you you know a lot of post-production places if you approach them
and you're only asking for help on a five-minute long short and you have time
you're like whenever if you can do it in your spare time sometimes you can get professionals to
help you on these things for not that much money or you pay like a regular client if you have that
money you can get top not I know a lot of short filmmakers who have Skywalker Sound do their sound
it's doable you know so if you have the money frankly in filmmaking if you have the money
a lot of things are possible that's true but don't skip on post and don't skip on marketing.