Film Courage: When I say the word filmmaker what comes to mind?
Khoa Le, Entrepreneur and Filmmaker: Storytelling.
People that want to make an impact and people that want to walk with the elephants.
People are going to look at filmmaking as an industry that for the artists for the people
that want to tell stories they want to leave a legacy and the people I think about filmmaking as
people that want to be in with a community that just wants to be a part of something to belong.
Film Courage: Walk with the elephants?
Khoa: Yeah.
Film Courage: What is this?
Khoa: Walking with the celebrities and the red carpet, the hoopla. oh the Giants the
Giants yeah okay it's a noble industry that's how I look at it yeah but where it's not a
yeah I mean it's like I'm a filmmaker and they lift this up oh hi I'm a filmmaker right that's
how I that's how I think about it with when I think about that but when it comes to for me it's
about impact when I say the word entrepreneur what comes to mind troubleshooting solving problems
that's solving problem it's I think it's about empowering people to want to
make a change in industry and impact people's lives same thing and to be able to
I would say to move the generations forward
can you survive as a filmmaker if you're not an entrepreneur
good question yes if you are if your content is good and yes if
if your content is good yes and if you are in a place
to in the place of good timing to be able to have good business people around you if not then no
it's not the no is that the old adage like you're only as good as the the brightest one in your
company or something like that I don't even know yeah or maybe you're as good as your last film or
look I think I think anything that's creative is subjective and it's very
difficult and I think that in in the creative world I think that it's
um I think that people don't value the art form don't value art as much as other Industries right
and I think that it's it's not tangible in a way where people say oh my God I it's it's something
that is so like it's like it's an everyday job people don't look at that way that's
why it's that's why films are scarce those films are rare the good ones are and people
are not willing to pay for the bad ones right so that's why it's hard for filmmakers in my opinion
do you enjoy a challenge do you rise to the occasion if somebody says you can't do something
I do I do when my back's against the wall I I would say that it's that's when I excel
I did it for all my films and I did it in my entrepreneurship Journey
I mean I'm not here to talk about my background but I'm a refugee immigrant from Vietnam and I
grew up with my back on the wall all the time and it's always been challenging so I don't think it's
a matter of people telling me that I can't do it I think it's a matter of just the nature of the
job itself and not wanting to disappoint people that believes in you is the challenging part
you think normal things don't scare you so you're you're ready to oh no one thing
scares me I'm scared of heights and I'm I'm I'm I think I think it's it's complacency scares me
your passion is storytelling before building a business entrepreneurship baseball oh baseball
okay okay so baseball and then and then storytelling then music then music right
music videos no musician I was a record producer and a songwriter oh and you went to Juilliard
right I went to Julia for music and then I went and then filmmaking because I couldn't
I didn't make it in music but I thought that the medium was at the filmmaking was a better
medium than music so I got into that you said you didn't make it in music what is making it
I would say like defining it would be like getting a hit record
making it as getting a hit record being able to have millions of people across the world be
able to listen to the music and and and use that as a platform to create change
that's how I defined it who did you want to be like Michael Jackson at least the
what I wanted to see the music to affect yeah and at what point did you realize it would either be
a harder role than you thought or you weren't it wasn't a challenge you wanted to take on
no I just saw that the the business got harder you know with the ever with the whole streaming
the craziness of people just well in our industry was backstabbing people
nobody's honoring contracts at least that's what I experienced and then people want to
take advantage you over and over and over I I just had enough with that and I said
I put it on pause and my thought process was just like if I ever had a chance to
come back in the game I'm gonna flip this industry upside down and I want to I want to be able to do
it right and really expose the problems and then have a solution for that and that's that was my
mindset when when so I put on I didn't give up on it I just put it on pause and and then
going into the film industry I thought it was a little it was more structured but like more
ethical people at least on this filmmaking side of things oh it's more ethical people there was
more structure there was more processes and and if you understood that and then you understood the
business I thought there was a better chance in making the film industry than the music industry
how does a filmmaker's vision compare to that of an entrepreneur they go hand in hand
I think I think just back to just a backtrack I think the I think you'll I think your career
and your life is defined by your purpose and how you want and so everything I do from music
to films to entrepreneurship All Leads back into wanting to impact people's lives for the better
right however you do it I want to do it at scale some but it actually does feel good when you do
impact people's lives in general and so when it comes to filmmaking it was a way to scale the
communications it's like I look at filmmakers like the commercial way of scaling of of an operation
and Entrepreneurship was like the vehicle to be able to understand how this problem solve and take
business and then and then still go through the same thing of solving problems so that's so they
they all both they all go ahead and hand to me and I think that it's um I think for other people
well I mean for other people they think of film against filmmaking it's like they're
pocket themselves right for me I look at the whole entire picture and I happen to be in filmmaking
I happen to be an entrepreneur because my goal is to update the innovate industries that I think are
problematic for the things that we're passionate about so if you took your favorite entrepreneur
I'm not sure who that is Steve Jobs okay good choice and your favorite filmmaker Stevens to
be at work okay great choice and do you think they have similar dis similar makeups yeah okay
both both are innovative very innovative Steven Spielberg changed the game with his creative
and innovations of films and how he takes it to new levels and story time to a different
level storytelling is pretty much structured very similarly a lot of times right but how he
I look at him as like the the the person that knows how to tell stories to kids and he's able to
tell those he's able to create these fandoms and build this innovative I would call it Innovative
structure that allows people to be inspired to make films at not at his level but be inspired to
do films that want to do films and I look at Steve Jobs as this Innovative guy that's in technology
that that knows how to Target the kids right and be able to create this a luxury good for people to
change the world with and I look at it the same way how would you compare risk taking
between filmmaking and entrepreneurship risk taking oh my gosh I think I think filmmaking
is a complete risk and I think entrepreneurship is a complete risk I think they both have to
there's no guarantees for any of that I think entrepreneurship might be a little bit safer than
filmmaking I think filmmaking is one of the if not the the biggest risk of them all right because
you spend your years trying to make a film raising funds creating the scripts onboarding
people hoping people will stay employing if you had the money for it and and then you put the
product out and then it could get screwed right and people don't like it no one wants to buy it
entrepreneurship is the same thing right it's like you spend maybe not maybe years or maybe
months or whatever it is developing the product putting a team together structured processes and
raising money to launch it and and you put it out there and it doesn't happen so they're both risky
but I feel like filmmaking is just a harder medium because it's creative
it's subjective and entrepreneurship is you could be building a lemonade stands
you could be selling jewelry you could sell whatever it is you want but it's
the same mechanism and it's and it's not as direct it's not it's not like filmmakers are
but some are but but majority it's not filmmakers not going from B2C [aka Business to Consumer]
it's usually go to B2B [aka Business to Business] with a distributor or sales agent wherever it is
that communicates to the sea levels right to the community to the consumers in the entrepreneurship
world you're either straight B2B which is contract procurements and then you have your
oh you're going straight to like your retail store going straight to a B2C base and so I think it's
they're both risky but yeah I think that filmmaking is far more riskier than anything
there's the perception though that being an entrepreneur is a safer route in that it's
business so it's seen as something that's you're going to have a widget that you're going to sell
or a service whereas filmmaking is not but it's actually an illusion they're both equally
equally risky because you can fail you can have a great product and can sit on the shelf
no one wants it now you've bought all the stock a bigger fish can come along yeah I think I think
it depends on what entrepreneurship you're doing right let's say entrepreneurship lane you could
be the entrepreneurship as but entrepreneurship is not all created equally I think entrepreneurship
is if you're a business owner you're a business owner doesn't mean you're an entrepreneur
entrepreneur actually solves problems the ones that want to move the needle forward move want
to maybe possibly you want to change the world maybe not at the scale of Steve Jobs or Elon Musk
but you still want to solve industry problems and you get into it because of that now some
want to have a title entrepreneur right but then you got business owners that might run a
franchise and they're not entrepreneurs they're just franchise owners that just wants to have
some sort of passive income and they have no intention of changing the world or wanting to make
any impact and I think that that's that there's a clear difference filmmaker you want to in a
filmmaking world I think that you got storytellers that want to tell the stories because they haven't
they're having fun telling stories and they want to hopefully have people hear their stories for
whatever reason right and there's multiple reasons for that and then there's filmmakers
that want to just be a part of a community and that's really it and I got plenty of those people
I think I would say 99 of my employees all were filmmakers but they don't want to be filmmakers
because they don't work towards being wanting a filmmaker what I'm saying and I think that
wanting to be a filmmaker also means you want you have to be an entrepreneur to run it.