Becoming the Future of the Silver Screen

Mrs. Grinnell

English 12

1st May 2005

Film and Video Production:

Becoming the Future of the Silver Screen

Every so often a movie is released with such tense anticipation and glamorous visual art that the public is drawn to this dramatic rendition of life in the theatre. For even just two hours or so, you are put into a different lifestyle. Action, drama or comedy it may be. We are thrust into a different way of thinking. We are forced to learn the characters thoughts and feelings. The hard work and artistic skill that goes into these magnificent films is not an easy thing to mimic. Out of the thousands of movies released worldwide each year only a handful are truly worthy of the label film art. Most of the great movies are either produced by a multi million dollar company that hired a director with quite a bit of experience under his belt, or are made with little money and slowly find their way into the film business due to

increasing popularity because of the good writing and talented though

unknown actors in the film. These small films are a great way to get a foot in the door of the giant Hollywood business.

There are many courses that need to be taken to get a bachelors degree in film arts, and though not promised, it can really help one get a good footing in the business of film and video production. The first thing needed is to learn the basics of film making. This course would be labeled as Introduction to Film and Video or Introduction to Cinema. It introduces the basic education for prospective film students. It starts with the conceptualization to execution and examines the many different film genres, such as context of history, theory, fiction, drama and comedy. Many major colleges across the U.S. offer this course, such as UCLA, UT at Austin, SDSU and many others. This course is easy to complete and requires no pre-requisites. Though taking courses such as these is not required to get into this business, it is defiantly recommended since one's chance of creating a small film with the common amount of knowledge and having it produced and hit the big time is very slim. Film is such a competitive business that education is crucial if one wants to land a decent job in the work force. Although it is possible to do it all without the education, it is highly unlikely.

The knowledge one learns from just basic filmmaking techniques will prove extremely valuable in the future on the set.

Another important skill that needs to be at least looked at is screenwriting. Screenwriting refers to the art and craft of writing screenplays or scripts. Even if one plans on becoming a director and not a screenwriter one needs to know what kind of scripts to look for. This is very important for a beginning small movie director since the reader will most likely be writing their own scripts to get some recognition. A script is a document that outlines every aural, visual, behavioral, and lingual element required to tell a story, according to the dictionary definition at www.Wikidpedia.org. It is crucial to remember that film is a visual medium. One doesn't tell the audience the story, one shows them. So what one will be writing is not a novel but more like explaining a dream on paper. One must learn to write a screenplay visually. As famed director Darren Aronofsky said in an interview with a struggling screenwriter trying to get published,

"Most of what one writes that doesn't work on screen will just be

improvised on the movie set".

There are many important requirements for screenplays that may seem like minutia at first glance but the format of ones script is extremely important

since it will be submitted along with hundreds of others to one producer. For example, the main font in use in the U.S. by both publishers and the Hollywood film industry is Courier 12 pitch According to AFI (American Film Industry) the basics of screenwriting. Though this seems unimportant, when a publisher is looking at a manuscript he is going to look for things like this. So if one is planning on writing a screenplay one will want to learn the most intricate aspects of how it is done. There are classes one can take to learn the basics screenwriting, many of which can be found online, such as www.writinclasses.com. This site offers plenty of online workshops that can greatly guide one in the style of screenwriting. This is highly recommended for anyone starting out in this business.

It is also important to know ones role in this whole process. There are producers and then there are directors. A film producer oversees the making of movies. The producer initiates, coordinates, supervises and controls matters such as raising funding, hiring key personnel, and arranging for distributors. The producer is involved throughout all phases of the filmmaking process from inception to completion of a project. A director orchestrates the artistic and dramatic aspects of a film. The role typically includes: Defining the overall artistic vision of the film and controlling the

content and flow of the film's plot. As well as directing the performances of actors, both mechanically by putting them in certain positions (i.e. blocking), and dramatically by eliciting the required range of emotions. Also organizing and selecting the locations in which the film will be shot and managing technical details such as the positioning of cameras and the use of lighting. All concerning definitions according