Despite currently attending a book fair, I have managed to squeeze in some precious movie devoted time. One such instance involved accidentally stumbling into a talk on 'Self-Marketing in Filmmaking and Publishing'. One of the panelists was a man named Shaun Rana, a filmmaker who has recently signed a contract to make a feature film after his concept trailer was seen by a major studio:
The trailer was shown to us with very little context, and therefore there were a few giggles from the audience (especially at the "dominate this" part). So we were quite relieved to hear this was purely a 'concept trailer' made for 1000EUR, and not an actual feature-length film. Shaun then explained how he had 'self-promoted' his highly stylised trailer by mentioning it on message boards and fan forums - before being plugged on the prestigious IMDB NewsDesk. After "4 or 5 days" he was contacted by a studio (didn't mention which one) and is now in the works to make a feature length version. Impressive indeed. But I can't help but feel this new wave of Zack Snyder wannabees is going to start a very tiresome trend: the movie/video game look.
After box office hits such as 300 and Sin City, studios have gone a little mad with trying to replicate these successes, and failed spectacularly (The Spirit and Watchmen to name but a few). This goes to show CGI and clever lighting is not a worthy substitute for a good ol' fashioned storytelling. However, the public have spoken and demanded more green-stage based films. Which means computer whizzes/geeks like Shaun are seen as the next generation of filmmakers, despite having little concept of cohesive narrative or non-cringeworthy dialogue.
The end of life as we know it? Probably not. Just expect to find films such as Warren Lich littering a bargain bin near you very soon.
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