Be honest: when you think of the word “documentary” are you envisioning a specific genre of filmmaking? It’s okay if you are. Most people do. But in and of themselves, nonfiction films aren’t really a genre, per se. At least not in the same way “horror movies” or “romantic comedies” are a genre. Documentary—or nonfiction film, if you prefer—is its own unique medium, encompassing myriad different tones, styles, approaches and wildly different storytelling techniques....

Recent trips have included destinations such as Algeria, India, Morocco, Nepal and Tunisia. In 2022, GMM started supporting filmmakers throughout the continent of Africa. Our first trip was to South Africa was with producer Avril Speaks, a veteran program mentor who has previously collaborated with two filmmakers from Johannesburg. Avril was gracious enough to share her experience with GMM in Cape Town, Durban, Johannesburg and Pretoria, as well as some background about her long-standing relationship with Film Independent....

Thankfully, moviemaking has only become more equitable and accessible in recent years, as technology develops and distribution methods are continually disrupted and reinvented. But with every new creative outlet comes yet another raft of challenges and intimidating skillset to master. It can be a lot. Luckily the pros are here to help you navigate it all, at Film Independent’s annual Directors Close-Up, which returns next month on February 7. 2018 marks the DCU’s 18th year, featuring a series of five weekly panel discussions devoted to unpacking the art, craft and collaboration of visual storytelling....

All across the film industry there is a worrying lack of qualitative information and insight into audience behaviour. On the one hand, box office data is no longer representative of the broad spectrum of platforms where films are being exploited; on the other, big data is owned only by big companies, and therefore not shared across the industry. This situation is odd for a high-risk industry full of prototypes. Frankly, we are basically spending billions of dollars—blindly....

Favorite football film moment of all time? Oliver Stone’s Any Given Sunday may not be a masterpiece, but Coach Tony D’Amato (Al Pacino) delivers this iconic locker room speech to Miami Sharks quarterback Willie Beaman (Jamie Foxx) and his teammates, including NFL legend Lawrence Taylor. But hey, if dramatic monologues aren’t your thing, try this. -Cooper Hopkins, Website & Database Manager The speech in Any Given Sunday by Al Pacino is the greatest football scene in my opinion....

Returning for the first time since 2017, the Forum seeks to equip working, aspiring and mid-career filmmakers with the knowledge, resources and expert advice needed to get their projects both made and seen. Which, if you know anything about independent filmmaking, is way more impressive than picking up a big dumb hammer or just shooting a bunch of arrows at shit—though admittedly the haircut does up the degree of difficulty....

Creating an original score is a complex, collaborative and sometimes intense process between a director, a composer and their team. In this article, I will try to provide a step-by-step overview of how a composer creates a score and describe a bit of the creative process along the way. Enjoy! SPOTTING The spotting session is technically not part of the composer’s process, but rather a collaborative process between the composer and the director....

By Jim Lichacz / LA Film Fest Guest Blogger One of the joys of attending a film festival is finding the next big thing before it gets packaged by the industry and over-evaluated by the press. One hopes to find the great project that rises to the top based on the mature talent of its creators, the cast they have assembled and the ultimate execution of the idea. The world premiere screening of Goodbye World at the 2013 Los Angeles Film Festival was such an occasion for me....

They say if you don’t believe in yourself, who will? This was the question I found myself facing when it came to completing production on The Fall, my first feature film as director. In the wake of inspirational indie auteurs like Kevin Smith, Robert Rodriguez and Steven Soderbergh, it was always on my mind, the idea of trying to complete production on an independent feature. It seemed at once possible and impossible, and the question Could I actually do this?...

“It starts with Black women. This night is all about female empowerment,” Film Independent Curator Elvis Mitchell proclaimed to the full house at LACMA’s Bing Theater as he introduced the film of the evening. Over the weekend, Film Independent at LACMA hosted a screening of HBO Films’ Bessie and conversation with co-writer/director Dee Rees and executive producer/actor Queen Latifah. The screening was the second of five films featured in the HBO Screening Series at Film Independent at LACMA....

Recently, writer-director Ramin Bahrani graced the Film Independent at LACMA stage for a conversation with Elvis Mitchell following a screening of his new film 99 Homes. Bahrani’s taut thriller about a man’s desperate attempt to save his family home during the subprime mortgage crisis features memorable performances from Michael Shannon and Andrew Garfield. Bahrani was in top form on the evening and shared a number of stories about the making of his latest opus....

The critically-acclaimed film was awarded the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, where it premiered, and is the recipient of a $50,000 distribution grant through Film Independent. “One of my interests was not so much about Yang, but about humans and their emotional attachment to technology,” said the filmmaker Kogonada of his sophomore feature, now out from juggernaut indie studio A24. It was April 8 in Los Angeles, during a post-screening Q&A with the director alongside USC roboticist and artificial intelligence researcher Maja Matarić....

Luckily, things have come a long way since the days of Fred and Wilma—both in our understanding of what television is capable of as a vehicle for visual storytelling as well in our understanding of the mid-Pliocine era (using a woolly mammoth’s snout as a domestic bathing appliance? Highly implausible.) But TV’s capability for projecting thoughtful scientific ideas into the culture need not end at debunking cartoon paleontology. Enter the Sloan Episodic Grant....

As with Assayas and Stewart’s prior collaboration on the director’s 2014 Clouds of Sils Maria, Shopper reflects the theme of women uncovering facets of their identity while experiencing the world around them. Stewart plays Maureen, a young American woman living in Paris working as a personal shopper for a spoiled celebrity. It’s gradually revealed that Maureen is also a medium using her uncanny abilities to communicate with her dead brother, whom she was very close....

What was it? “We were over 50 percent women in the crew,” she told Film Independent President Josh Welsh. “Brendan Gleeson said he’d never been on such an estrogen-filled set in his life.” The film’s subject matter inspired the primarily female team making it: Suffragette tells the story of the women’s suffrage movement in England in the early 20th century, which has largely been neglected by the history books. “Women’s history is a very minor part of history [compared to] the history of powerful men [that we learn in school],” Owen said, “and working class women’s history is almost completely erased....

In a guest column for the The Hollywood Reporter, Simon Kilmurry, executive director of the International Documentary Association, wrote: “If cinema is our most powerful art form, [then] documentary is both its beating heart and its conscience. It is more important than ever that we come together to speak up for and support those filmmakers, here and around the world.” Over the past decade, there’s been a demonstrable increase in interest and excitement around nonfiction filmmaking....

There are a ton of great movie-related books out there, including some that we’ve already talked about. In this month’s Must-List we asked our staffers to put some balm on that sunburn, stay hydrated and share some of their favorite 2017 movie-related beach reads. MAKING THE RENT IN BED-STUY (2017) Beautifully written with what feels like a novelist’s eye to detail, filmmaker and critic (and Film Independent Fellow) Brandon Harris’ Making Rent in Bed-Stuy is the must-read book not just of the summer but the year....

It’s a small outfit, but a determined and effective one. “Mercedes is the Director of Marketing for Array, who does an amazing job with the two pennies and a shoestring that I give her,” said DuVernay of Cooper. She was quick to clarify just how much work her collaborators put into their mission: “Tilane is the Executive Director of Array,” said DuVernay, adding, “She’s the boss of me.” DuVernay, who then illustrated the need for more minority-focused distribution outlets with an anecdote, “I got onto Twitter when Straight Outta Compton came out,” she said, “I remember a CNN headline saying ‘Compton Film Debuts with no Shootings’....

SUBMITTING TO SUNDANCE Each January, the Sundance Film Festival (located in snowbound Park City, UT) welcomes independent filmmakers from all around the world, hoping to jumpstart their careers by premiering at one of the countries most renowned venues for independent film. But! Getting there requires being selected from the 14,000+ shorts and features submitted each year. And attention to detail can make a huge difference in helping your film stand out amongst the crowd....

KNOWING WHEN TO QUIT So we’ve talked about saying No. We’ve talked about bouncing back from disappointment. But what do you do when you’ve bounced back, and bounced back again and even bounced back two more times—and things still don’t seem to be working out the way you’d hoped. Then what? When do you hit your bounce-back limit? Sure, perseverance in any creative field is key. But is there ever a time to finally quit, or take a step back, for good?...