Independent Filmmaking Around the Globe

328 Pages·2015·2.24 MB·English

by  Doris Baltruschat

Independent FIlmmakIng around
the globe
Edited by Doris Baltruschat and Mary P. Erickson
Independent Filmmaking around the Globe calls attention to the significant
changes taking place in independent cinema today, as new production
and distribution technology and shifting social dynamics make it easier
for independent filmmakers to produce films outside both the main-
stream global film industry and their own national film systems. Identi-
fying and analysing the many complex forces that shape the production
and distribution of feature films, the authors detail how independent
filmmakers create work that reflects independent voices and challenges
political, economic, and cultural constraints.
With chapters on the under-explored cinemas of greece, turkey, Iraq,
China, malaysia, peru, and West africa, as well as traditional produc-
tion centres such as the united States, the united kingdom, Canada,
and australia, Independent Filmmaking around the Globe explores how
contemporary independent filmmaking increasingly defines the global
cinema of our time.
doris baltruschat is an SShrC research Fellow and instructor in
the department of theatre and Film and the Centre for Cinema Stud-
ies at the university of british Columbia. a former juror for the Cana-
dian Independent Film and Video Fund, she has extensive professional
experience in the film and television sectors.
mary p. erickson is a film/media consultant who specializes in dis-
tribution, marketing, research, and writing and founder of the pacific
northwest media research Consortium.
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Independent Filmmaking
around the globe
edited by
doris baltruschat and mary p. erickson
unIVerSIty oF toronto preSS
toronto buffalo london
© university of toronto press 2015
toronto buffalo london
www.utppublishing.com
printed in the u.S.a.
ISbn 978-1-4426-4948-4 (cloth)
ISbn 978-1-4426-2683-6 (paper)
printed on acid-free, 100% post-consumer recycled paper with vegetable-
based inks.
______________________________________________________________________
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Independent filmmaking around the globe / edited by doris baltruschat
and mary p. erickson.
Includes bibliographical references and filmography.
ISbn 978-1-4426-4948-4 (bound). ISbn 978-1-4426-2683-6 (pbk.)
1. Independent films – production and direction. 2. Independent films –
history and criticism. 3. motion picture producers and directors.
I. baltruschat, doris, author, editor II. erickson, mary, 1977–, author, editor
pn1995.9.I457I54 2015 791.4309 C2014-908494-3
______________________________________________________________________
university of toronto press acknowledges the financial assistance to its
publishing program of the Canada Council for the arts and the ontario
arts Council, an agency of the government of ontario.
an Ontario government agency
un organisme du gouvernement de l’Ontario
university of toronto press acknowledges the financial support of the
government of Canada through the Canada book Fund for its publishing
activities.
Contents
Foreword: Producing Independently in a Global Industry vii
david hamilton
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction
1 the meaning of Independence: Concepts, Contexts, and
Interpretations 3
doris baltruschat and mary p. erickson
Part One: Independent Film vis-à-vis the Local and Global
Mainstream
2 an Increasingly global presence: Contemporary american
Independent Cinema outside the united States 19
yannis tzioumakis
3 european union Initiatives for Independent Filmmakers
across europe 39
teresa hoefert de turégano
4 dependency and Independence in british Independent Film 53
erik knudsen
5 From aussiewood movies to guerrilla Filmmaking: Independent
Filmmaking and Contemporary australian Cinema 71
mark david ryan
vi Contents
6 Independent Filmmaking in the peruvian Context:
Seeking meaning 90
gabriela martínez
Part Two: The Meaning of Independence in Regions of
Conflict and Change
7 In the Shadow of the Studios, the State, and the multiplexes:
Independent Filmmaking in greece 113
lydia papadimitriou
8 turkish Independent Cinema: between bourgeois auteurism
and political radicalism 131
murat akser
9 Filmmaking in Iraq: a rebirth 149
mary p. erickson
10 the grassroots perspective: Sixth generation Cinema and
Independent Filmmaking in China 175
hongwei lu
11 Independent Filmmaking in africa: new Voices and
Challenges 188
martin mhando
Part Three: Digital Media and the Independent Voice
12 Syiok Sendiri? Independent Filmmaking in malaysia 213
gaik cheng khoo
13 Independent Filmmaking in the Canadian arctic 236
doris baltruschat
14 digital Video Films as “Independent” african Cinema 255
sheila petty
Glossary 270
Filmography 275
Bibliography 282
Contributors 309
Foreword
producing Independently in a global Industry
david hamilton
Filmmaking is often described as a collaborative art and is perhaps the
most collaborative of all the arts. paradoxically, this may explain why
so much energy is expended resisting influence or control from any
external forces – especially those forces that are not considered to be on
the creative side of the collaborative spectrum.
there is a hierarchy of evil where influence is concerned, and at
the very top is the studio executive who, looking out from his pala-
tial offices, searches the skyline for creative genius over which he can
impress his will and thus dilute the genius magic potion to a consist-
ency that can be consumed by the largest audience. this image has
been promoted and passed on ever since studios came into existence
and in some cases by the executives themselves. It is the major reason
that the definition of independence has been so often related to inde-
pendence from film studios and studio executives. that is not to say that
there is no truth in this stereotype. Very, very few directors obtain final
cut from the studios, and this is one of the key criteria that filmmakers
use in determining their freedom quotient.
Studios are not the only threat to independence, or even the major
threat. If we count the number of films made each year throughout the
world and calculate the percentage of these that have been made under
studio direction, we find that it is very small. If we consider every film
director’s career over the past fifty years and look at how many direc-
tors have ever even spoken to a studio, let alone worked within the
confines of a studio production, we would also find this to be a tiny
percentage.
the greater threat to independent filmmaking throughout the
world, I believe, comes from the exertion of control by governments
viii Foreword
and by religious, issue-based, and commercial interest groups. there
is an increasing awareness of the pervasive intrusions that govern-
ments are exercising in our private lives. much of it appears benign
and dormant in Western society, but as more and more information is
collected and stored, it provides the fuel for more aggressive interven-
tions in the future. there are many signs of governments’ intense desire
for greater control even today, but they are somewhat held at bay by
the still widely held belief that a democratic and free society is a good
thing. as this belief is eroded by the fear of a shift in the world’s power
balance, it provides a more fertile ground for governments to let loose
more increasingly restrictive practices.
there are examples currently throughout the world of governments
that find no obstructions of either conscience or public opinion to limit
their blatant constrictions on filmmakers and storytelling. there are
numerous, well-known examples of attempts on the part of the power
elite to control the recording of facts and history and to stifle independ-
ent voices that attempt to present an alternative view.
While shooting the film Water1 in India in the year 2000, we were
attacked by a crowd of angry hindu fundamentalists who were
apparently outraged by our portrayal of Indian widows. they had no
knowledge of the script, and we were perplexed as to the source of
their discontent. the Indian ministry of Information and broadcasting
reviews the scripts of all foreign productions to ensure that there is
nothing in the content that could put India in a bad light. We had sub-
mitted Water, and they had issued full permissions for our shoot and
assigned an officer to our set to ensure that we shot the script we had
submitted.
When the riots started, the Indian government provided us with three
hundred heavily armed troops to move us in convoy to the set every
day. When one of the fundamentalists attempted suicide in protest of
our film, the ensuing riots convinced the authorities that they could not
provide us with adequate protection, and we were shut down.
We subsequently found out that the protestors had been paid and
that the so-called suicide attempt was performed by a person who did
this as a profession. all of the press knew this, but it was reported as
if the issues were real and not the politically motivated charade that
it turned out to be. We were told that one of the political parties had
1 Water (2005) is an internationally acclaimed and academy award–nominated film
written and directed by deepa mehta and produced by david hamilton.
Foreword ix
fomented this pretence in order to gain favour with its electorate and
to promote itself as a protector of the hindu faith. our meetings with
government ministers, religious leaders, and community activists in an
attempt to save the situation were always cordial and sympathetic, but,
as it turned out, they were all quite aware of the conspiracy and in a
collusive relationship with the perpetrators.
I know I am beginning to sound like a fearful, mistrustful, iconoclas-
tic anarchist. but this sort of thinking is an even more dangerous threat
to independent filmmaking and storytelling; the concern over what one
sounds like or how one might be perceived, or the tendency to follow
trends that others have found successful, corrodes our ability or even
desire to create original, meaningful content.
how many times have we heard someone say that his or her film
is a bit like My Big Fat Greek Wedding or, more recently, like Slumdog
Millionaire. of course, they are hoping that some buyer will see the sim-
ilarity and follow the crowd. but even voicing these notions takes away
from the originality of the initial creative impulse.
the most profound example of this thinking is in hollywood itself
where over the past five years the majority of films have been based on
comic books; here the fan base is built in, and the storyboard is effec-
tively already in place. one can simply assemble the movie by moving
the image blocks like a lego set. everyone is aware of Batman, Superman,
and The Hulk, but what about Art School Confidential, Oblivion, Road to
Perdition, and A History of Violence? these are also based on comics.
not that there is anything wrong with comics and not that they can-
not be made into compelling films. It is the obsessive servitude to a
particular kind of thinking or the desperate clinging to an approach
or a genre that creates enormous limitations on the independence of
the filmmaking process and has reverberations far beyond the studio
lot. It creates a restrictive diet for the potential audience and limits the
opportunities for a wide-ranging, luculent cinematic experience. a bit
like junk food: delicious but not nourishing or sustaining.
the challenge for independence is not the studios themselves but the
limits that their product induces on the audiences’ exploratory impulse.
there are many other impediments to independent filmmaking. the
focus has been on financing and access to resources and talent, but the
issues extend beyond the production process itself to the sale, marketing,
and ultimately the exhibition of the film. not surprisingly, independent
filmmaking is most often associated with low-budget art films bereft of
marquee acting talent, whose only star is often the director.