Making Movies in the Internet Age

Being a filmmaker today means embracing the latest medium created to lure audiences.

Photo by Daniel Guerra

“Someone said to me a while back that Hollywood used to be the center of culture, but now the Internet is the center of culture. I think attention is shifting how we consume media.”

The above quote is from an interview

The Label

’s

Ellis J. Sutton

and

Taylor Lewis

conducted with Max Reisinger is the CEO of Creator Camp, a company that hosts events geared specifically towards filmmakers who cut their teeth on the internet.

You can read the whole thing here:

Fantasy. Lunacy. Revolution.

Embracing the latest lure

Every half a century, it seems, we create new ways to lure audiences.

In the late 19th/early 20th centuries, it was motion pictures that drew audiences away from the theatre.

In the mid 20th century, it was TV and the rise of TV movies that tried to lure audiences away from the movies (I talk more about that here…)

So you want to write a TV movie?

At the end of the 20th century, we got the internet. It’s just the next thing vying for audiences.

It’s been 20 years since YouTube launched. A whole generation of people have already grown up on YouTube. What began as a weird lil step-cousin has quickly turned into a storytelling juggernaut.

I myself make half of my money writing TV movies, and the other half writing for YouTube. I work as a professional screenwriter and the only time I’ve ever seen my work on a big screen was a short that I wrote and produced myself.

I think almost all filmmakers nowadays understand that we need to find ways to make films that fit with the medium that’s unfolding right in front of us. And we’re starting to realized that, because of the nature of this medium, we don’t have to wait for greenlights: We can just do it ourselves in any way we want.

Back in the early days of cinema, there was only one way to see a movie. Whoever controlled the making, distribution and exhibition of that movie controlled everything. We no longer live in that world.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think cinema is dead nor that it will ever die. TV didn’t kill it. Streamers didn’t kill it. YouTube doesn’t stand a chance either! The magic of going to the movies is something that is irreplaceable. Nothing beats the unique experience of seeing a movie at the cinema. NOTHING.

Our challenge as filmmakers today is to create projects that work for both the movies and the mini-movie theatres we all carry around in our pockets.

As Max, Taylor and Ellis discuss in their interview above, there are a lot of lessons to be taken from the creator model, specifically about audience building and ownership.

I don’t have the answers to what the future for film looks like just yet, but I’m working on it along with a lot of you.

I’m excited to see what new world we create.