Wednesday, August 02, 2006
THE 48 HOUR FILM PROJECT
This is a fun artistic project for would-be film makers. Anyone can enter, so long as they can pull a team together. I suppose a single person could enter on their own, but it would be that much tougher to make a movie. As the name implies, you only have 48 hours to make a short film. Why not film it beforehand? Because at the designated start time, you are randomly assigned the genre for your film. At that time, each team is also given a character and a prop that they all have to use in their films. It’s all done to focus attention on independent filmmakers and it’s a fun exercise of creativity and commitment.
We first heard about it last year, and my wife has been anticipating it for months. We contacted several friends about getting a team together, and we were all set to make an entry. Unfortunately, we also signed up for the Fluid Movement show, and the final dress rehearsal was set for the same weekend. A little disappointed, we decided not to participate this year. However, in typical Smalltimore fashion, at our first Fluid Movement rehearsal who should walk in and sit down with us but Rob Hatch – the local producer of the 48 Hour Film Project! We were taken aback at first, after all, if we couldn’t participate in the one because we were doing the other then how could he? Well, he just needs to be available for a few hours at the beginning and end of the weekend; he isn’t making a film for that entire time so scheduling around the rehearsal is easy for him.
We did go to Café Hon in Hampden, where all the teams were dropping off their films. It was a lot of fun watching these exhausted folks walk in and hand off their films and asking them about the genres they wound up with and how they did. Since we were hanging out with Rob for several weeks, we did wind up helping him out the night of the screening at the Baltimore Museum of Art. We manned the ticket table while he worked the crowd and dealt with other matters a figurehead should. (I gathered he manned the ticket table himself last year, which is just insane on top of running the event as well.) We’ll also be going back tonight to perform the same job at the screening of the winners.
My wife does want to participate next year, and we probably will if it doesn’t conflict with anything else. We may not be able to churn out a product than can compete with the winners, but she’s confident we can do better than the worst films that were produced. We’ll see.
www.48hourfilm.com
This is a fun artistic project for would-be film makers. Anyone can enter, so long as they can pull a team together. I suppose a single person could enter on their own, but it would be that much tougher to make a movie. As the name implies, you only have 48 hours to make a short film. Why not film it beforehand? Because at the designated start time, you are randomly assigned the genre for your film. At that time, each team is also given a character and a prop that they all have to use in their films. It’s all done to focus attention on independent filmmakers and it’s a fun exercise of creativity and commitment.
We first heard about it last year, and my wife has been anticipating it for months. We contacted several friends about getting a team together, and we were all set to make an entry. Unfortunately, we also signed up for the Fluid Movement show, and the final dress rehearsal was set for the same weekend. A little disappointed, we decided not to participate this year. However, in typical Smalltimore fashion, at our first Fluid Movement rehearsal who should walk in and sit down with us but Rob Hatch – the local producer of the 48 Hour Film Project! We were taken aback at first, after all, if we couldn’t participate in the one because we were doing the other then how could he? Well, he just needs to be available for a few hours at the beginning and end of the weekend; he isn’t making a film for that entire time so scheduling around the rehearsal is easy for him.
We did go to Café Hon in Hampden, where all the teams were dropping off their films. It was a lot of fun watching these exhausted folks walk in and hand off their films and asking them about the genres they wound up with and how they did. Since we were hanging out with Rob for several weeks, we did wind up helping him out the night of the screening at the Baltimore Museum of Art. We manned the ticket table while he worked the crowd and dealt with other matters a figurehead should. (I gathered he manned the ticket table himself last year, which is just insane on top of running the event as well.) We’ll also be going back tonight to perform the same job at the screening of the winners.
My wife does want to participate next year, and we probably will if it doesn’t conflict with anything else. We may not be able to churn out a product than can compete with the winners, but she’s confident we can do better than the worst films that were produced. We’ll see.
www.48hourfilm.com
# posted by Renfield @ 11:00 AM 
