I break the phases of filmmaking into six distinct areas: The Idea; Development; Pre-Production; Production; Post Production; and Distribution. Most new filmmakers spend most of the research and education in the production phases. But the biggest hurdles are in the two “D’s”– Development and Distribution.
Development is where you raise the money and build the right team. Distribution is where you make money to pay back the investors and enough for you to keep going. These two areas are woefully lacking. That’s why I started teaching the Greenlight seminar several years ago.
Sean Patrick Flanery and Dan Millican on the set of "A Promise Kept."
Often people have a story they want made into a movie and they either write the screenplay or commission the writing of the screenplay. Then it’s an upward climb to get the script sold to a production company. Then it’s an uphill battle for the production company to actually go into production on it. I heard one screenwriting teacher say that if you stacked all the scripts floating around Hollywood on top of each other, they’d reach the moon. That was ten years ago.
On Tuesday June 12, we’ll take an evening to go through these hard parts of making a movie and we’ll talk about the number one question I get asked: How do I get started? And the second: How do I get distribution? Sign up for your seat here at the SFilms store.
