Micro Budget Filmmaking
Tim Burton’s Short Film: Hansel and Gretel
Tim Burton’s Short Film: Hansel and Gretel For you obscure media fans, here is one of legendary filmmaker Tim Burton’s early efforts in collaboration with The Disney Channel that aired only once on Halloween night in 1983. This is Burton’s unique, twisted, Burtonesque version of the classic Grimm Fairy Tale featuring an all Asian cast.…
Read MoreWes Anderson’s Micro-Budget Short Film: Bottle Rocket
Wes Anderson’s Micro-Budget First Film: Bottle Rocket Bottle Rocket, which was written by Owen Wilson and Wes Anderson, was the first micro-budget film the accomplished Wes Anderson directed. Screening at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival, Bottle Rocket is loved and hated by many people. You can see the origins of Wes Anderson’s unique directing and…
Read MoreFilmtrepreneur Breakdown: Do Something Jake – $0 Budget
Filmtrepreneur Breakdown: Do Something Jake – $0 Budget It’s not for every first time feature filmmaker: the stress, the financial worry, the self-doubt, the cojones to go ahead and announce to the world you’re gonna make a movie and it’s gonna be great! But that’s what we did. Middle-aged, no feature filmmaking track record, no…
Read MoreGeorge Lucas’ Rare Micro-Budget Short Film: Filmmaker – A Diary
George Lucas’ Rare Micro-Budget Short Film: Filmmaker – A Diary Even the legendary filmmaker George Lucas had to start somewhere. Filmmaker: A Diary by George Lucas. This 30 min documentary is an intimate portrait of another legend in the film industry Francis Ford Coppola. Lucas filmed and recorded sound for the documentary himself, using an…
Read MorePaul Thomas Anderson’s Micro-Budget Short Film: The Dirk Diggler Story
Paul Thomas Anderson’s Micro-Budget First Film: The Dirk Diggler Story I can remember when a young director by the name Paul Thomas Anderson released a remarkably good film called Boogie Nights back in 1997. The film was kind of a small bomb going off in the film industry. Anderson made by far the best feature film about the groove porn business of…
Read MorePaul Thomas Anderson’s Micro-Budget Short Film: Cigarettes & Coffee
Paul Thomas Anderson’s Micro-Budget Short Film: Cigarettes & Coffee Cigarettes & Coffee is a 1993 short film written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, starring Philip Baker Hall. It tells the story of five people connected through a twenty-dollar bill. The film helped launch the career of Anderson and was used as a basis for…
Read MoreJames Cameron’s Micro-Budget Short Film: Xenogenesis
James Cameron’s Micro-Budget Short Film: Xenogenesis Before James Cameron was breaking every box office record he was a struggling indie filmmaker. We all started somewhere and before The Terminator, Aliens or hell even Pirana II: The Spawning, James Cameron had been inspired by George Lucas‘, Star Wars. Enough so that, in 1978, James Cameron raised the budget from a group of local…
Read MoreIndie Film Lessons from an Oscar-Winning Producer with Michael Gottwald
Indie Film Lessons from an Oscar-Winning Producer with Michael Gottwald When you talk about independent film producers, Michael Gottwald is on that top list. He’s hit it out of the park a few times, especially with his film: “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” which won the Camera d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for…
Read MoreMicro Budget Filmmaking: How to Make a Feature Film on the CHEAP!
Micro-Budget Filmmaking – How to Make a Feature Film on the CHEAP! I’m always on the lookout for top-notch filmmaking education, especially when it’s DIY kind of stuff. I came across this pretty amazing course called The Art of Micro-Budget Film Production. This film workshop is 3 days of non-stop information, all of which will allow you…
Read MoreUnsolicited Material: $62 Budget – From the Laptop to the Red Carpet
Unsolicited Material: $62 Budget – From the Laptop to the Red Carpet Is Unsolicited Material a documentary or a mockumentary? It’s both and neither. Here at Filmtrepreneur, we encourage projects that champion creativity over budget. And no film embodies that spirit more than Ed Surname’s Unsolicited Material, which has seen the filmmaker go from editing on his…
Read MoreFilmtrepreneur Breakdown: CON – $7K Budget
Filmtrepreneur Breakdown: CON – $7K Budget One thing I want to make abundantly clear from the beginning is that producing a feature film for 7,000 euros (8,500 dollars)in total (from idea all the way to screen)is not easy. You have to think outside the box. The point is this; you have to be prepared to…
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