The Costco Connection - January 2014

SONY PICTURES HOME ENTERTAINMENT COURTESY OF LIONSGATE ENTERTAINMENT

“My marketable skill was editing. I started edit-
ing other people’s movies,” she recalls. “I became this
go-to narrative film editor. I edited a couple of fea-
tures and a lot of narrative shorts. And that was when
I realized that I felt ready to direct my own narrative
feature film. So, I made the move from experimental
short filmmaking to making—writing and direct-
ing—features. And that was about 2005.”
Her independent films have made impressions
in the film world, and the budgets on her films are
getting bigger.

“Laggies [her latest film] is an
independent film,” she notes, “but
it’s the first time that I’ve not
raised the funds. It’s a higher bud-
get level. My first multimillion-
dollar film.”
She adds, “It’s also the first
time I’ve ever had to collaborate
with investors who are looking out
for their financial investments and
want to make sure they get a
return. It’s been a really great
learning experience to find out
what that collaboration looks like.”
In regard to new acting tal-
ent, actors never before seen by a
wide audience can gain attention,
while others show themselves in
new lights.

For example, despite being on the verge of turning 27 in February, Michael B.

Jordan has been acting professionally since 1999.

While he began in TV, the independent films Chronicles and Fruitvale Station really raised his visibility. His starring role in Fruitvale Station is garnering a lot of award buzz, and Jordan has just been announced to star in the big-screen reboot of The Fantastic Four as Johnny Storm. But he doesn’t necessarily do indie films for acclaim, and he echoes the sentiments of many artists who work in the medium.

“Sometimes independent films can be a little
more collaborative than bigger studio films, for the
actor,” he says. “We have a little bit more of a voice.
Your opinion goes a little further. And it’s more
character-driven. It’s not made for the masses. It’s
about the impact and the mes-
sage and what type of emotional
impact that you have on the peo-
ple that are watching your film.”
Veteran character actor
Robert Duvall has done his share
of independent films and likes
the simplicity of it. “It all boils
down to action and cut,” he says,
comparing acting in big studio
films with appearing in indepen-
dent features. “But sometimes I
notice actors, when they get into
a higher-bracket film, somehow,
sometimes, not always, their act-
ing suffers because they feel they
have to do more.”
Josh Welsh sees a bright
future for independent film. “I
With new technologies, anyone can make a
movie. Of course, there’s still one key factor that
may not be as easy to achieve: They have to be good
to find an audience. C

Independent films at Costco

THIS COMING YEAR, Costco
will be focusing on offering
independent films in the
warehouses. Michael Barker,
co-president of Sony Pictures
Classics, says, “We think
places like Costco that have
an outlet for this product are
really, really important.”
Josh Welsh, president of
Film Independent, says,
“When I heard that Costco
was getting into distributing
DVDs of independent films, I
think that is a fantastic devel-
opment for the independent
film community. There’s all
different ways of getting your
film out, but DVD remains a
critically important piece of
that picture. Especially when
you’re talking about communi-
ties around the country. There
are a lot of cities and towns
that frankly don’t have a great
number of theaters. Or the
theaters that they have are
only playing the bigger studio
films. So, for audiences to be
able to discover independent
film at Costco is really, I think,
a great thing.”—SF