Seed and Spark – Page 5

Seed & Spark: It Just Got Better

Although I don’t share a common background with many people that I meet, I can relate to them thanks to my shared vocabulary: the lexicon of water-cooler moments provided by Bright/Kaufman/Crane, Angelou, Sorkin, Kaling, Chaiken, Fey, and so many others — and I will always be grateful for that. Entertainment and popular culture are universal languages that anyone can buy into as long as she’s willing: social capital as accessible as cable (and the Internet). That the same 35 lesbian-related films are available to stream on Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime — which is only about 20% of the overall “Gay and Lesbian” Genre tag — is frustrating because we’ve made so much progress offline. The fact that there are fewer than 200 films total that we can rent, stream, and buy on major platforms is discouraging, but it doesn’t mean that’s how it has to be forever.

Casablanca (reimagined) — *Casablanca* (reimagined)

This is a guest post by Allie Esslinger.

I grew up at the knee of amazing storytellers; talk was cheap and all we could afford. There was never a nest egg, but I always had a cache of stories…and I had television. And…I watched a lot of it. Malcolm Gladwell theorizes a person needs 10,000 contact hours to be brilliant in any one area: serialized, episodic content is my only shot.

I should also mention that I was raised in Alabama — home of the Crimson Tide, Rick Bragg, and the only ABC affiliate that did not air Ellen’s coming out episode in 1997. It took me a long time to understand myself in the context of the world at large because I didn’t have much access to it. A lot of progress has been made, but there’s still a lot to be done.

The idea that I made it through thousands of hours of programming and 20 years of life before I ever saw another mixed race lesbian is astonishing. There are 200+ LGBTQ film festivals each year, but only 17 films with a queer female character made it to theaters in 2012. If you aren’t lucky enough to get to OutFest or Gaze or Frameline, it can take months or even years to find a film that got buzz when it premiered– and especially ones that didn’t.

Last month I was finally able to see the full short film Social Butterfly, which was at both Sundance and SXSW in 2013. It stars Anna Margaret Hollyman and was writtern and directed by Lauren Wolkstein, one of Filmmaker Magazine’s Top 25 to Watch, among other accolades. It’s a different circumstance — the film was bought at the festival and is currently playing on television in France — but there are so many films that go undistributed out of festivals and then aren’t available again unless the filmmaker themselves are willing to promote, distribute, and make us all aware of their film rather than start a new project.

Despite my love for the gang on Friends, my affinity for high schoolers on the CW, and my complete and utter sympathy for every doctor to ever time an inner monologue to a catchy indie rock tune, I never felt like I had a character who I could identify with on a personal level. Although I generally agree that the beauty of the best films and series is that their stories transcend their characters and their settings, I also maintain that sometimes it’s nice to have the film do the leg work. I don’t always want to be metaphorically related to the person I’m watching on screen. I want it to be obvious (like this new campaign we started on our Tumblr that will re-imagine classic romances as lesbian romance films through their key poster art). It’s not just that the lack of well-produced, well-developed lesbian stories has a negative effect on queer women — it hurts society to never see diverse depictions of this diverse segment of the population. And that’s something we can fix.

When I was a sophomore in college, I walked into an Honors seminar with a blank index card waiting for me as I sat down. On one side, Dr. McKenzie had us write the most important question we could ask ourselves, and on the other side, we wrote the one thing the world needs most. Before he read the answers aloud, he explained that the exercise is the foundation for politics–the work of connecting the self with the needs of others. Since we only had 30 seconds to think of these answers, I learned in less than a minute what is most important to me as an individual and a world citizen.

What does the world need most?

Hope.

What’s the most important question I can ask myself?

Am I being helpful?

That index card was like a globe spinning on its axis, and then all of a sudden, it was laid out flat like a roadmap–self-awareness and optimism as the compass.

Although I don’t share a common background with many people that I meet, I can relate to them thanks to my shared vocabulary: the lexicon of water-cooler moments provided by Bright/Kaufman/Crane, Angelou, Sorkin, Kaling, Chaiken, Fey, and so many others–and I will always be grateful for that. Entertainment and popular culture are universal languages that anyone can buy into as long as she’s willing: social capital as accessible as cable (and the Internet). That the same 35 lesbian-related films are available to stream on Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime–which is only about 20 percent of the overall “Gay and Lesbian” Genre tag–is frustrating because we’ve made so much progress offline. The fact that there are fewer than 200 films total that we can rent, stream, and buy on major platforms is discouraging, but it doesn’t mean that’s how it has to be forever.

Until 1968, “Section II” of the Motion Picture Production Code outlawed lesbian characters in film. I am reclaiming our namesake as the premier space for relevant content and the people who love it. We want to help deliver diverse content with strong minority characters in major roles so that more people are included in–and compelled to be a part of–more water cooler moments.

Section II is a new Benefit Corporation dedicated to improving the representation of queer women in popular culture. Even in 2013, part of that equation remains “visibility,” but I’m also talking about divergent stories, different formats, contemporary issues being presented without making “issue films.” We’re building a destination platform for curated, high-quality, lesbian-related films and series committed to the idea that seeing positive portrayals of people we identify with is good for us and good for the people who love us. We’re a new option for both filmmakers and audiences alike — a place for all the best content. The model for releasing a film is changing, but I don’t think that should worry filmmakers. Knowing where a film can live takes away the pressure to modify a film’s premise in order to find an audience. Of those 17 films with a theatrical release, Pitch Perfect was the only one was from a major studio that GLAAD deemed a positive portrayal based on their Vito Russo Test. You won’t find a bigger Pitch Perfect fan than me, but after years of looking for queer women in film, 1 positive portrayal out of 101 studio films remains disheartening.

Last year I produced a sizzle reel for a film that is currently looking for funding, called Pretty Girls. It will be a second feature for the talented team at Invisible College, Andrew Gitomer and Jonathan Stromberg. My plan for last summer was to follow suit and produce three trailers for films that I wrote or co-wrote, all of which would fit nicely (I’m biased) on Section II. Last Spring I was in the throes of pre-production and creating comps and worrying about finding investors for the slate of films when the idea for the platform emerged. And then the opportunity to develop it was presented through the Dogfish Accelerator, a program designed to make filmmakers think more like start-ups and give themselves better odds for longevity. It’s been a long sprint as we work to test and plot-out enough of this idea to pitch to investors next month, and it’s been invaluable to have the chance to talk with film lovers, filmmakers, and distributors to make sure we’re creating an ecosystem that will sustain all the different segments who want to see an increase in quantity and quality of lesbian-related films.

I was so excited to have the chance to write a post for Bitch Flicks because it’s a site that has taken matters into its own hands–it addresses a void by building a community around conversations that want to take place. It’s what we want to do at Section II.

I considered writing a fan letter about Ingrid Jungermann’s post-gay agenda and Julie Goldman’s irreverently endearing brand of stand-up comedy. I could write about how I geeked out when Lauren Wolkstein accepted my Facebook friend request or when I finally had a good reason to introduce myself to Lena Waithe. I could’ve recycled my analogies about how Brooklyn is like Paris of the 20s because everyone is doing cool things that spur me to figure out the anatomy of a platform launch. But I realized that Section II is a fan letter, and that what I’m most excited about is this process of delivering it to everyone else who is excited about the direction lesbian-related films and series are heading.

We launch this month with a showcase site designed to show you that we’re serious about outstanding content and the talent behind it. I hope you’ll join in on the fun.

[youtube_sc url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMYG8yD9lqQ”]

Allie Esslinger is a Southern transplant living in Brooklyn. Her company, Olive Juice Films, has produced projects across genres, including documentaries, feature films, web series, live comedy, and commercial campaigns. She earned her BA in International Affairs at the University of Alabama, her MA in International Affairs and Media Studies from The New School, andher MFA in Creative Writing (Screenwriting) from Full Sail University. She is developing Section II, an online and streaming platform for curated, high-quality lesbian content.

Seed & Spark: A Balancing Act: A Year of Film

At the same time I’d been reading a lot of reports about how underrepresented women filmmakers are. I’d seen a lot of fabulous films directed by women, but I recognized that there were many more women-made films I had yet to see. I actually had NO IDEA how true that was until I launched into this process, but that insight sparked my idea to create a year of film watching that focused on films made in the past ten years, and gender balanced my viewing. So here’s the vision: over the course of a year I’d watch films directed by women and men in equal number. Every day I’d see at least one feature film and one short. I chose to put my attention on films from the past decade, so I could tune in to the powerful energies of film creation arising on the planet at this time.

This is a guest post by Barbara Ann O’Leary.

I’m having a great year in film viewing. I attribute that in large part to my choice to take conscious charge of what I see. It’s a process, rocky at times, but it’s been an amazingly eye opening adventure. I call it A Yearlong Film Viewing Balancing Act.

Yes, that’s a clunky name with a cryptic hashtag #yfvba, but I rather like it. It’s a little strange and obsessive. I think I’m on to something.

I’m an enormous lover of film. I watch a LOT of films, but I’d started questioning what my film viewing choices were based on. Media hype? Friends’ suggestions? Whatever just happened to be showing at the local theater? Pressure I put on myself to be able to say I’d seen all the so-called great films?

Why not just dedicate myself to watching women-made films for a whole year? That would be a great project too. That might be what someone else needs to do, but for me it’s about inviting harmony. It’s about fostering balance in my own film-loving life, and it’s about recognizing that as an individual I have the power to impact the entire world of cinema through my film viewing choices.

What? Change the entire world by film watching?! Yes. I really think so.

When I launched A Yearlong Film Viewing Balancing Act on May 4th, which was the day the idea struck me, I created a manifesto of sorts. It started off like this:

“Today I begin a yearlong film viewing balancing act… where I dedicate myself to inviting authentic creative expression to flourish in the world in a balanced and harmonious way by bringing my attention to–and opening to receive–the creative motion picture outpourings of women and men filmmakers in equal measure.”

To me this was an act of power, a fierce awakening. What we put our attention on grows in our own lives and in the world at large. I’ve experienced that over and over again in my life. When I ask myself what I want to see flourish in the world I get this crystal clear answer: I want to live in a world where everyone’s authentic creative expression is honored, supported, and received fully. Film is my favorite form of artistic expression, so it’s a natural place for me to bring my awareness.

Through A Yearlong Film Viewing Balancing Act I’m making an unshakable commitment to be awake to what films I’m experiencing. I’m noticing and honoring who made them. The film world responds to viewer demand–not instantaneously, but over time–and I’m doing my part to call forth balance. Gender balance is not the only balance I value, but I’m inviting it to serve as a grounding force for balance in all other aspects of life.

Even if no one else is changed by this process, I know I will be. I already am, and I’m only halfway through the 365 day process. As I’ve been blogging, tweeting, Facebooking, and talking about the adventure with others, I am noticing that things are starting to shift in the wider world, so I’m gaining confidence that my actions are making a difference. That’s delightful to me.

Here are a few things that have already shifted in my life, because of this experience:

I have become aware that MANY women are in fact filmmaking. Five months ago I started a list on IMDb to help me find the world of Women Filmmakers: Active in the past decade. Astonishingly, without even making an effort, I’ve grown that list to 2,338 filmmakers. That’s just a start. Women do in fact make movies. And many of them tweet. I’ve located 863 so far and gathered them into a list.

Starting out on this adventure I’d feared that to keep my theatrical film viewing even I would have to struggle, but although women-made films are underrepresented in theaters, I have been able to go out to see an even number of movies directed by women and men without difficulty. Yes, it’s taken some focus and planning, but by combining multiplex, art house, and film festival viewings, I’ve been able to stay even. As of today I have seen 23 man-made films, 24 woman-made films, and 4 films by mixed gender directing teams out at theaters. Including films I’ve streamed, watched on disc or on TV, I’m up to 219 features. Men- and women-made films are running neck and neck.

It’s ridiculous to generalize about filmmakers by gender. Each filmmaker is unique and expresses her or his own vision of self and world. For instance, I’ve found both woman- and man-made films to be tender explorations of love and family. Jeff Nichols’ Mud, David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, Ava DuVernay’s Middle of Nowhere, and Lake Bell’s In a World… come to mind. And women-made films can be as harsh as any man’s.

[youtube_sc url=”http://youtu.be/Vatw1xlgZJM” title=”Ava%20DuVernay%27s%20Middle%20of%20Nowhere%20trailer”]

Ava DuVernay’s Middle of Nowhere trailer

[youtube_sc url=”http://youtu.be/b_gGlYCMye4″ title=”David%20Lowery%27s%20Ain%27t%20Them%20Bodies%20Saints%20trailer”]

David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints trailer

I feel more centered and grounded when I’m saying YES to authentic creative expression that arises in a balanced way.

The journey is ongoing. If you’d like to join me, I’d love your company. Come find me at O’Leary’s Reel Life on Tumblr, Twitter, or Facebook , etc. Tell me how your film viewing adventures are unfolding. And stay tuned for my new podcast–under development.

Barbara Ann O’Leary, Indiana University Cinema’s Outreach Specialist, loves to help people engage authentically. Recent projects include: Every Everything: The Music, Life & Times of Grant Hart (Executive Producer), Indy Film Festival (Screening Committee), Indiana Filmmakers Network Made in Bloomington Film Series (Programmer), Bloomington Screenwriting Community (Founder/Facilitator). A Film Explorer/Blogger, Barbara shares her adventures in film and reports on her initiative A Yearlong Film Viewing Balancing Act at O’Leary’s Reel Life: http://olearysreellife.tumblr.com/

Seed & Spark: Goodbye Camera Time

It was 2006, Los Angeles, and I was attending yet another audition technique seminar. I stood on the stage, hoping to fascinate and stun the visiting talent manager with my craft. I was hopeful when I saw that it was a young, black woman. Surely, this meant she was supportive of women and actors of color. I gave it all I had. Or, as good as one can give with dialogue for a one-dimensional, “cute, racially unspecific,” best friend role with no arc. The feedback changed my life.

“You are great, but you don’t look enough like Halle Berry.”

This is a guest post by Candice Sanchez McFarlane.

“You are great, but you don’t look enough like Halle Berry.”

Like lightning, clarity ran through me. Every role I had ever auditioned for was a poor attempt at filling a race or gender quota. Not because there aren’t good writers out there but because it doesn’t matter. It’s a business. What Hollywood wanted from female actors was to just look the part and say the words. This woman knew that for the machine to make money, she needed to be able to sell me. I was not an attractive commodity.

I started dissecting every film that was in production at the time. Even when a woman had written the original script, there was a man also listed as a writer. Even when a woman was the producer, there were far more men with producer titles. In every capacity, women were outnumbered. Except in front of the camera.

Despite a lifetime of acting classes, a five-year audition marathon trying to infuse life into flat black/latina characters and the loss of a dream I had for so long, I stopped. Right then. Cold turkey. There was no way for me to make an impact in front of the camera. There were enough people striving to book a role–many of whom look like Halle Berry.

I wanted to be behind the camera. I began taking writing and production more seriously. I focused on ways to develop and empower women in the business conversation of film. This presented an even greater challenge. Many of the women I came across were looking for the best way to market, finesse, and accept the films that were being made. Thinking like Capitalists.

The media spoon feeding its audience — The media spoon-feeding its audience

I wanted to be a satisfied audience member.

I couldn’t understand why these women weren’t identifying the issue instead of trying to assuage it. The issue in the very first step, the step that all the other steps are built upon. The step that allows actors to not have to look the part but to understand the complexities that go into every woman, fiction or otherwise.

The writing.

The writing became everything to me. I wrote until I couldn’t stand the clicking of the keys any longer. I attended any seminar (I could afford) that focused on writing. I joined groups for underrepresented writers in entertainment. I worked in branding/promotions in the industry with a focus on empowering women’s voice and issues. I hosted and taught groups of young women in high school and college who were interested in becoming writers, hoping to nurture their interest and support their goals. I sent my materials to every possible festival, contest, open submission that had a mailing address. I got back “encouraging” feedback like “strong writing but not what we are in the market for” or “love your voice but could you water it down a bit for the audience?” It amazed me each time because I WAS the audience for my work. The women and girls in my life WERE the basis for my characters. This was the true face of women but not the image the industry wanted women to see of themselves.

Every woman can see a romantic comedy for the first time and predict the ending. Every woman knows the tale of the power struggle that the successful female character has with her mate on television or that her success prevents her from finding a mate. Every woman can watch a sitcom and know exactly when the Mom’s desperately forced and unfunny lines will be delivered. Even though we know these things and can handle more intellectually stimulating content – we accept it.

For those who are more conscious of their content, they might deploy some effort and search for something indie, to feel like they are not just another part of this machine. I like to include myself in this group, but I keep coming to the same questions. Why is “indie” the place to find realistic female characters? If today’s society is full of women with fascinating lives and varied interests that do not all revolve around the same core story – why does our mainstream content not reflect it? Would we not pay the same $14 for a movie ticket about a woman we really connected with that we do for the one that is a caricature?

I believe that we would. I believe that if the content were accessible, it would be supported. The truth is we all have a say, if we choose to exercise it.

Through this journey, I have met wonderfully bold and gifted female writers and producers who are looking to make a way. In my current documentary, Click Here: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Making Movies, we are highlighting a new generation of storytellers who are doing it their way. People who have been met with the frustration of an industry that tells them there is no audience for their work and who choose to ignore it and make it anyway. These are women, men, and even students who are trailblazers in my eyes. The group may be small, but it is inspiring.

So what do we do in a world where you can do anything? We blog, we crowdfund, we search, we SXSW, we Hulu, we Netflix, we YouTube, we support and spread the word about the content that speaks to us. We don’t let ourselves get caught in the web of the lesser of all content evils. We seek out the content creators that we believe deserve a chance. We actualize our place in this world of film. We don’t remain passive audience members but active participants in the conversation. We do it because we now have the tools. We do it because it will eventually make a difference. If we do it enough and do it consistently and do it boldly, there will one day be a girl in an audition room who is reading for a role that feeds her mind and soul, that represents the emotion, intricacy and capability within every woman.

Forgive my rally call but now more than ever is the time.

Actress turned advertising executive turned branded content expert turned writer, producer and mommy–with creative prowess and keen business savvy–Candice has developed original content for major brands (Visa, Pepsi) and indie distribution alike. She is currently in production on the documentary Click Here: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Making Movies. More information can be found at http://www.seedandspark.com/studio/click-here-or-how-i-learned-stop-worrying-and-love-making-movies.

Seed & Spark: ‘Gloria’: Dancing On Her Own

As we watch Gloria’s flailing, her triumphs, her mistakes, her fun, we can’t help but be reminded (and I was just by typing all those words) of another single lady on a smaller screen and a familiar part of the feminist zeitgeist: Girls’ Hannah Horvath. Only living in Santiago, Chile, all growed up. I’ve seen a couple of Gloria reviews mention Girls, but almost always in the context of the film’s sex scenes, the sort not traditionally shown, between bodies wider audiences (or producers) aren’t generally begging to see nude. But the character similarities don’t end there. Though they are generations and cultures apart, it continues with their flighty boyfriends, with their finding themselves alone in a dress on a beach without their belongings, with their ability to be irritating and down-to-earth simultaneously, and with their love of dancing.

This is a guest post by Amanda Trokan.

This is not a review of (the life-affirming! Berlin Festival prize-winning! Dare I say glorious?) Chilean comedy-drama Gloria. No. This is a call, nay an order, no, no a call (I’m an indecisive lady, right?) for women under 50 to go see a film that depicts a woman over 50 in such a way that you just might leave the theater as excited to get old (well, older, while we’re being polite) as I did. Not despite its titular character’s spinsterhood, but surprisingly because of it.

Gloria is no kind grandma stepping in to take care of the family when the leading-lady daughter’s marriage falls apart, nor a lonely grandma dealing with an ailing husband, nor a stubborn grandma slowly getting ill herself, nor the sassy single grandma making one-liners about her granddaughter’s sex life from the periphery. All that, one might expect from Hollywood. The 58-year-old divorcee grandma in Gloria (played by the vibrant Paulina García) is the center of our story as she casually takes up dating again, but mostly just continues living. And I mean really living.

I would like to say “living it up” here, but that phrase might suggest living lavish or fabulously. And while I personally think her life falls under that definition—smoking weed, having sex, romantic weekending—I understand the subjective nature of my opinion on lifestyle choices. (I tend to see the fun, or at least “interesting experience,” in waking up solo by the sea missing a shoe after a night of gambling—as Gloria does—rather than the shame in it.) What I objectively mean is: she is existing no differently from a woman of any other age, with some age-specific issues (ex-spouses, children, gastroplasty) but mostly universal, adult ones.

In Gloria, we are swiftly pulled into Gloria’s day-to-day life as she flirts, drinks, dances, deals with the various characters in her apartment complex, gives her blessing to her pregnant daughter who’s moving abroad for love, and embarks upon a new relationship with Rodolfo (Sergio Hernández), who has a family of his own to manage.

As we watch Gloria’s flailing, her triumphs, her mistakes, her fun, we can’t help but be reminded (and I was just by typing all those words) of another single lady on a smaller screen and a familiar part of the feminist zeitgeist: Girls’ Hannah Horvath. Only living in Santiago, Chile, all growed up. I’ve seen a couple of Gloria reviews mention Girls, but almost always in the context of the film’s sex scenes, the sort not traditionally shown, between bodies wider audiences (or producers) aren’t generally begging to see nude. But the character similarities don’t end there. Though they are generations and cultures apart, it continues with their flighty boyfriends, with their finding themselves alone in a dress on a beach without their belongings, with their ability to be irritating and down-to-earth simultaneously, and with their love of dancing.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not implying direct influence here. But if I must make the ubiquitous Girls connection in order for the female masses (ew?) to get out and experience this film and understand that getting older is going to be A-OK, that we don’t need to hurry up to find a partner and figure out who we are, that we don’t need Botox or lipo to get naked after 40, that we don’t need to fit into one of two categories, career woman or mom, and that we don’t need to fear being alone (and I don’t just mean single here, I mean physically alone)—well then the ends justify the means.

Here’s the thing, women over 50 should watch it, too. In the same way that I enjoy watching Girls because it gives me that thank-heavens-I’m-not-dealing-with-that-nonsense anymore feeling, the 50-pluses might get a thrill out of Gloria’s life not being their own anymore, or on the flip side it might completely resonate. Win, win! Because while it may seem like some big secret of growing old has been revealed to us in Gloria (or at least to me, a 31-year-old)—namely that we actually will still have those young brains in those old bodies—women of a similar age as Gloria might feel satisfaction seeing themselves or people they know represented more accurately on screen.

You could garner exactly none of this from Gloria, and it’d still be a really good time. But for me, it was refreshing to see a female-led film where the moral of the story isn’t the girlie best-friendships above all else, nor the incomparable bond with your mom, nor your unconditional devotion to your daughter, nor the knowing nod from your sister. It is about learning to love dancing on your own.

[youtube_sc url=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/h9PrVESAYeA?rel=0″]

Amanda Trokan is a writer turned Seed&Spark Director of Content. Watcher of many films, lover of some. Winner of 1993 West Road Elementary D.A.R.E. essay and two 2013 Oscar® pools; loser of hair thingies. Follow @trokan on Twitter for insight into her likes/dislikes/whatever.

Seed & Spark: Princess of the 22 Clark Bus

The idea for THE DREAMERS came to me over time. I saw it in the periphery of my vision as I woke up at 4 a.m. to go work the opening shift at my day job. I felt it pulling at the hem of my secondhand cargo jacket as I biked the heinous Chicago streets from one six-hour shift to another. I heard it in the stories and anecdotes of my fellow artists and friends as they struggled just like I did. It got to the point where I felt like I was being haunted.

Photo Credit Kelsey Jorissen Photography

I’m thirteen years old and staring open-mouthed at the ending credits. Immediately I hit the stop button, eject the DVD, and reinsert it into the player. Again. I have to see Princess Mononoke speak her mind, stick up for the sprits, and save the forest again. Then a third time. And then six more times. And then twice more for my friends who hadn’t seen it yet. No shame. I was completely blindsided by the power and grace of this story. The princess of the wolves was incredible, and not only was she a fucking badass… she was a she.

As a 20-something female operating in a big city far far away from the confines of her small town where everyone goes to the Polar Bear Diner for breakfast on Sundays, there came a day when I realized I had to stop waiting for permission. In 2011 I graduated from DePaul’s Acting Program with a solid education, a hefty repertoire of monologues for 20-something females, and a whole hell of a lot of anxiety. That first summer out of college was a cluster fuck. I got mugged on the CTA, I lost friends, I had to put my cat to sleep, I watched fellow artists give up, I had my heart broken into a million pieces, and I got rejection after rejection from talent agencies. Never had I felt so alone and lost.

My solace was going to the movies. It always had been. Much to my dismay that whole first year out of school I didn’t see a single movie in theaters that made me want to go right back, watch it again, and then show my friends. So you mean that the token female character clad in a cat suit is supposed to pass as an excuse for me to connect with a film? Well maybe if she was given more than a poor excuse for one-liners and a sensibly tight mid shot of her perfect 24-inch waist and 36-inch bust I would have paid attention. I’m sorry. I missed the memo on black lycra-wearing women are better seen and not heard. The stories were without spirit. The characters weren’t saving any forests anytime soon. At the end of the day I felt stigmatized. Where was the epic and sweeping storytelling that made me pursue this career path in the first place? What type of women were these filmmakers catering to? Certainly not the intelligent and capable females I knew. There are single women, there are married women, there are homosexual women, there are women who love dead lifting, there are women who love whiskey, there are women who are mothers, and there are women who really enjoy pirates. However there is one group we all fall under. The fact is that we all have a valid opinion.

Beauty shot of main character, Kara, in THE DREAMERS. Set up took two hours …

The idea for THE DREAMERS came to me over time. I saw it in the periphery of my vision as I woke up at 4 a.m. to go work the opening shift at my day job. I felt it pulling at the hem of my secondhand cargo jacket as I biked the heinous Chicago streets from one six-hour shift to another. I heard it in the stories and anecdotes of my fellow artists and friends as they struggled just like I did. It got to the point where I felt like I was being haunted. The creative spirit world was calling to me wake the fuck up and just make it happen. Come on Princess of the 22 Clark Bus. Get with it. Hear our cry.

So I answered. At the beginning of 2013 I took a step away from answering casting calls, and Facebook posts, from text messages, and booking myself straight through the day from sunrise to sundown. Instead I turned on some Beyonce, made myself a big ass cup of French roast coffee, and sat down to write the first season of THE DREAMERS. Three months later I held in my hands the story of one female artist and her five friends as they try to navigate the unbalanced world of post-graduation. Over the course of the process of writing the first season I realized this series was a way to bring much-needed exposure to other artists working in Chicago. The heart beat of this show is that of the hundreds of actors, singers, theatre companies, installations artists, photographers, and musicians that inhabit the streets of the Second City. Why not expose the musical talent of my friends who turn pop music into Latin-fusion? Why not feature the hilariously talented ladies of Awkward Pause Theatre Company? Why not create a show that brings other artists into the limelight alongside these fictional characters? Initially I was shocked at how quick the universe was to respond. But when you are a young struggling artist writing a show about young struggling artists, it’s not that hard to find a group of young struggling artists who want nothing more than to create that story with you.

Filming the final scene for the pilot episode of The Dreamers. — Filming the final scene for the pilot episode of THE DREAMERS.

Producing and directing is problem solving on crack. It hit me that I had to speak louder in order to be heard. I had to be braver, smarter, faster, kinder, and most of all willing to fall flat on my face an infinite number of times if this show was ever going to get off the ground. As I look back on my process for the filming of the first episode I feel that being a female has worked to my advantage. People trust you. I cannot tell you how many meetings I have walked into donning my mental, emotional, and creative armor, ready to work any angle to get the yes I needed in order to make this web series a reality, only to be met with equal compromise and kindness. I am the only female on my crew, but they respect me and trust me because I send thank you notes. I make us breakfast at the beginning of a 12-hour shoot day. This show takes a village and I am only the sum of the dozen dedicated crew and cast members. As a woman I know how to appreciate, how to communicate, and how to listen. We are expert collaborators, because we’re hardwired to be.

The tides are turning. I think of the glowing faces of female filmmakers like Lena Dunham, Jennifer Westfeldt, and Brit Marling. Their body of work is compelling, honest, and raw. Their films are not meant to reach only one demographic of people, nor are they meant to reach only one type of woman. These filmmakers are breaking walls, speaking their minds, but most importantly- telling stories worth telling. And that is what it comes down to, being brave enough to say it out loud. And guess what? We women are here to understand a good story when we see it just as much as men are. We are equally as capable to walk into theatre with a pair of eyes, a set of ears, and a heart absorb it all. On that fact alone we are worth quality storytelling.

Kelsey Jorissen

Kelsey Jorissen hails from Cottage Grove, Minnesota. She has been making movies since the age of seven when she recreated Grease in her garage with a VHS camcorder. She graduated with a BFA in Acting from DePaul University’s Theatre School in 2011. After graduation she collaborated on a number of films projects with DePaul film students as well as finished her first feature film Sanctuary. Alongside film she has worked as a professional stage actress. Alongside acting she works as a freelance photographer and runs her own small business at Kelsey Jorissen Photography. She aims to live a fulfilling life of adventure and mayhem with her beloved cat, Momo. So far so good.

Millenials These Days

Masthead for Chicana From Chicago, Christine Davila’s blog

This is a guest post by Christine Davila.

If you hear someone utter, “Kids These Days,” it’s usually in a disapproving tone toward the younger generations’ fresh attitude or their breaking with tradition (or their tendency to speed while driving). When I think about Kids These Days, though, it is in sheer awe. I am so impressed by their confidence and transcultural expression with which they carve out their bold self-individuality. I don’t remember ever being that loud and proud in my teens. I, like most, just wanted to fit in. But the Millennial generation has spoken: Assimilation is out; non-conformity is in.

As a first generation Mexican-American I’m naturally drawn to bi-cultural narratives because they relate to my own culture dash – American clash. Speaking Spanish at home, making tortillas with abuelita, and my parents’ late night dance and Tequila parties, blasting Sonora Santanera or the passionate cries of Vicente Fernandez, all formed a very specific childhood. There is something really powerful about seeing a reflection of your roots in a contemporary context in the biggest form of entertainment: the movies. You may have read the numbers; there are 55 million+ Latinos in the country, making us the fastest growing and youngest demographic. Brands clumsily chase after this market and miserably try to coin terms to define us like New Generation Latino, Young Latino Americans, Hispanic Millennials. The term Latino attempts to encompass far too many diverse ethnic and social cultures that it is a useless denomination, a limited view failing to recognize the fluidity of our social zeitgeist in the 21st century.

It is critical to adapt with the changing times and engage the new generations of our immigrant nation. It’s time to reframe our notions and classifications on race and identity. Más American is my humble attempt of doing away with outdated and ill-defined terminology like Hispanic or Latino. It is meant to convey the real, inclusive and radical reflection of society’s eclectic fabric found in fiercely independent filmmaker voices. More aptly, it speaks to the transcultural identity and non-conformist spirit of today’s characters and narratives. It’s not necessarily confined to speak about people of “color.” It is about all kinds of shifting identities, from conventional, traditional and sociocultural norms to a more progressive evolution. It is about gender – equality, reversal of roles, gender variant. Filmmakers are out there telling these unique perspectives through independent film. These stories are out there. I can attest to that with some authority because of the volume of screening I do for film festivals year round. Films from underrepresented communities usually have an outsider/insider perspective, which in turn provokes highly original and compelling narratives by its very nature. This emerging class of individualism is what embodies American spirit.

Más American also speaks to the influence Latinos have on non-Latinos. You don’t have to have the blood in order to appreciate or acquire a sensibility of the Latino experience. Many non-Latino filmmakers have made extraordinary films capturing the US Latino experience. It’s only natural considering the countless generations who originate from before the Hidalgo treaty was signed. We are your neighbors, friends, colleagues, lovers, wives, husbands, in-laws, in each of the 50 states. Indeed, a long time ago my mom and I learned to stop talking trash when out in public about non-Latinos in proximity realizing that many people understand some Spanish.

Más American

And so it is with much pleasure, and gratitude toward the filmmakers, the Más American conversation on Seed&Spark is rolling out. These films purely conceive of characters and a world more reflective and authentic of our reality. Perhaps the freshness comes from a subconscious in which they derive and embody a defiant individuality, outside of any identity politics. Más American hopefully is a starting point for a more forward and richer conversation toward genuine, original and underrepresented narratives. I hope to add more titles to the mix in this Conversation, championing filmmakers who get America’s evolving sense of cultural self-identity and who are on the pulse of the rapidly shifting zeitgeist.

In THE CRUMBLES, written and directed by Akira Boch, the acting talent naturally inhabit LA’s Echo Park hipster artist scene in such a sincere and rocking way. The lead happens to be a Latina and her co-lead happens to be Asian. Their color is so not the center of the tragicomic slice-of-life. Yet it does make them who they are: badass rock ‘n roll girlfriends who resist quitting on their dream of hitting it big with their band.

In THE NEVER DAUNTED, writer/director Edgar Muñiz explores the toll and cross a man must bear who can’t conceive, in such a profound, heartbreaking and uniquely creative way. The film explores a modern masculinity more open to vulnerability, clashing with the Western stoic cowboy machismo image imposed on men from boyhood.

GABI – director Zoé Salicrup Junco’s impressive NYU thesis film – centers around its titular business-smart, sexy and confident 30-something woman living an independent and successful life, whose main conflict is the reminder that, in her hometown, her success represents a failure within the context of the marriage, kids and housewife model.

Seed&Spark logo

In all of these stories, new definitions of traditional norms are celebrated, and scripts are being flipped. I’m thrilled that with Seed&Spark the public at large can discover these rebellious voices.

I want to thank the filmmakers for sharing their inspiring non-conformist narratives on Seed&Spark and for, whether they know it or not, breaking type.

Christine Davila is film festival programmer, festival strategist, script consultant and blogger (chicanafromchicago.com). As a first generation Mexican-American from Chicago, she loves multi-cultural stories and has the privilege of screening hundreds of US Latino and Spanish language films throughout the year as a freelance programmer for film festivals like Sundance, Morelia, Los Angeles Film Festival, San Antonio’s CineFestival, among others. In her blog, Chicana From Chicago, she focuses on the diaspora of American cinema made by people with roots/origin/descendant in Mexico, Central & South America, Cuba, Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. You can follow Christine @IndieFindsLA.

Unconventional Women

Screening of Like the Water in Rockland, Maine

This is a guest post by Emily Best.

I am lying on the floor of a small bedroom in an East Village mansion in New York City. It’s the holding room of a site-specific production of Hedda Gabler in which I am playing Thea, and Caitlin FitzGerald (who is soon to co-star in Showtime’s Masters of Sex) is playing Hedda. We have been playing for about two weeks to sold out, packed crowds of 28 people who sit around the living room while the show happens so close to them they can feel us breathing (and we them).

We are warming up. I am reading over some sides that Caitlin is preparing for an audition the next day–for the role of a chronic masturbator. The dialogue is trite, the character non-existent. This woman who stands across from me every night in full possession of the force of her intelligence, complexity, delicacy, beauty, humor, and wrath is auditioning to play a trope.

Director Caroline von Kuhn on set with Like the Water cast

I remember that day as the deciding factor for me. For Caroline von Kuhn–who wrote a piece for Bitch Flicks about directing Like the Water, the film we would eventually make together–I’m not sure what it was. Or for Caitlin, who was perhaps tired of being asked to audition for parts like that. Or for the other seven women who would join the production of our film, all of whom I count as dearest friends. But somehow, together we decided we would attempt to make a film about women we recognized. We would attempt to make a film about women who do not fall into one of two categories we typically see in films: the mouthy, too-smart for her own good teenager, or the emotionally stunted 35 year old for whom the solution to the world’s problems is a man. (You could add to this perhaps the oversexed Other Woman and the mean mom/stepmom.)

We wondered what it would be like to make a movie about situations familiar to us, with characters who react the way they do in life: imperfectly. But it was also important for us to include something about the nature of our friendships: funny, challenging, loving, and absolutely necessary.

DP Eve Cohen — Like the Water and Mana O’Lana: Paddle for Hope

We made Like the Water to lean against what we felt like were the conventional portrayals of women in their 20s and 30s. Until we made the film, I hadn’t gone out of my way to seek out the ways other directors were pushing the boundaries of female characters. It was only through my own experience producing Like the Water that I realized just how difficult a task it is to fund and lock down distribution for a film that bucks these conventions. So when we started Seed&Spark, I suppose it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that most of our early submissions both for crowdfunding and distribution were from women. It’s so exciting to be able to bring together a slate of films that I hope adds to the conversation about those conventions, and also what it means to be unconventional.

My good friend Anna Kerrigan made her directorial and acting debut with the film Five Days Gone, an exceptional screenplay she wrote which she turned into a feature film about family, sisterhood, and the subtle complexities in relationships between men and women. In The Sound of Small Things, Pete McLarnan found an actress who possessed so much of her own life, he turned the camera on her and for the most part, stayed out of her way. (This film has one of the most beautiful, intimate scenes of a deaf woman finding an unconventional way to connect to her musician husband.) In Café Regular, Cairo, Ritsh Batra trains the camera on a Muslim woman testing her relationship by playing with taboo. In I Send You This Place, Andrea Ohs opens her creative world to the audience as she explores her relationship to her brother’s schizophrenia. And in Mana O’Lana: Paddle for Hope, documentarian Eve Cohen enters into her mother’s story of arduous ocean paddling with a group of determined breast cancer survivors.

Film posters and stills

None of these women can be put in a box or labeled, reduced or diminished. In many ways, all of these films are political acts, though I am sure few intended them to be. I look forward to adding films to this conversation and learning from the discussions that ensue. Hopefully those teachings will filter back up through the chain, and the next generation of studio writers will give us new, broader conventions–ones we will happily defy with the next generation of independent films.

Like the Water, inspired Seed&Spark. Before producing Like the Water, Emily produced theater, worked as a vision and values strategy consultant for Best Partners, ran restaurants, studied jazz singing at the Taller de Musics, tour guided and cooked in Barcelona, and before that, was a student of Cultural Anthropology and American Studies at Haverford College. Recently, Emily was named one of the 2013 Indiewire Influencers, dedicated to 40 people and companies who are asking the big questions about what the independent film industry is today (and why) and, more importantly, what it will become. Emily is touring film and tech festivals around the world, Sundance and SXSWV2V to Sheffield and Galway, to educate filmmakers and learn their best practices in connecting with their audiences to build a sustainable career. Emily founded Seed&Spark to make a contribution to the truly independent community in which she would like to make moving pictures. In 2011, she had the great fortune of producing her first feature with a remarkable group of women. The spirit, the community and the challenges of that project.

How to Navigate a Film Festival

Bushwick Film Festival

This guest post was written by Kweighbaye Kotee and edited by Casey Johnson-Aksoy.

Film festivals can be overwhelming, scary, frustrating, and a major blow to the ego of any filmmaker–times ten if you’re new to the scene, especially if it’s a big one. You show up, no one really knows who you are. The festival planners check you in, get a photo of you with their major sponsors, then you just sort of disappear into the wide vast industry ocean. But on the flip side they can also be rewarding, career changing, relationship building, and just really freaking amazing! It’s all up to you to decide. With a little bit of planning and managed expectations, you can really plant a lot of seeds and watch them grow for weeks or even years. Here is a list of five things you should do (or not do!) to make sure you get the most out of your film festival experience!

1. Have a website for your film. Seriously, it’s very easy, and these days you can have a pretty professional website for free or for a small monthly fee. We all know as indie filmmakers the budget is tight or non-existent. Especially if you’ve just submitted your film to a gazillion film festivals at 25-75 bucks a pop. But you need that website and the Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and while I’m at it, DEFINITELY GET BUSINESS CARDS. Filmmakers need to build an audience and cultivate relationships, and that takes promoting and reminding. No matter how breathtaking your film may be, people get amnesia the second it’s over. They need to be reminded over and over again by receiving your newsletter, interacting with you on Twitter or just simply hanging out on your website. Taking care of the relationship with your audience is the most important thing. Everyone loves to see a star rise every step of the way. So keep their attention.

Bushwick Film Festival

2. This one is three-fold. If your film is not in the festival, buy a package, create a schedule, and attend with someone who has the same goal as you do. Yes, packages can be expensive, but they get you in the rooms with people you need to talk to. On the bright side, there are different levels of pricing, and if you plan ahead I’m sure you can swing the least expensive one. When you get the package and festival program, create a schedule! We all know that a little planning leads to a lot of efficiency. Festivals are fast, so if you’re not careful you’ll end up just wasting a whole lot of time and getting stuck with a thought bubble of burning cash. So dedicate a few evenings to creating a master plan. Turn up the notch and go out and buy a large 30 x 25 Post-it pad and make a day by day schedule, post it to your wall, and take a step back and refine it until the plan is solid. Then put it into your planner or online calendar and stick to it. Remember that you’re there to have character-growing conversations, make connections, build relationships, and talk about your work.

3. Swallow that fear and accept there will be lots of awkward. Every time you feel that little fear gremlin creep up, remind yourself why you are there. This is your opportunity to get your story out, grow as a filmmaker, and expand your circle. There will be lots of awkward moments. Like when you’re trying to talk to someone who’s stuffing their face and looking at all the other people they would rather talk to. If that happens, that’s okay. Politely end the conversation and move on to the next person. Talk to people who are interested in carrying on a conversation with you. Don’t force it. So what if that super famous producer won’t give you the time of day. One day he will. Until then, be happy with who is nice enough to share their time with you. Remember, the most important person is the person in front of you. So engage.

Organizers of the Bushwick Film Festival

4. DON’T GET WASTED. Actually, try not to drink at all. It may seem like a fabulous idea, especially if you saved up for months and got that V.I.P. package that comes with an open bar, but it’s a waste of time. You have to be sharp and ready to deliver that 5-, 10-, or 15-minute pitch you’ve been working on. Ask good questions that lead to better conversations and even a coffee date with an industry professional the next morning. So stay sharp. While everyone else is throwing back whiskey gingers and getting loose on the dance floor, continue working the room, pitching, exchanging business cards, and leaving gracefully.

5. FOLLOW UP. Don’t let those business cards go to waste. If you’re following up via email, be specific. Remind the recipient of who you are, where you met, and maybe mention highlights from your conversation. You can’t expect everyone to remember who you are, especially if they didn’t follow step #4. When ending the email, be clear about what you’re asking for. Would you like to set a coffee date? Follow up with a phone call? Send them a film you’ve been working on? Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want. The worse that could happen is the person says thank you, but no thank you. Also, remember silence does not equal no. People tend to be busy, so if they don’t reply the first time, don’t feel bad. You can always send them a second email following the same format as the first. Be patient; good things come to those who wait.

Kweighbaye Kotee is the CEO and Director of Programming for the Bushwick Film Festival. She runs the festival with her amazing partners Casey Johnson-Aksoy (Director of Social Media & Marketing) and Meenakshi Thirkude (Director of New Media) and their all-women staff. The Bushwick Film Festival celebrates the art of filmmaking, provides a platform for artists to showcase their work, and brings diversity to the film industry.

Kweighbaye Kotee

Casey Johnson-Aksoy

The Answer Is in the Questions

This is a guest post by Erika McGrath.

I do not have all the answers. Or should I say, I do not have all the right answers. Maybe there’s no one with the right answers? Ahh, yes. That’s it. Nobody has all the right answers.

I am days away from beginning principal photography on Half Life, my first go at directing a narrative. And just in case I forgot that I was making an independent film, the universe was able to drum up two significant and totally unrelated events in the past 48 hours just to remind me. First, one of our crew members was arrested. Second, we were sold down the river when our equipment rental house completely backed out on the production. While getting arrested is no barrel of laughs, being three days from getting the first shot off and suddenly having no equipment lined up has been the real catastrophe. Just to put any producer who might be reading this at ease, the tough got going and in less than eight hours we were able to set up accounts with three new vendors, adjust our insurance, secure all the equipment we needed, and lay out a new travel plan.

That said, I find myself back inside a truth I came to know several years ago, which is, the best and most important thing you could do in any given situation is listen with vigilance and ask all of the right questions. However, more often than not, I find myself pursuing the right answers—the clear and exact opposite of said lesson I fought so hard to learn. Solving problems, finding solutions, fixing anything, making everything OKAY—all seems to be in the “Answer” business, don’t ya think? Well, not really. No answer will fit just right until all the questions have been tested. The answer is in the questions.

We find Gary, the lead character in Half Life, in a similar position–pursuing a path toward something he can’t quite get a grip on and along the way he is thrown up and down and then straight into living his way through all the questions. This is an experience commonly referred to as “being tested.” At the beginning of the film, Gary seems content; everything in his life is pretty peachy. Little by little, he starts to see fractures from his past, new ones creeping in, each one unto itself not so damaging, but all together, they break his world wide open. Now, Gary is standing in the middle of a wide open pile of broken pieces, staring at it saying, “What the hell? Where was the wrong turn? How do I put it all back together and make it work again? Is there a different way to do this? A better way? A truer way?” Well, my advice to Gary—Go climb a tree.

There are many different ways to climb a tree. As a kid, I took every chance I had to get up in one of those beasts. The thing to remember as you climb, no matter which way you take them on, each branch and each step will have its own set of challenges and its own set of consequences. Standing around staring up into the leafy green unknown, trying to figure out which combination of challenges and consequences will be the least damaging or difficult, just keeps you on the ground. You’ll never get anywhere by trying to figure it all out before you start. And, as my grandmother always reminded me, if you stand there looking up at the sky with your mouth hanging open, a sharp shootin’ bird will probably come along and poop in it.

Some of you might be saying, “Girl, get real. Clearly you’re up in a tree right now and too far off the ground to see what is really happening.” Okay sure… you might be right. But I’ll say this, the tree I’m climbing is an ancient oak and its roots are deeper in the ground than any of us probably ever will be. The tree will let you know what you need to know; you’ll feel it every time the wind blows. Yes, the climb is dangerous and scary—at times you’ll feel lost and unsure of your next move, your feet will slip, your hands will lose grip, you’ll get a few cuts and take a few knocks. But, if you keep your head up and remember what you’re there for, listening for signals each step of the way, you’ll find what you need and you’ll make your way to peer out over the tippy, uneasy top. What that looks like? Well, I don’t know; I imagine it looks different for everybody. I’ll let you know when I get there. And if I do, you’ll see it in Half Life.

To come out of this analogy and into real tactics, the message I want to share with you here is that the answers are relative and none of them are stopping points. Every answer you land on will still contain questions, whether or not you acknowledge them, that will lead you to your next step. The experience of making a movie is bigger than the sum of its parts. As a director, I think we have to accept that the film is bigger than us; most everything is beyond your control after a certain point. At that turn, it’s our job to listen to the film and let it become what it wants to be. The right questions are your guideposts. They will save you in times of reeling panic and maybe keep you from passing out. My wise assistant director, Chi Laughlin, reminds me daily, “Whatever your movie needs will happen… just maybe not the way you expected.” And that brings me to the last piece of advice I’ll bother you with—Nobody can make a movie alone. So, I say, gather around people who will work hard, tell truths, make you laugh, dance a little—And listen.

Erika McGrath is currently developing her first feature length picture and is in production for her short film Half Life, which was successfully crowd funded on Seed&Spark this summer. When not making movies, she is also an active dog lover, motorcycle rider and pie enthusiast. Born and raised in Ohio, McGrath now resides in New York City.

Like the Water

Like the Water, DP: Eve M. Cohen, Dir. Caroline von Kuhn

This is a guest post by Caroline von Kuhn.

Artists in every discipline play out our personal neuroses in our work, but there are few outlets as indulgent a playground as film.

My most pleasurable experience of a contemporary film in a theatre last year was Leos Carax’s Holy Motors, which I saw twice on the big screen. It raises the ultimate question of identity near and dear to my heart: is human existence a truth formed through an evolution of identities building on one another until we are whole? Or merely a series of empty performances conformed to our given circumstances? Do we evolve, dropping deeper into our Self with each relationship we enter or instead chip away until only an empty shell remains?

Carax houses these dark, looming questions in a delightful succession of dream-like vignettes. The film transpires over the course of one day in which M. Oscar (Denis Lavant) takes a series of appointments, each a distinct, if not surreal, homage to film and literature. We, like M. Oscar, get lost in the act, re-emerging to digest the one and prepare for the next: left to return to the question of his, of our, identity.

My first attempt at filmmaking was a collective autodidactic pursuit of the medium with a team of five other female artists. We set out to tell a story of self-identity and the even bigger struggle of self-acceptance in one’s 20s. We set out to tell a story of the imperfection of the Female. We set out to tell a story of that first taste of a contemporary’s mortality, which leaves youth grappling with grief in its rawest, ugliest, truest form. We set out to teach ourselves the craft of filmmaking through this story.

What results is our Like the Water.

Caitlin FitzGerald in Like the Water, DP: Eve M. Cohen, Dir. Caroline von Kuhn

The inspiration for our film stemmed from a deeply formative shared experience Caitlin FitzGerald, my lead actress and co-writer, and I had of losing childhood friends in our early 20s. We both found that encountering death at a young age – especially that of a contemporary – provoked a seismic shift in the way we came to understand the world. We not only shared experiences of grief but had turned to writing in a therapeutic attempt to capture and express something ultimately inchoate: the memory of a life.

The 20s prove to be a time of extraordinary growth – a fuller awareness, a deeper appreciation, of the world and the self. It was more or less around this transitional chapter that we six artists met and committed to exploring, perhaps exploiting, iterations of our story. One of the universal feminine, in a way that film never allows the feminine to be portrayed. The film that results is a product of this particular chorus of women’s voices. We discovered a shared urgency for us to tell this story with these women that summer because our voices were right for it at that moment.

On the set of Like the Water, photo by Lori Traikos

So we wrote a script, raised some money, cast our friends and family (yes, my parents are in my movie, as are many of our parents), assembled a great crew and went up to Maine. A very generous community of Mainers welcomed us into their fold and set us up to pull off this adventure. Within 16 months we had conceived, written, funded, shot, edited and premiered our first film – most of us first-timers in our positions.

With age does come wisdom, or, at the very least, a more weathered, cynical perspective. Maybe it was exactly this naivety that ultimately allowed us to pursue such an ambitious endeavor with such uninhibited sincerity and gusto. For the gift of directing my first film, I will forever be indebted to this group of women – for indulging me in the pursuit of our story.

And I look forward to this continued pursuit with the next.

Like the Water is written, produced, directed, stars, shot & edited by women. It can be viewed on Seed&Spark.

Caroline von Kuhn works as the Managing Director of the Camden International Film Festival and is producing The Fixer (Dir. Ian Olds).

[Photo Credit: Frances F. Denny]

When Opportunity Knocks

Shooting Fog City

This is a guest post by Liz O’Neal.

I am not a traditional filmmaker, and to be honest, I was not an experienced filmmaker until I produced Fog City. I moved to SF a year ago to manage a video studio – from operations and client services and video production — for a large corporation. At one of those too-large-and-somewhat-dull conferences that we’ve all been to, I serendipitously stumbled upon the Seed&Spark team. They were amazing to meet, and within several days of meeting Liam Brady, we knew that we wanted to work together. He brought the creative energy, and I brought the focus and project management.

Liam and I have been on an extraordinary journey together.

Our first Seed&Spark campaign went toward pre-production. In the first 30 days, we raised $6K from our friends and family members; it’s hard for them to say no! The development was moving along as planned. We used the funds carefully, printing postcards and hosting local script workshops.

When it came time to create the production budget for our second campaign, the goal was much larger: $50K.

On the set of Fog City

Quickly realizing that the budget and timeline were incompatible with each other – an important lesson that should be learned by all aspiring filmmakers – we did what no filmmaker should do when crowdfunding: in order to stay on schedule, we slashed our budget without fully considering the consequences. The final numbers: we raised $32K in 30 days, but inevitably our film still cost us close to $50K. We are now backfilling with personal funds and hoping to raise enough in our next campaign to reconcile the difference.

To gain followers for our crowdfunding campaign, I carefully developed a social calendar – tweets, Facebook posts, video updates – to include all-things SF, baseball and war veterans. I assumed that we could rally support through hash tags and local associations but severely underestimated how challenging it was to translate support into donations (we needed $1K per day).

Halfway through our campaign, we hadn’t even hit 30%. I went into full-blown panic mode. Why hadn’t I organized a live auction or a fundraising softball tournament? The clock was ticking, and I was running out of options. Through a series of desperate tweets, Facebook posts and personal phone calls to friends and family members who had “always wanted to support our film” but hadn’t yet, we gained some late momentum and, thankfully, finished the campaign with enough funds to shoot the film. Phew.

I learned that you need to spend your money wisely, and some things are worth splurging on. For example, we flew a steadicam operator and his gear out from NYC because he had worked with our crew before, and I was told he was a rockstar – I was hesitant to spend the money on this, but he made all the difference in the caliber of our film.

As a student project, we were fortunate enough to have insurance from NYU and were given student rates for all of our locations. NYU wanted us to have signed location agreements before they would issue any insurance, and our SF locations wouldn’t consider signing any forms without seeing proof of insurance – I ended up in an endless cycle of Catch 22 with 8 locations. Several emails and phone calls later, NYU begrudgingly issued insurance on the promise of location agreements ASAP.

Still from Fog City

The most bizarre part about this is that we received insurance that expired on July 1st, 2013 (our shoot was June 28 – July 8); we learned that NYU’s policy expires over the summer and was being renewed in the middle of our shoot – a strange and awful coincidence that has probably never happened to anyone else because students tend to shoot during the year. So now, I have void insurance for more than half of my shoot, my locations will not give me permits, and the rental houses will not rent us equipment. One of our NYU team members sent a very stern, yet pleading, email to the insurance department explaining that they were single handedly derailing our entire production and that they needed to help us. Meanwhile, I scrambled to take out my own insurance policies for each location and rental house (something we did not have the budget for). 48 hours before we were supposed to start shooting, we were notified that NYU had taken out temporary insurance policies from another company to backfill our gap. My rental houses and locations were confused by the hubbub but accepted the dual insurance policies.

We survived a series of crises throughout our 8 day shoot: our Red Epic broke on Day 1 and had to be replaced overnight – pushing our entire schedule and robbing us of a day off on July 4th. I had to let go of a crew member, and we were nearly kicked off location for not following the location agreement (note: don’t drink bottled beer on a beach!). With each unexpected incident, I had to be a calm and confident leader. There were times that I panicked in front of crew members, but I quickly realized that spreading my anxiety was damaging and counterproductive.

By the end of the week, I had learned to take a deep breath and take my triage center (i.e. laptop and cell phone) to another room. I would have private conversations with one person who could help, without letting everyone know that we had a big problem on our hands; isolating the chaos is just as important as finding the solution. I learned that being a producer is like being a perpetual problem solver; it’s never easy but always necessary. I’m happy and proud to say that we wrapped last week and have stunning footage that I couldn’t be more proud of.

Filmmaker Liz O’Neal

I now know that things happen for a reason. It’s important to trust your gut, to seize every great opportunity, and to know that you can, and will, overcome any obstacle that comes in the way of your film. Liam and I will soon begin phase two of our journey: fundraising for post-production and festival submissions. I will be better prepared for fundraising this time and can’t wait to see our final product in the fall.

Liz O’Neal is a Connecticut raised Syracuse Grad living in San Francisco. She recently accepted the role of Creative Director at Six Spoke Media and is in post-production for her first short film, Fog City. To find out more about the film, please visit http://www.seedandspark.com/studio/fog-city and follower her @LizONeal.

On Stop Motion Animation and Starting a Project–Whether You’re Ready or Not

This is a guest post by Cait Davis.

In 2009 I wrote a series of short stories that were supposed to be a Halloween costume. My plan was to go as “The Unconscious” and hand out the stories as first person narratives for the receivers of said stories. But I didn’t make the costume and I was left with the stories. I loved them. They came from a different part of myself than what I am aware of in my everyday thinking, and I am fascinated with this part of myself, fascinated with this as a part of human nature. What is the river that runs beneath our every day meanderings? Who are we really? And what does that even mean–to be someone for real? These little glimpses of those sailing depths were what I held on to, and I wasn’t really sure what to do with the stories.

Photo of my old project binder

I took the nine short stories I had written, and I put them into script format. I printed the scripts out, and I looked at them and I put them in a binder, and then I made other movies. I told my friends that those scripts were for later in my career, when I could make them the right way. In part I meant when I could afford to make them, but I also meant when I felt ready to make them. That’s always a funny idea, when a person feels ready for something. It’s pretty abstract, but you know it when it’s there.

Stories of the Unconscious logo–an original lino print

About six months ago I launched a campaign using the film-centric crowd-funding website Seed&Spark. In collaboration with my friend and producer Sara Murphy, Stories of the Unconscious was launched onto the internet, and funding was successful. The campaign process sounds so simple when it’s written in two quick sentences, but it was an arduous task and a tale in and of itself that I’ll leave for some other time.

Now is where we can come back and revisit the idea of being “ready,” because “feeling ready” meant only that I was ready to not feel quite ready, if that makes any sense. I was ready to feel nervous and push forward; I was ready to not know what was going to happen; I was ready to have anxiety and frustration; and I was ready to get excited and have confidence and experiment with new creative processes. And it even meant that I was ready to make this project even if I wasn’t sure I was ready, if all of this needs further unclarification…

One of the many ways we sold our souls for crowd-funding dollars

Sara and I had the money and now we were ready to make a movie. We organized the scripts from “easiest” to “most difficult” to ease our way into the production. We went on to film five of the stories over the next five months. There were confusions and stresses and things that needed figuring out and happy accidents and frustration and excitement and elation.

A still from “The Statue,” one of the nine stories that make up Stories of the Unconscious. Cinematography by Alex Hill.

We’re now on the sixth film, and it’s going to take the longest amount of time to complete. This film is the only one in the series that is entirely stop-motion animation. I’m collaborating directly with my theater designer friend Damon Pelletier, and neither of us has any real experience with stop-motion animation.

The studio work table

Together, we collected reference images and discussed the look of the project. The central character of our story is made from wire and computer parts. Damon scoured the streets for tiny pieces of rusted metal, circuitry boards, discarded hard drives, and various interesting trinkets. We bought armature wire and watched online tutorial videos. Damon went through at least three versions of the character before he was satisfied with one.

A shot of the central character on the set of our stop motion animation

For the set construction, we decided on cardboard, a readily available material and one that doesn’t have to cost anything. Once again, Damon took to the streets, focusing on industrial buildings that discard more durable cardboard pieces. He also is not shy about diving into dumpsters and trash bins in search of the right material. Once acquired, he sorts the cardboard into different qualities and thicknesses. My favorite is when we walk down the street and he picks up a piece of cardboard and, holding it to his ear, he knocks on it and then says, “Oh, that’s a good piece of cardboard.” He’s turned into the cardboard expert.

Damon making columns for the set of “In the Well”

Most recently, Damon and I have been working on a suburban sidewalk set that utilizes forced perspective. What this means is that each house in the set is actually smaller than the house before, creating the illusion of greater depth than what is actually there. This makes a space or a scene look larger than it really is.

Unveiling the trickery of forced perspective: the beginning of some urban house facades

For the rooftops of the houses Damon is peeling off the top thin layer of a standard piece of cardboard, exposing the ribbed interior and therefore creating a roof shingles-like texture. We haven’t figured out the backdrop yet, but it may be a painted sky or some sort of rear projection. At this time, we are required to vacate from our current studio and so have to move our set up into the basement of Big Irv’s. After we complete this short, we’ll have three more before the whole series is filmed.

I guess, at the end of all of this, the big lesson I’m learning is that you won’t ever really be ready, so you just have to go ahead and start doing it when you feel like it. It’s like Robert Rodriguez says, “So you want to be a filmmaker? Wrong. You are a filmmaker.” Or, as David Lynch says, “The beautiful thing is the doing and if you love your work, that’s the greatest blessing.”

Cait on the set of “Smells Like Chewing Rubber”

To follow the progress of ‘Stories of the Unconscious,’ click LIKE! on the official Facebook page.

Cait Davis is a media creator of short films, installations and video experiments. She is co-creator of an experimental slide show shown at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. A feature script written by Cait and her father, Derek Davis, was accepted into IFP 2010 Emerging Narrative program.