Short Film in the UK: Availability, Audience, and the Future May 1, 2007
Posted by Daniel Stephens in : Artfully Deranged, Short Film , trackbackThis article is written in conjunction with several others and is best read in conjunction with them. Click the below titles to read/navigate between each individual article:
1. Short Film: A brief critical history
2. Short Film In The UK: Screen Yorkshire and the Independents
3. Short Film In The UK: Film Festivals and Competitions
4. Short Film In The UK: Technology and the Tiny Screen
5. Short Film In The UK: Availability, Audience, and the Future
6. ‘Okay, we’re done’: The story of my first short film
7. Short Film Take II: The Trouble With Mr. Goldman
8. Short Film In The UK: Recommended Links
This article is written in conjunction with my essay - Screen Yorkshire and the Independents, accessible HERE
Availability
Exhibition is all-important if short film is ever to succeed on a mainstream level. With the creation of Propeller TV and the widespread use of the internet, short film has found a basis to prosper.
The internet has been vital for young and new filmmakers to get their work showcased beyond just family and friends. Chris Patmore says ‘one of the easiest ways to get your film seen is to put it on the internet.’ He continues, ‘well-established sites, such as triggerstreet.com, have a huge audience, mostly of other filmmakers, improving the chances of your movie being seen by the right people.’
Triggerstreet.com aims to discover and showcase ‘new and unique talent.’ ‘Based on the principles of creative excellence, it provides industry access and exposure to help build the careers of notable new filmmakers’ Yet, triggerstreet.com is not just a website designed to exhibit short films. It aims to assist new filmmakers learn their craft by allowing users to comment on and review each others work. This idea of reviewing other people’s films seems to have been inspired by the work of Francis Ford Coppola. He created a writers workshop for his short story magazine Zoetrope: All Story, which quickly grew to become the Virtual Studio, and is a web-based application allowing writers and filmmakers to showcase and critique each other’s creative endevours. Patmore believes this sort of ‘workshop’ is a vital tool to improve the work of a new filmmaker. ‘This is especially true of triggerstreet, as all newly posted films get a chance to be reviewed by other filmmakers as part of the conditions of posting on the site. Getting feedback from your peers is always a useful way to find out if what you have is any good.’
Triggerstreet.com was formed from Kevin Spacey’s production company. The site’s purpose is based on Spacey’s belief that the ‘path to his own success would have been much rockier without the support and encouragement of many outstanding mentors.’ He now believes it is his ‘earnest duty’ to ‘sought out a way to inspire, nurture, and help bring exposure to new and undiscovered talent.’ Such sites as this, as well as Kevin Smith’s moviesaskew.com and atomfilms.com go someway of alleviating one of Andrew Quinn’s criticisms about Screen Yorkshire’s assistance in filmmaking – the non-existence of an easily attainable help network. Quinn states, ‘I think some sort of easily accessible advice or support network would help a lot more people. Just someone to ask where to look or to answer questions when you really don’t know the answers.’
Now, with the creation of Sky television channel Propeller TV, Ronke, Future Shorts, MySpace networking, and Youtube.com, short film has never had a better chance to attract a wide, mainstream audience. Propeller TV’s Dawn Simpson said, ‘the idea is that it’s a showcase – a platform for young filmmakers. What happens most of the time is that short films end up gathering dust on a shelf somewhere, and apart from the film festival circuits, there’s no life to it. What we’re trying to do is bring some life back to it.’
The channel broadcast not just in Britain, so it opens up the audience for new filmmakers:
‘We actually transmit across Europe so the opportunities are there and you never know who is watching. What we are trying to say is that there is a lot of new hidden talent there. We want to give it some life and hopefully by the end of our three year funded period we’ll have a lot of films where someone has said – that’s a great piece of filmmaking, or that’s a great idea – that’s what we really want to do, to help filmmakers.’
Audience
As Patmore says, ‘The whole point of making a movie is for it to be seen, and anyone who tells you otherwise is either trying to fool you or is fooling himself.’ Therefore, there has to be an audience for short film, and with the potential of both Propeller and the internet, that audience may now be being found.
Simpson believes this will cause a knock-on effect to entice the government to put more money into the industry. ‘Filmmakers who do the festival circuits don’t get the opportunity to show their films to a wide audience. We are saying to the government - this is now public viewing. Everyone has seen this, it’s got a wider audience. Therefore, more money should be injected into the film industry.’
Simpson clarifies just how important Propeller has the potential to be:
‘When you go for funding, they say to you, ‘well, who is going to see this?’ and the answer is ‘well maybe 30 at the screening, or if it gets to a festival 50 max!’ If I’m the U.K film Council and I’m giving you £10,000 to make a film and only 50 people are going to see it, how do you justify money coming from tax payer’s pockets? Now, you can say it has potential to attract 16 million viewers across Europe and suddenly you equate that £10,000 and its minimal expenditure. It could have a big effect on the type of funding, and the amount of funding that is available.’
Simpson tells me that the BBC want to have access to the best short films screened on Propeller, which examples the type of industry professionals who are interested in this new channel.
Theoretically, if more people had access to short films, then popularity would grow. With new mobile technology and the likes of Lisa Roberts’ ‘Pocket Shorts’ scheme, the mainstream arena is available for short film to utilise. Now, despite big cinema chains not exhibiting short films and smaller independent exhibitors struggling to find a large audience, the basis for both exhibition (television and the internet) and distribution (mobile phones, new technology) are in place.
Simpson believes people are into ‘snacking’ – ‘if it’s on a mobile telephone, for 5 or 6 minutes while you’re on the bus, or you’re just waiting for your friend to turn up, people, because of their lifestyles are more into ‘snacking’, which is your 5/6 minute short.’
She also adamantly believes that the measures that are being put in place will push short film into the mainstream. ‘I think it’s because people haven’t had the opportunity to see them and I think what we’ll do is introduce the whole short world on a national basis, and yeah I think they will come into the mainstream.’
Chasing Rainbows or Rain Clouds
Propeller TV is funded by the same agencies as Screen Yorkshire and therefore the same criticisms could be levelled again. Propeller claim to want to showcase new talent and provide short film with a platform, but their major funds come from ‘Yorkshire Forward’, an agency whose chief goal is the economy of the Yorkshire region. Again, if short film is merely a treasure trove of talent, ready to be moved elsewhere in the industry to maintain jobs, increase skilled workers and fuel the economy, then short film will forever remain a niche cinema market. Largely because the skilled filmmakers are constantly being pushed into other areas of the industry, namely television and commercial cinema, leaving short film a testing ground, flooded with amateurs.
However, it would be unfair to criticise Propeller because they are still in their infancy and one such idea does set them apart from the rest. As they are not for profit, all money they do make will be filtered back to the filmmakers to go towards new projects. This can only help short film, because it increases the amount of funds available for new filmmakers. Through Propeller’s ‘Gold’ scheme, where people will vote for their favourite films shown on the channel and each film will gain points on the basis of votes, they plan to sell an end-of-year DVD. This will include their best shorts, and this money will be given to the top filmmakers to help them with their subsequent projects.
Citation:
Patmore, C (2005) Get Started In Short Filmmaking London: Quarto
Quinn, A (2006) Interview conducted by Daniel Stephens with Andrew Quinn at Slack Video Hull
Roberts, Lisa (2006) Interview conducted by Daniel Stephens Huddersfield
Simpson, D (2006) Interview conducted by Daniel Stephens with Dawn Simpson of Propeller TV Huddersfield
Triggerstreet.com (2006) About Us [online] available from http://www.triggerstreet.com/gbase/Trigger/HomeMain (accessed 10 March 2006)
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