Learning How to Make a Movie (Part 1)

I read an interview some years ago in which James Cameron advised creatives to do this: “Make stuff.” Per Cameron, actually making movies is the single best way to learn, really learn the entire process of cinematic storytelling.

Screenwriter Ian Fowler did just that and wrote a reflection on his experiences making his movie Crazy Right. I am sharing that story with you over the next several days.

Learning How to Make a Movie: Part 1

By Ian Fowler

Colleen insisted I make movies. I had quit, given up, succumb to the overwhelming fact that I would never get financing for “my” movie(s). Three times I had tried and failed. One guy even had me picked up in a spotless Lexus and driven me to Seattle where he listened for three hours, shook my hand, said we had a deal, and two months later (with no money transferred at all) called me and said the deal was off with no explanation. I had been excited, had started putting everything together, hiring cast and crew and these were phone calls I didn’t want to make.

I had even tried to just sell my scripts. But was told repeatedly that despite how good people thought they were that no one would make quirky, dark, funny, dramatic movies. I heard repeatedly that “my style” didn’t sell.

So, I just wrote scripts for hire. A comedy over here, a drama over there, sci-fi, horror, you name it. Back in the day a producer hired me to write a sci-fi script based on a book he loved as a child. I wrote it for $3,000 dollars. He offered me points on the back end when the film was financed but I turned him down stating the glaring fact that the film would never get privately financed. It was rude, but true and has never been sniffed in anything other than script.

I had made some really good short films, too. I even won an award and a cash prize. Strangely enough, it had become apparent that I really didn’t know what I was doing. I mean, I knew what I wanted to see from actors. I knew how I wanted to frame shots. But if I’m being brutally honest with myself, Jon Meyer (a local writer, director, cinematographer, editor and musician) did most of the heavy lifting. I wrote and directed (sort of) and he did all the other work. “My” films were good.

I sorta in the back of my gut understood this and went off to make some films on my own. At that point I just knew that I wanted to make movies and I had friends wanting to work with
me. So I made a few short films. A futurist mocumentory about serial killers having a #1 show on TV, a silent film about depression and I shot and edited films for other directors and even learned a little about musical choice.

After yet another fake financing deal fell through I just couldn’t take it anymore and sent a note to all my friends that I was leaving the biz.

And I tried to paint. I started my artist “career” in comic book art with my childhood friend Ben in Gastonia, North Carolina. That transitioned to painting with the aid of my high school art teacher Mr. Griffin. Painting did not go so well. I managed only one piece I considered good in two months.

Out of the blue a friend in Toronto asked if I would write a script. She and her boyfriend had ideas, and she’s pretty damn well connected in Hollywood. Amazingly famous brothers. I knew this was something I could do, so I said yes. I finished the script in 2 months and a year later….nothing. No sale, no development, no money, no nothing.

I lost complete faith that I would ever do anything in movies other than hold a boom or move a C stand. It took Colleen months to convince me.

Enter Patrick Green. A Portland actor and friend who wanted to make a good movie. The problem with the low budget world is that there are “filmmakers” (I do use the term loosely) who think they know what they’re doing. They don’t know anything about how to make a movie other than their vibrato. It’s rampant. Actors get sucked into this crap all the time. Itsucks. Actors get used and thrown away for the express purpose of some idiot’s wet dream. Patrick was no exception. He and I had talked at length about it and how troubling it was/is and how there’s nothing actors trying to get any kind of exposure can do about it, especially if it pays a little, because then you’re a “real” actor, getting paid to do what you love…only, it rarely turn out well.

Patrick Green in the movie Crazy Right

I sent him the original script for “Crazy Right” which was a fractured wet dream 120 pages in length. It was sorta an alcoholic pissing himself, having sex, drinking, arguing and ultimately finding no peace what so ever script. It was about me. I had written it erase demons of the nearly two decades I had spent at the bottom of a bottle. Patrick loved the script and as we started talking about how to make it a reality with no budget, we quickly realized we had to rewrite the script to actually make it work.

We got rid of any locations that weren’t really needed. We consolidated characters. We added agoraphobia so the character couldn’t leave the house. We needed a way to introduce his psychological break and enter his delusions so we came up with a Walkman. How else can you have a character recount the past when everything has already been done? I’m sure this has been done too, but it worked.

We had a 75 page script that we really liked.

Tomorrow in Part 2, Ian starts shooting his movie and learns some big lessons up front in the process.

Ian Fowler has been writing scripts professionally for 8 years and began making short films 6 years ago. He’s written everything from science fiction to comedy for producers from LA to Toronto, original works based on producer’s ideas to books and even a life story. The best thing about writing so far has been getting paid even though none of the films have been made to date (especially the 100 million dollar sci fi script — hehe) In 2016 he set off to make his first feature film Crazy Right.

The movie’s Facebook page here.

If you have a story about making a movie which you feel Go Into The Story readers would enjoy and benefit from, email me.