Lesbian Directors Calling the Shots (page 3)
by Danielle Riendeau, December 4, 2006
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Also offering practical advice to new filmmakers is Hilary Goldberg, director of high-profile shorts such as Beyond Lovely and the soon to be completed In the Spotlight, both starring Guinevere Turner. She also directed Saferoom and the feature documentary Render: Spending Time With Ani DiFranco.
Goldberg advises: “The rule of thumb with short films is if you keep the film under 10 minutes, it's more likely to get programmed.” Why? “The more time your film takes up, the less time another will have, so that gives it a better shot, the shorter it is.”
Goldberg herself is a film school grad who started making movies at the ripe old age of 12, which might just explain her no-nonsense approach to filmmaking. She recommends that directors use whatever they can to make their film, including the possibility of digital video. While many traditional filmmakers scoff at the prospect of using digital video, Goldberg embraces it as an exciting new medium.
“There's such a different look between film and video,” she says, “and as far as I'm concerned, you should do whatever it is you need to do to make your movie. This goes especially for the queer festivals, where I see a lot of films shot on video. It's a film media, and each one comes with pluses and minuses. It's all about telling the story.” Lim and Chisholm have also shot projects on digital video, and all three attest to its usefulness and flexibility.
On a broader and perhaps more essential level, Goldberg advises new artists to go out and get things done. “Make the decision to make the movie,” she says. “That seems to be the biggest thing. You could sit there with a script for a really long time, sort of hoping that something will come out of the woodwork and get done, and that's quite different from deciding ‘I'm really going to make this,' and then going into the process of doing whatever it takes to make it.”
She adds that business knowledge is a powerful tool for getting your film out there: “Film is a business at the end of the day, and even though it's sort of the producer's job, the director needs to know what's going on in every level, and be able to make those kinds of executive decisions.”
Goldberg also agrees about the community aspect of the queer festival circuit. “For me, Outfest feels like queer summer camp!” she exclaims. “It's different, and has a feeling of being at home. Frameline's really fun as well, and compared to the mainstream, it's like the difference between going to a straight bar and a gay bar.”
“We've gotten to a point with queer filmmakers where some people are saying some of the festivals don't matter, but this matters,” says Mary Guzman, a filmmaker whose work will screen Dec. 1–3 at Fusion: The Los Angeles LGBT People of Color Film Festival. “But it matters that you have this festival that looks for things that wouldn't be shown in other places, things that wouldn't be honored, or maybe would be one of a million films at a broader festival. This is honoring this particular community. It's beautiful.”
No matter what path you take, one thing is certain about film: It's not easy. Any film, feature-length or two minutes long, still must travel the long, arduous road from preproduction and planning issues to the actual shooting, to the realm of postproduction and — hopefully — distribution. But according to these three talented directors, if you have the drive and the voice, there's no better way to express yourself. As Goldberg says, film is simply a calling like none other: “Why do I make films? Well, I really can't help it. I love this form of storytelling.”
For more information, visit altcinema.com, qwocmap.org or hilarygoldberg.com.
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