.... do with the money if you could finance one movie? If you could produce one movie that you haven't written and had a million for the budget what genre would it be and how would you go about making it? Even though I don't love horror movies that much I know they sell so I'd find the best contained thriller or horror and spend time finding it. Then search for a music video director that has done a bunch of great videos who has NOT made a film. Tell him/her you can only pay them 100k but you will give them back-end points and ownership in the movie. Then cast it and make it with a director that knows what they are doing and a solid line producer (who you give a piece of it to as well) and put every penny on the screen. Chances are if it's even decent (and you always hope for good - I mean GREAT) it will sell and find an audience as horrors usually do. Even if at a festival or AFM (where Stage 32 is partners with FYI). The key is the script. But bringing on a great director who is motivated and incentivized by owning some portion of the film makes them fired up about delivering and doing everything the can to help find an audience besides you yourself. Getting other people to invest in themselves for success is the way to get a collaboration firing on all cylinders. And you will actually be PRODUCING a film. And by being on set and being there everyday you are paying yourself to learn. And pay yourself enough to eat but design a piece where you own the whole picture and win in success note producing fees.
Producing : I you had 1 million dollars what would you......... by Ilan Breil
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Love this question Ilan Breil ! I would definitely move forward on a project!
Interesting fantasy - but it ain't gonna happen..
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I'd invest the money in the stock market, use the profits from that to produce a few good low budget films to enter in film festivals. This would give me the opportunity to "cut my filmmaker teeth". I've learned I need to do something at least six times before producing something of quality. "Perfect practice makes perfect". So it wouldn't really make sense to blow one million dollars on a first film, especially considering how difficult it is for first time filmmakers to get funding.
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I would first spend a part of the money on a complete "comic book" rendition of the script. I read the comic book first and if it felt good to great, I would proceed to look for a production company - a crew and Mgmt with a track record, a body of 'recent' work, which impressed me and then hire them and tell them the budget is 500K but they /we would have to make it look like a 2 MiIlion budget. (Haha.) I'd try to shoot in a state which offered the best incentives and locales for what seems to me a genre that could use a serious re-invention: The western. (A-yo, can I get a Yee-ha?)
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I would go to USC & NYU film schools, speak to professors there and ask which film student is the next big thing and fund a debut feature.
Decade ago, my LA friend's neighbor was Forest Whitaker and Forest invited my friend to a fundraiser/meet and greet a young filmmaker. My friend asked me to go with him and I declined. I wanted to watch ESPN and stayed on the couch.
That young filmmaker is Ryan Coogler and the fundraiser was for his debut feature movie, "Fruitvale Station."
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So they made hay and you have regrets. Forget it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHkKUPHn8TE&ab_channel=RoadshowFilms