Lucas McNelly is one of the three filmmakers who kicked off the whole #2wkfilm
movement. He made the feature film "Blanc de Blanc" during the
very first #2wkfilm run in May 2009.
Here is an interview with him discussing filmmaking and the #2wkfilm process.
Why did you decide to do #2wkfilm?
I remember when you first suggested it
to Amir, thinking it was the craziest fucking thing I'd ever heard of.
But then, after I thought about it for a little while, it began to make
sense in a strange way. Eventually I realized I had nothing to lose.
Worst case scenario I make a terrible film under impossible
circumstances and I shake it off as a learning experience. But, if the
film is actually any good. Well, then that's all upside.
What are the things you learned by doing #2wkfilm?
I learned that after a point, maybe on
hour 30 in two days, your brain sort of shuts off, and if you don't
have storyboards, you're in trouble.
Seriously,
though, I think I learned how to trust actors. There's a big difference
between letting actors do their thing and knowing when to let
them do their thing and when to rein them in. Part of my approach here
was to give the actors a great deal of free reign in building their
characters and performance (80% of the dialogue was improvised, after
all). Considering the time constraints, it felt like the only way to
get solid performances was to bring the actors into the process from
the very beginning and let them help come up with the story, to
effectively help write it. Most of the time that worked, but there are
scenes where I had to take that control back, and scenes where I should
have done it more. It's a tricky thing to figure out when you're moving
that fast, but I think I'm better at it than I was when we started.
Of course, the actors may not agree with that...
I'd
be better organized. Specifically, I'd have gotten someone to start
editing as we were shooting. Editing in the evenings after work made it
hard to get into a groove. Having someone to get everything sorted out
in the early days would have been a great deal of help. Also, I
probably would have taken a couple weeks off work.
What would you expand on?
The two weeks?
I
would have pushed to get more connective tissue. I think the biggest
problem with the film is that it lacks the footage to connect the
scenes, and that can tend to give it a kind of choppy feel. I'm not
entirely sure where we would have found the time to do that, but I wish
we had.
Also, I would have added a couple of weeks of pre-production. That would have been vital.
What are you going to do about the release and distribution of the film?
I'm not sure. I'm famously skeptical
of a method that jumps right into streaming the film for free online. I
just don't think it's as effective as we all hope it could be, at least
not yet. So, I'll send it to some critics and at very least the
festivals that screened gravida (to try and capitalize on any
existing audience I have there). After that, I'm leaning toward setting
up screenings in non-traditional places to see if we can't make some of
the budget back and get the cast and crew some money in their pockets,
even if it's not a lot.
I'm not sure. I'm not a fan of making
films just for the sake of making films, as I think if you're going to
spend that much time and energy on a film, it should be in pursuit of a
story you really want to tell. Otherwise, what's the point?
So, if I did #2wkfilm again, it'd be because I found a story that'd benefit from the treatment, which is certainly possible.
Has #2wkfilm changed the way you approach filmmaking?
Yeah, I think it's shown me that you
don't have to always have all your pieces in place to make a film, that
you can wing it a little and it won't all go horribly wrong. Plus, it
was pretty liberating to tell a potential actor that we can't
reschedule for the next weekend because they had to do a play, that we
were going to make the film on these dates, whether they could help or
not.
Probably everything but the last 3
hours of the day. For the most part they found it exciting to be flying
blind, but man were they exhausted by the end.
Would the cast and crew do another #2wkfilm?
They very well might, but I don't
think they'd do more than one a year. We kind of swung for the fences
where maybe we should have just tried to hit a double.
What has been the response to your film so far?
So far I've been keeping it under
wraps until I can figure out what to do with it, but the couple of
people who've seen it seem to like it a fair amount. As for everyone
else, well, we shall see.
What else would you like to say about film and filmmaking?
I think the real value of something like
this is that it allows you to shake off the cobwebs, to get out of the
eternal cycle of trying to get a project off the ground. It's a
fantastic change of pace. And while I don't know if the approach would
be ideal for every filmmaker, but I think every filmmaker should do
something like this at least once.
If nothing else, it's gotten me moving a little
faster than before and introduced me to other filmmakers around the
world, and for that it's been so very valuable.
Lucas McNelly
3 filmmakers. 3 cities. 3 films. 2 weeks.
#2wkfilm
http://www.2wkfilm.com
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