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Friday, February 06, 2009
YouTube's Hollywood Deal
YouTube and the the Hollywood talent agency (William Morris Agency), are close to signing a deal that would place the company’s clients in made-for-the-Web productions. William Morris Agency represents a number of famous clients like the actors Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe and producers J. J. Abrams and Michael Bay.
The deal underscores the ways that distribution models are presently evolving on the Internet.
Some actors and various celebrities are creating their own content for the Web, bypassing the often arduous process of developing a program for a television network.
William Morris clients would be given an ownership stake in the videos they create for the YouTube Web site.
Directed by Michelle Lehman, last year's Tropfest Australia winning film, Marry Me, tells a little love story about "a little girl who likes a little boy and a little boy who likes his BMX bike".
The film was inspired by a true story when director, Michelle, at 5 years of age, would chase Jason Mahooney around the school in a pretend wedding dress (her mother's nightie).
has quietly become the hottest celebrity on YouTube.
Banned from MySpace, XBox Live, World of Warcraft, Wikipedia, and everywhere else, Hitler rants about Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Barack Obama, everyone and everything else.
In a dramatic scene from the feature film, DOWNFALL, a hundred comedians, independent filmmakers and screenplay writers have discovered that they can re-edit the subtitles and create their own comic version.
The original scene is well edited and well acted. In it, Hitler is given bad news, dismisses it with a counter-suggestion, is told why that won’t be happening, then pauses before dismissing most of his staff in the room in order to blow his top, while outside in the corridor everyone eavesdrops in terrified silence, apart from a weeping secretary who is comforted by a comment from her colleague.
“It works well,” explained Paul Blackburn, who posts under the nom de guerre of animukfilms, “because it fits within the parameters of sketch comedy. “We have conflict, a high level of tension and an emotional, over-the-top character, who is also safe to ridicule, due to him being such a despicable person. The structure is already in place, it’s just a case of making the dialogue fit and timing it right.” Since July, Blackburn has posted seven Downfall mash-ups, in which Hitler reacts, inter alia, to bad news concerning Gordon Brown, Adam Sandler comedies and the Australian Olympic team.
“It could be applied to any circumstance where people get brought down by hubris. It’s the same theme for every other parody video, and as long as great people fall victim to hubris, there will be parodies.” This from 7boon, who is, in reality, a 19-year-old Canadian whose film illustrates the way in which the democracy of the internet allows parodists to respond to unfolding events with the nimbleness of bloggers.
Films in which the Führer explodes with frustration at events in the sporting world over which he has no control are funny because they locate the ranting, screaming, infantile little Hitler in all of us. They are comedy through identification.
READ THE COMPLETE ARTICLE by Jasper Rees - http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/article5197025.ece
Indie filmmakers are always searching for that perfect short film that will get them noticed. One technique creating a lot of buzz involves taking a hit film (or a hit screenplay) or TV show and parodying it. There are now thousands on youTube and some fans are having a field day producing more while vying to have the best parody of each title.
A screenplay has to be really good to spawn a great parody. The gentile version of the parody below won Best Original Screenplay at this year's Oscars.
