During the busy promotional tour for Source Code this year, Duncan popped into the Empire Magazine offices in London to take part in an online web chat during which sergithegreek asked:
Hi Duncan! What helpful and inspiring guidance can you offer a young filmmaker / writer who is almost near the end of his TV & Film degree?
To which Duncan replied:
Gather a group of like-minded people around you, find people who want to be producers, cinematographers, actors and composers, because you’re always going to have far more ability to get things made if you have the momentum of a group of people working together. It’s hard work trying to do it on your own, and you’ll be taken more seriously if there’s a group of you.
This advice rang a few bells with a group of young film makers in Melbourne, Australia, who were in the process of going about setting up just such a group themselves, Duncan’s web chat answer was inspiring enough by itself, but imagine how much more inspiring it would be if a BAFTA award winning director of two critically acclaimed feature films took time to Skype into your group to offer further advice…
Well that’s exactly what happened. The Line By Line group got set up in May 2011 including Duncan’s web chat answer as part of their initial online post of intent to collaborate and assist each other. They also got in touch with Duncan on Twitter to ask if he would like to talk to the group in Australia from his current home in LA, which Duncan happily agreed to.
At the agreed date and time, heading into the early hours of the morning (around 2am LA time, 7pm Melbourne) Duncan Skyped (wearing a special skin tight International Skype suit I believe) into the Line By Line meeting in Melbourne, and got stuck into a great chat with the group down under.
I’m sure if you are an aspiring film maker, you’d love to have been there, to share Duncan’s thoughts on writing methods, the process of film treatment to draft iterations and onwards, garnering feedback, going into production and continuing to collaborate with cast members (Sam Rockwell & Jake Gyllenhaal in the case of Duncan’s two features ‘MOON’ & ‘Source Code’)
Very interesting perspective also on what you should be trying to achieve when making a short film as well, if you have ambitions to move up to features. Duncan cites his short ‘Whistle’ (available on the MOON Blu-Ray & DVD) as his example to the Line By Line group.
Luckily, Line By Line have put up a great report of their meeting with Duncan, featuring all of the above, and a hell of a lot more. So head over there now, and have a good read, maybe it will inspire you to get together with some mates and do something similar 🙂
Photo of Duncan by Rodene Ronquillo.
Full Empire web chat here.
Thanks to Line By Line’s Charles Fisher
