“Budnitz, a 54-year-old serial entrepreneur, has built a content studio of zany, multimedia characters designed to thrive in the coming metaverse. The noir-themed world of Superplastic feels more like The Matrix than Wonderland. Its colorful inhabitants have gained millions of their own social media fans. They’ve also made $20 million from selling tens of thousands of NFTs with Christies and others.”
These two appeals raised over $1 Million, from over 6,700 backers!
In a fascinating presentation from October 2018, Budnitz summarizes his life and credo and, at 28:30, outlines the Superplastic strategy for the next five years:
“Superplastic… we have a secret plan… we’re not really making another toy kind of streetwear company. What we’re doing is we’re… making all these characters. We are making toys, but they’re just sort of an excuse because they’re awesome. What we’re really doing is we’re making these characters. Then we’re animating them in 3D but then putting them in the real world. Like, there could be one sitting right there in that empty seat, right? But you would only see it on Instagram. Then we take a picture of it; then we 3D model it and then render it and then put it on Instagram. And then we turn these characters into celebrities (we haven’t done this yet but we’re doing it — we’re in the process) and we make them celebrities. And then, they can, like, we can do cartoons and I can make movies again. We can make movies and then we can make more toys and all that kind of stuff.”
I’m not even going to go into the whole NFT side of the Superplastic Global Entertainment Brand.
My take: this is a hard one for me. My problem is that I’m such a bad consumer! I don’t collect toys or anything, and don’t buy much. I tend to use things until they wear out. Sure, I’m frugal but I also value sustainability.
I get it; we have the technology so why not “update” black and white footage into colour? I can think of three good reasons.
First, especially for analogue movies, the filmmaker chose to shoot black and white stock for a reason. Most probably for money: colour film stock and developing costs a lot more. To colourize an old movie is a decision that should be left to the original director.
Second, the choice of black and white may be very deliberate. In this short film, I made an aesthetic choice to mimic German Expressionism.This was actually shot in colour but finished as a black and white film.
Third, colour demands more attention to art direction, wardrobe, etc. If you’re shooting a short film in a day, you can make your life much easier if you decide it’s going to be in black and white. Plus, it makes it stand out from all the other films shot that day!
For these reasons, I think black and white films should be left as is. Unless the director is part of the project.
Seeing a fractured socio-political landscape, he blames this unintended consequence squarely on Facebook and social media in general:
“In February 2012, as he prepared to take Facebook public, Mark Zuckerberg reflected on those extraordinary times and set forth his plans. “Today, our society has reached another tipping point,” he wrote in a letter to investors. Facebook hoped “to rewire the way people spread and consume information.” By giving them “the power to share,” it would help them to “once again transform many of our core institutions and industries.” In the 10 years since then, Zuckerberg did exactly what he said he would do. He did rewire the way we spread and consume information; he did transform our institutions, and he pushed us past the tipping point. It has not worked out as he expected.”
He says the Like, Share and Retweet buttons and the algorithms capitalizing on these behaviours allowed posts to go viral for the first time in history:
“This new game encouraged dishonesty and mob dynamics: Users were guided not just by their true preferences but by their past experiences of reward and punishment, and their prediction of how others would react to each new action. One of the engineers at Twitter who had worked on the “Retweet” button later revealed that he regretted his contribution because it had made Twitter a nastier place. As he watched Twitter mobs forming through the use of the new tool, he thought to himself, “We might have just handed a 4-year-old a loaded weapon.””
Jonathan says that, effectively, “from 2009 to 2012, Facebook and Twitter passed out roughly 1 billion dart guns globally. We’ve been shooting one another ever since.” Lamentably, “when our public square is governed by mob dynamics unrestrained by due process, we don’t get justice and inclusion; we get a society that ignores context, proportionality, mercy, and truth.”
“The new omnipresence of enhanced-virality social media meant that a single word uttered by a professor, leader, or journalist, even if spoken with positive intent, could lead to a social-media firestorm, triggering an immediate dismissal or a drawn-out investigation by the institution. Participants in our key institutions began self-censoring to an unhealthy degree, holding back critiques of policies and ideas—even those presented in class by their students—that they believed to be ill-supported or wrong.”
His conclusion? “American democracy is now operating outside the bounds of sustainability. If we do not make major changes soon, then our institutions, our political system, and our society may collapse during the next major war, pandemic, financial meltdown, or constitutional crisis.”
His prescription? “We must harden democratic institutions so that they can withstand chronic anger and mistrust, reform social media so that it becomes less socially corrosive, and better prepare the next generation for democratic citizenship in this new age.”
Other takeaways:
Social media has both magnified and weaponized the frivolous.
Social media amplifies political polarization; foments populism, especially right-wing populism; and is associated with the spread of misinformation.
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and a few other large platforms unwittingly dissolved the mortar of trust, belief in institutions, and shared stories that had held a large and diverse secular democracy together.
Nothing really means anything anymore––at least not in a way that is durable and on which people widely agree.
America is being torn apart by a battle between two subsets of the elite who are not representative of the broader society.
Thanks to enhanced-virality social media, dissent is punished within many of our institutions, which means that bad ideas get elevated into official policy.
America’s tech companies have rewired the world and created products that now appear to be corrosive to democracy, obstacles to shared understanding.
My take: I noticed this change at Facebook. Once upon a time, it was a great, fun place to stay in touch with people and build community over shared interests. Then the news feed and group pages changed. It’s so much harder now to actually communicate with your friends. I wonder if “fragmenting” myself into multiple accounts might help?
As filmmakers, we make films for our audiences. But in our digital age, how are those folks supposed to find our movies among the other million movies out there?
Once upon a time, pre-Internet times, you found a distributor who specialized in your type of film and could deliver it to the audience for those films. In other words, a curator curated a collection for their congregation.
In the digital age, the platforms are in charge. Their algorithms determine what folks will see. The videos above and below from Veritasium discuss the YouTube algorithm:
Derek Muller has approached the discoverability difficulty scientifically. He posits this plan:
Keep making high-quality videos.
Choose topics that are more clickable.
Use clickbaity titles and thumbnails.
How does this relate to filmmaking?
I think we have to realize that all streaming platforms and most if not all video aggregation sites have replaced curation with algorithms. My suggestion for discoverable movies:
Quality films.
Provocative subjects.
Click-worthy titles and central images plus logos.
It’s about applying Marketing at the conceptualization stage and not after the movie has been made.
My take: I’m not even sure my Number 1 (Quality films) is necessary. Think of Roger Corman, the King of the B-Movie. Elliot Grove claims Corman started with the title and artwork: “Roger is a morning guy. He would meet me in my London office with the morning British papers. Over a cup of coffee, he would tear out keywords and mash them up on the table. When he saw a good movie title he would hand-write it down and I would fax it to his office in Los Angeles. This is how he came up with titles for some of his 750+ features. Titles like: Grand Theft Auto, Death Race 2000, Rock ‘N Roll High School, Slumber Party Massacre, and The Fast And The Furious. When he saw a title in his mash-up he would hand write it down, and I would fax it to LA in the days of the flimsy paper fax machines. Roger would leave my humble Soho office and do what independent film geniuses do, and return about 6 pm. LA would be awake and through my fax would come a very lo-res poster with nothing more than the image and the title. If Roger liked it, he would tear it off, stuff it in his pocket and in the evening mingle with the great and the good of the London film scene. And acquisition executives of course. He’d tell me the next morning, if enough people liked his film he would hire a screenwriter to write the script suggested by his poster. Reverse engineering.”
“Canada’s Cineflix Media has acquired Toronto-based production company Back Alley Film Productions and its library of IP. With the acquisition, co-founders Adrienne Mitchell and Janis Lundman will leave the company to “pursue new horizons.” Cineflix said it will absorb Back Alley Films’ operations and acquire its programming assets.”
That intellectual property and those programming assets are very impressive:
Best wishes to Janis and Adrienne for their next chapters!
My take: I remember both Adrienne and Janis from my time in Toronto “back in the day;” Adrienne through Ryerson and Bruce McDonald, and Janis through LIFT (I was Employee 1!) I recall reviewing the Canada Council funding application and adding, “We need to roll more cameras!” Lol, yes, those were the days when indie film meant actual tactile, analogue, very expensive “film” — video was not yet digital and relegated to television. A photo of mine from those times:
I asked Sarah Nicole Faucher, a filmmaker with a hearing deficit in Victoria, how she felt about CODA’s wins:
“They made me feel hopeful that positive change is coming, not just for profoundly deaf people who only communicate with ASL, but for all disabled people like UK actors Alex Brooker (paraplegic amputee), Heather Mills (amputee), and Genevieve Barr (professional lip-reader) as well as American actors like R.J. Mitte (cerebral palsy) and the very well-known Peter Dinklage (achondroplasia). Better late than never.”
“For that, I’m very grateful. The director, Trent Peek, and the cameraman-editor, Connor Nyhan, are passionate about the project. ‘Going Home’ is a true drama based on an incident that happened not quite 40 years ago. Some members of our team experienced synchronistic incidents just prior and during the filming. Disabled people, some with hidden disabilities, including two background actors, came up to us expressing that no one makes films about difficulties experienced by people with disabilities. They were moved, touched, and thanked us that it was not ‘inspiration porn‘. My hopes for specifically deaf and hard of hearing stories are that they are coming for the sake of an inclusive, diversified society. We can not be afraid of change.”
My take: of course, there was another “upset” at the Oscars. All I’m going to say about that is that Chris Rock ought to know better than to poke fun at a black woman’s hair. After all, he made a documentary all about it, called “Good Hair“:
“Instead of going the festival route or trying to get distribution through Amazon and other large streaming sites, which are both strategies often employed by independent filmmakers, the makers of “Birdies” have employed a direct-to-the-consumer approach. It recalls a digital version of the “four-walling” of decades ago, when filmmakers would rent space in theaters across the country to ensure their movies were available to audiences.”
The feature is available to stream on demand at birdiesthemovie.com. There’s also merch for sale.
My take: this is the first time I’ve seen outtakes for sale! I could be wrong but it seems they’re using seer.la to stream the movie and pixpa.com for the store.
Scott Myers has analyzed the 2021 spec scripts specs and reported the results on his excellent website Go Into The Story.
The takeaways:
There were 34 spec(ulative) scripts sold in 2021.
That number is up from 2019 and 2020 but less than 1992-2018.
There was one first-timer who sold a spec script.
“Streamers acquired the same number of spec scripts in 2021 as did the major studios and their subsidiaries.”
Streamers doubled the number of their deals from 2020 to 2021.
The most popular genres were Action and Thriller.
Then came Drama and Comedy.
The least popular genres (that were bought) were Science Fiction and Horror. (I mean, the least popular genres were actually the ones that weren’t bought at all, like my Family Western or my Polka Musical.)
For The Definitive Spec Script Deals List [1991–2021], go here.”
My take: I can’t say enough good things about Mr. Myers. And I’m proud that in my own small way, I’ve contributed to his excellent website: see my breakdown of Andy Samberg’s Palm Springs.
“Normally, a movie doesn’t take 17 years to be released, and cast and crew can celebrate what they’ve created within a short time after production wraps. Our movie was a micro, micro-budget film where everyone knew everyone (or else they wouldn’t be there) and it was a particularly close, family environment. To have so many family members pass on is heartbreaking. This story, though, is a tip of the hat to and sincere celebration of those no longer with us, colleagues and mentors who have sadly crossed over. RIP to those gracious and talented people who were with our project in guidance, mentorship, and performance capacities. I hope they know, somehow, that we made it… finally.”
My take: Mazel tov! Locked away for 17 years, this film has become a time capsule. Now everyone involved with the production can finally watch it and have a good laugh.
“We show you where you can legally watch movies and TV shows that you love. You are kept up to date with what is new on Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV and many other streaming platforms. Our simple filter system allows you to see only what is important to you. We also allow users to track their favorite shows and movies, and can notify you when a title is available on one of your services.”
“savant academy award” finds Police Academy. Nope; second word match.
“Reelgood takes all the various movies and TV shows that have ever been made (almost) and tells you where you can watch them, from subscription services (like Netflix and Prime Video) to free services (like Crackle, TubiTV and others) to TV everywhere options (like FX, ABC, and FOX) to rental and purchase options (like iTunes, Amazon, and Vudu.)”
“savant academy award” finds The Savant. Nope; first word match.
WIMM or What is My Movie can help when you don’t remember the name of that movie. Just type in what you’ve got and WIMM will suggest matches.
“Descriptive movie search is based on our research on what is called “Deep Content”. Deep Content is everything we can see and hear in a video, but cannot mechanically analyze – until now. Deep Content includes transcripts, audio, visual patterns and basically any form of data feed that describes the video content itself. After analyzing the deeper levels of the video, we automatically convert it into advanced metadata. This metadata is then processed by the beating heart of our engine: a cognitive machine learning system that understands natural language queries and matches it with our metadata.”
“savant academy award” finds Rain Man, the correct answer.
My take: I use JustWatch. I’ve customized it with my services and have a filter set to 70% for IMDb. So if Netflix or Prime add a ton of new stuff, it only shows me those ones.
