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The
films are invariably shot on digital video or Mini-DV, edited on Final
Cut Pro, feature a crew of no more than three, and rarely are longer than
10 minutes or cost more than $250 (with a mean cost of closer to $50).
As a worker inside the industry, each filmmaker has access to equipment,
personnel and resources far beyond the reach of the average civilian.
But with 60- to 70-hour workweeks and schedules that often amount to being
on 24-hour call, the real challenge -- as in the film industry proper
-- is getting it done at all.
"When you've got 30 days and someone's throwing an assignment at
you," says Jeff, "you spend a week trying to figure out what
the hell you're going to do, you spend another week maybe honing the idea,
then you've got to try and write the thing. By the time you crew up, you're
just calling people and saying, 'Hey, what are you doing tomorrow night?
Can you come over and hold a mike for me?' Sometimes you get a DP, sometimes
you shoot on film. Sometimes it's grand, but most times it's just whatever
it takes."
IF YOU PULL UP THE GROUP 101 WEB SITE, you are immediately met with the
slogan "The first two or three were fun; now it's some kind of sick
compulsion fueled by God knows what." Other maxims that seem to have
arisen directly from experience include "Tape is cheap and inertia
is expensive," "You have 30 days -- get off your ass" and
the concise, T-shirt-ready "Freedom to suck." In fact, the entire
site is tinged with the sort of breezy insouciance and lack of self-importance
that is crucial to the world domination that Group 101 clearly has in
mind. In the members-only area, under "Instructions," there
is the admonition "Play fair. All I want is for you kids to get along."
Elsewhere, a list of standing rules is labeled "Our Bible: Learn
it. Love it. Do it."
The obvious comparison is to Dogma 95, the seven-year-old Danish film
movement that produced a handful of native features by Lars von Trier
(The Idiots), Thomas Vinterberg (Celebration) and others, and whose Vow
of Chastity -- a refusal to cohabitate with Hollywood or play along with
its conventions -- was subsequently taken up by filmmakers worldwide.
With Group 101, the only constraints on artifice are budgetary. But also,
the demands of a compressed running time and adherence to a common theme
result in a very different approach -- elliptical narrative, technical
flash, MTV-style editing hijinks, a high level of abstraction or formalism,
bite-size blackout humor -- i.e., one that seems more attuned to Madison
Avenue's agenda than to that of Group 101's Dogma 95 forebears. Between
the carrot of a compelling theme and the stick of a short-term deadline,
it's also far easier to bypass the pretensions and perfectionism that
so often leave creative efforts stillborn. And by adjusting the themes
to their own strengths and weaknesses, members can force themselves to
use creative muscles they might not have otherwise -- short-circuiting
their natural skills as editors, for example, by mandating that one month's
films all be shot in a single take.
Very quickly, Group 101 formalized a workshop approach to its monthly
screening sessions: The films are shown without apology or caveat, everyone
present has to comment, and no one besides the filmmakers themselves can
attend the first screenings. ("It's hard to say 'Your actor sucks'
if he's sitting there, or 'Who shot this piece of crap?'" explains
Maureen, pickup talent and cinematographers-in-training being, by definition,
hit-or-miss affairs.)
The ghoul-couple shoot is Dina's, and is competing for a place in a program
of Group 101 shorts the AMC cable network intends to broadcast over Halloween
weekend. Titled "The Witching Hour," the one-minute opus is
the story of two couples -- one living, one dead -- who, unbeknownst to
each other, occupy the same house. Kind of The Others meets The Honeymooners.
The living couple is played by Group 101 mainstays Pip Newson and Cristo
Dimassis. Pip is the undisputed queen of Group 101 actors, having appeared
in an estimated 30 shorts, including four for Dina, at least one apiece
for Jeff and Maureen, and a whopping 10 for Aaron. Originally hailing
from New Zealand, she has chosen to adopt a credible American accent for
as long as she's here. "You give casting agents any excuse, and they'll
use it," says this softer-edged Ashley Judd. "So I just stay
more or less permanently in character while I'm here. Whenever I go back,
it starts to slip out."
Cristo, a square-jawed Bruce Campbell type, has done half a dozen Group
101 films, including several by Michael Medaglia (available on Mike's
own Web site, www.prettypictures.com; "Danse Mediocre" is particularly
goofy). Opposite them (in ghoul makeup) are Gregory Macdonald, who identifies
himself as one of the two white guys in Ice Cube's The Players Club ("Not
the old white guy in the hot tub, the other one"), and Alex Grant,
who was last seen as a leather-clad dominatrix in Dina's spec commercial
spot for Coleman's Hotter Mustard.
Indeed, once you start navigating the Group 101 film universe, at least
as reflected in the 40-odd films posted on the Web site from the first
and second waves, you discover the early rudiments of a star system: Newson
in Jeff's "The Exchange" or Aaron's "Terminal Illness"
(which both use the same dialogue to radically different effect), Michelle
Featherstone in Dina's "A Dog Story" or "Wiggly Man,"
Michelle Carr in Jeff's "Falling Prey" (alongside Featherstone
and Newson). And the closer you look, the more self-references and in-jokes
you discover, the more you're drawn into this insular society. Which is
no doubt the point.
IN AUGUST 2000, THE FIVE PARTICIpating members of Group 101 organized
what was to have been a one-time screening for actors and intimates. Commandeering
a weeknight at Club Fais Do Do (on West Adams between Fairfax and La Brea),
they showed an hour and a half of homegrown cinema, sans air conditioning,
to what turned out to be a rapturously enthusiastic crowd of 250.
"They applauded. They loved it," says Jeff. "And then,
afterwards, people were just crazy about the idea, so we made the challenge.
We stood up at the end of the screening and said, 'If you want to do what
we did, come join us.' And about 15 people stood up and said, 'Yeah, I
want to do it.'"
Out of that tent-revival moment, the second wave of eight filmmakers was
born -- initially called Group 102, but when the third wave produced some
80 participants, they declared everyone Group 101 and subdivided into
nine tribes named after famous film icons: Keyser Soze from The Usual
Suspects, Max Fischer from Rushmore, Rosebud from that Rosebud movie,
etc. A subsequent screening, christened the Shortorder Film Festival,
was held in May 2001 as a fund-raiser for the Shakespeare Festival/L.A.,
before a crowd of 400 at the Knitting Factory. The evening was hosted
by Charlie's Angels director McG, and raised more than $10,000. (At the
benefit, McG announced, "I'm one of you guys -- I just got lucky.")
A fourth wave of 70 filmmakers was launched earlier this year, some 30
of whom were holdovers from the third wave. Their films will be shown
August 15, again at Fais Do Do. In the process of overseeing each subsequent
group, the founding members stumbled upon perhaps the biggest secret motivator
of all -- community.
"Everybody in L.A. is going for the brass ring," says Jeff.
"All of us at this table are. And that's part of our lives. But it's
hard to find a community of people who are satisfying their own creative
impulses together. There aren't really all that many such communities
in L.A. We've created one."
Adds Dina: "I prefer to think of us as the Weight Watchers of filmmaking
-- you have to weigh in once a month, there's guilt and shame involved,
and we all build support."
Participants in the rapidly expanding program include not only burgeoning
directors, but actors looking to expand their demo reels, cinematographers
making calling-card films, animators, documentarians -- even working directors
who just want to recharge their batteries, or experiment with the medium.
Anthony Dalesandro, director of Escape to Grizzly Mountain, for instance,
joined to perfect an idea he had about telling a story in a fractured,
David Hockney style ("The Box," available on the Web site).
Some recruits even learn that filmmaking, or at least the production end
of it, is specifically not what they want to be doing -- a revelation
that might have come after five or 10 more years of waiting around for
the chance to direct.
"We all have films that will never see the light of day, and that's
okay," says Dina. "You're not risking your professional reputation,
or your client, or a significant amount of money or time."
"We're advocating action rather than just talking about it,"
adds Rachel. "You can talk and talk and talk, but once you actually
convene to do the thing that you dream of, it's never how you imagine
it to be. Once you walk on the set and try it, it's always harder and
slower and more painful. But it's ultimately empowering that you realize
your own goal, that you walk through some sort of gauntlet. People hold
themselves back all the time, and this is one way to overcome that."
"Try the experiment out," concludes Aaron. "If it works,
great, you're a genius. If it doesn't work, put it in the closet, don't
worry about it, it's 30 days out of your life."
***
Closing in on its own witching hour of 2 a.m., Dina's makeshift crew is
setting up for the "picture martini," the final shot of the
night. People are getting tired. Jeff, who's been helping out on sound,
just stuck the boom mike into the whirring blades of a ceiling fan. Claire
Nach, the special-effects/makeup woman, regales those still with us with
her most recent infomercial credits -- one for the Freedom Ring, which
shoots Mace, and one for something variously called Eliminodor, Terminodor
or Vacu-Fresh, a kind of sawed-off Dustbuster that attaches to the back
of your toilet and sucks up noxious fumes. It is unclear from the story
where her makeup skills leave off and her special-effects skills begin.
Dina has framed all four cast members in bed in a Bob and Carol and Ted
and Alice shot, and is looking to dial up the energy. "It would be
nice if you were spooning, maybe," she says to the two male actors,
anticipating a comic reveal. "Good Lord," says Justin Lang,
her DP, as scenes from a career in porn flash before his eyes. Everyone
gets a close-up, and then it's a wrap -- with at least some of them scheduled
to start their next film in just 17 hours.
AS GROUP 101 GROWS, CHANGE IS INevitable. In the past year, what it calls
"distant chapters" have sprouted up both domestically and abroad.
One year ago, friends of Jeff -- an actress and a composer -- put off
relocating to L.A. and started a New York chapter, which, being New Yorkers,
they renamed Quick Flix. Once the Web site had been established, e-mails
started pouring in from Japan, Australia, Korea and across the planet,
from people wanting to get involved. The Copenhagen chapter has just finished
its first wave of films (Dogma, look to your laurels). The Chicago and
San Francisco chapters are in the middle of their first wave. (The Chicago
chapter was founded by an actress who later discovered she had been Maureen's
roommate in college.) And there are nascent groups in Prague, Tokyo, Orlando,
Nashville and Dallas, with many others in the planning stages. Group 101
offers e-mail mentorship to the chapters who request it, and asks a $250
flat franchise fee in return. And the site's message boards have become
a continuous scroll of crew positions, casting calls, job opportunities
and insider tips, as virtually all of the L.A. members are employed in
the industry. "You look at our e-mail list," says Maureen, "and
it's like a laundry list of every top entertainment company in the world."
The founding five, as such, are in the process of incorporating, and have
instituted dues ($100 for the six-month program), as much to weed out
the pikers as to cover operating costs. And they are trying to balance
the possibility of applying for and administering nonprofit grants against
the much larger ambition of seguing into features and beyond. A showcase
of Group 101 films is currently available at http://ifilm.com, and the
community is reaching out to a whole spectrum of like-minded organizations
in the interest of forming strategic alliances: to the Writers Boot Camp,
to Exploding Cinema, to improv groups and theater companies. This year,
they sponsored a short screenplay competition on the theme of "The
Nick of Time," in conjunction with Words From Here, a Web site established
by former applicants to HBO's Project Greenlight. The contest generated
more than 200 submissions, the best of which are posted in the members-only
area of the Group 101 Web site to attract collaborators. The site also
has T-shirts, ball caps and stenciled mugs for sale. And there is always
the possibility of corporate sponsorship -- say, by a major credit-card
company, which would be appropriate inasmuch as independent filmmaking
continually threatens to collapse the private-banking system.
But aside from whatever future markets ambition and innovation may reveal,
there is, for now, the confidence that comes from having accomplished
something -- especially in an industry that intimidates almost as second
nature.
"You know, I felt that I was a great filmmaker five years ago,"
says Jeff. "I made a $70,000 short film that stunk. I made a $50,000
short film on credit cards. It took me four years to pay it off, and by
the time I did, it was $70,000. It's a beautiful film. It doesn't make
a lick of sense. But for $70,000, I could have bought a house.
"We're all so precious with our goddamn work -- we're gonna make
this epic film that's gonna change Hollywood and our lives -- and I thought,
'My God, I'm never going to make another film, because I blew everything
on that one.' But then this group came along, and it said, 'Here's a camera,
go make a film,' and that's liberated me. I still haven't made a film
that's on Spielberg's radar or anything, but I feel I could do that if
I were handed the right materials, because the intimidation is gone.
"I've also learned my life is better in a way, because I've learned
to take pride in this thing we've created, in nurturing this huge collective,
which I find immensely rewarding. And I feel like I'm getting closer to
being the filmmaker I've always wanted to be. When I get there, I'll find
out that it's nothing like I ever imagined it. That's what this teaches
you: Every time you think you know it, there's something else."
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