I read this article in this morning's Globe. It saddens me to hear that documentary funds are drying up and opportunities for distributing them are becoming fewer and fewer, while the number of filmmakers is rapidly increasing.
I love docs, have made some before, and hope to make more in the future. I sympathize with the people in the article who need to have day jobs in order to keep making their films. But for me, this idea is nothing new. I'm pretty much resigned to the fact that I will always have to work to pay the bills, and make films on the side.
Until box office sales pay our salaries or internet distribution becomes financially viable, Canadian filmmakers will always have to sacrifice their personal finances in order to keep going. But there is an up side to this equation. Having to fight tooth and nail for their work means that they must care deeply about it. Hopefully, with so much of themselves invested, the outcome will be better quality films.
The landscape has changed; today, legions of people with DSLR cameras or videos on YouTube are calling themselves filmmakers and flooding the festivals with content. The sheer number of films (especially documentaries) is impossible for the industry to support. The "accessibility" of filmmaking, which has enabled many of us to learn the craft in the first place, is the very thing that's preventing us from making a living by it. We have no choice but to keep our day jobs and make our films the best they can be--in our spare time, if necessary.
On the up side, films like Up the Yangtze and The Last Train Home have shown that it is possible, with a great product (emphasis on great), for independent, one-off docs to make money in addition to being socially-relevant, cinematic works of art. There is always an appetite out there for good stories well told, but the filmmaker has to be willing to make sacrifices in order to get them out there.
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