I’ve never written a blog before. So I apologize if the flow of this is scatter-brained. I do however keep a film journal, and have for the last several years. What I do is I write about each film that I see, even repeats, forcing myself to think about them good, bad, and ugly. First off I’m going to apologize for my grammar, it sucks – it’s screenplay writer’s grammar, which I hope most of you will empathize with. I came up with the idea for this blog a few weeks back with the WILDsound staff. Mostly I’ll be talking about the process of making a short film, and also dealing with Bravo!FACT.
So an introduction to myself. My name is Jeremy LaLonde. I am a local filmmaker, born in Cayuga, ON, but I’ve been living in Toronto for the last two years. As far as writing and directing goes my biggest successes have been in documentary. You can check out some of my work at www.visualheritage.ca I have since left that project which, my best friend Zach Melnick, continues along with. Right now I’m working in downtown Toronto as an editor. I have worked on features, series, long form, short form, the list continues. Not exactly where I want to spend the rest of my days, but with my long term goal of being a feature film director, there’s definitely worse jobs you could be doing to refine your skills as a storyteller.
Jeremy LaLonde path to a Feature Filmmaker
I have a feature film script I have been whoring around for the last year and a bit trying to get funding for it. You may have seen it at one of it’s several readings around Toronto. It’s called “The Untitled Work of Paul Shepard”. Last year I submitted to both the Canada Council and Ontario Arts Council for funding, both rejected me. Upon inquires they seemed to be quite happy with the project/script, however they wanted to see me have some more experience with actors first, seeing how most of my directing was in documentary. So I’ve spent this last year working on short films. Personally I think shorts are a great exercise. That being said you’ll never make money from them (unless you’re very lucky). In all cases shorts should be used as tools to sell yourself as a storyteller. I wish there was a better venue for showing shorts after they are completed since there are a very large number of great ones. I always wish when I’m watching commercials in the movie theatre that instead they’d show a short or two… alas, maybe one day.
Jeremy LaLonde and his Directing career
So in the summer I directed “Mrs. & Mrs. Moosewood”, from a script I’ve written. I’m just now finishing the post-sound for it. Luckily for me it’s been a busy fall/winter with editing work, alas my own art suffers. My producing partner, Anthony Grani, and I decided that we should probably do another short. We did Moosewood with our own money and, after learning that my other filmmaking friends were getting funding from a proposal called BravoFACT, we decided to apply at the next deadline.
Jeremy LaLonde Preps BravoFACT application
So Anthony and I put together the package for another short I’ve written called “Hoff’s New Direction”. Now right off the bat I’ll tell you one thing if you’re thinking of applying to Bravo!FACT, there’s a bit of a name game involved. I should probably also mention that Bravo!FACT, although it gives money to short films, it also gives out it’s money to music videos and experimental films, and it’s all from the same pot that short films come from – so when you apply you’re not just competing against other short films. Another thing to consider is that Bravo!FACT will only supply half of your budget, and the money is retroactive, which means you don’t get it until your short is finished and they like it. If you say in your package that you cast Jason Bateman, and he’s not in the flick – guess what? No money. Which, getting back to the name game, it really does help to have an actor that they’ll be somewhat familiar with in your submission package – but just make sure that you can actually get said actor. It doesn’t have to be an uber celebrity, but someone who has a few television credits to their name helps.
Jeremy LaLonde begins Pre-Production on film
Now there’s a few tips, budget wise, but I’m going to save those for a future blog. Right now we’re just finishing up our location scouting (which I’m very excited about, Anthony found us some beautiful locations). Also the ACTRA strike just kicked in and so we’re crossing our fingers that it won’t interfere with our shoot. You get 120 days to finish your film from the time that Bravo!FACT announces they’re giving you money, however you can file for an extension with certain circumstances, the strike, I’m sure, being one of them. A note on locations is that you can almost always get a good deal. For example we need an “artist’s loft” for one of our locations. We’ve found a brilliant art gallery that will fit the bill really well, however they normally charge $2,000 a day, which would eat up almost all of our location budget, so since they’re also artists and sympathetic to our cause we’re able to get it for a fraction of that, so long as we’re flexible with the shooting date.
I think that’s about it for now. I’m not sure if I’m structured this thing properly, spelling, grammar, etc… I’m writing this while a file is rendering. All right. Hope this helps. Will write more soon.
