Why Make A Short Film?

A few weeks ago I premiered my very first narrative short film. Not many people watch short films, but a lot of them get made. Why is that? Well, mostly because making feature films takes a lot of time and money. Short films allow filmmakers to exercise their creative abilities without sacrificing their financial stability or relationships (at least in theory).

And short films can get you noticed. In the case of my friend Paul, an award-winning short film  led eventually to a feature length narrative screening at Sundance this past year a theatrical release this fall. It’s the dream of most filmmakers to work on narrative features. Short films at festivals can feed our ravenous desire for accolades and affirmation at the same time providing us with lottery-ticket dreams of getting noticed by someone. 

So why did I make a short film?

So why did I make a short film? Pretty much the aforementioned reasons. I had been successfully putting off a project like this since the beginning of my career in video a decade ago. I imagined myself a creative titan who only needed the right opportunity to emerge at the head of the pack as a serious filmmaker. I’ll let you know later on in the series how it worked out.

It was working on my friend Paul’s most recent feature that finally pushed me to start the 12 week long process of pre-production in earnest. Five months earlier I had written a script that I liked and that, combined with some unsubstantiated optimism, led eventually to a film screening at the Knoxville Film Festival. 

I know a number of filmmakers and many, if they have not already made a narrative short, have thought about doing so. I decided to chronicle the process so that other filmmakers might have one idea of what they have to look forward to. My journey is broken into the parts listed below:

If you are a filmmaker wondering what you might be getting yourself into while producing a short film, my hope is that you will find this informative at the very least, if not helpful. Making your own short film is a monumental effort, but it there are countless resources out there to help you bring your visions to the screen. Whether or not it is worth it is a question you will only be able to answer once you’ve finished.