American Cinematographer - March 1989 - 81

Big Productions, Small Format
by Dan Frazier
A year ago, Michael Paul Girard knew
almost nothing about filmmaking. He had

Jet

made any kind of film. Nonetheless,
Girard has just finished shooting his first
feature film based on his own screenplay.
Girard is now concentrating on cutting and

Fernandez and

Benny cinema¬
tographer Audi

never

director

Roger

Evans prepare
"Maxwell" for

Super 8 shot.

splicing together his raw strands of film to
form his finished feature film. With his
editing nearing completion, Girard has
joined a growing number of people who
have discovered a shortcut to making their
first feature films.

Traditionally, students of film
have learned to make films by making
several short films. If such films showed

promising talent, a student might land a job
of some sort in the film industry. At best, a
short film led to directing an episode of a TV
show,

as

in the

case

of Steven Spielberg. At

worst, a short film led a film student to

change his

or her major. Some students
have realized that even with an outstanding
short film on one's demo reel, the competi¬
tion is so stiff that an opportunity to shoot a
feature could remain elusive for years.

However, all this may soon be
changing. These days, the average feature
film is budgeted at over $10 million. Some
young filmmakers are raising the eyebrows
of Hollywood production accountants by
making their own feature films with budgets
averaging a mere $10,000. In 1985, Mark
Pirro made a feature film for $2500 called A
Polish Vampire in Burbank. So far the film
has grossed well over $500,000 in video¬
cassette sales. Pirro's secret: The film was
shot and edited entirely on Super 8 film.

Although Pirro was able to save
by enlisting volunteer
actors, scabbing locations without permis¬
sion, and playing the part of writer, director
and editor, Pirro's most important cost¬
cutting measure was to shoot the project in
Super 8. Pirro found that Super 8 film was at
least three times less expensive than 16mm
reversal film stocks. Despite the relatively

thousands of dollars

low cost, Pirro could not afford to waste
film. He managed to keep his shooting ratio
down to about four to one on the 84 minute

picture. By carefully cutting his camera
original footage himself, Pirro also avoided

the costs involved in

making a workprint and
negative, as is normally done
in 16mm. There are no negative camera
stocks in Super 8.
Pirro's feature led directly to an
offer to write, direct, and produce a 35mm
conforming

a

feature called Death Row Game Show. With
these features under his belt, and others in
various stages of pre-production, Pirro has a

good chance for

successful filmmaking

a

career.

Pirro may

have been the first to
successfully sell a feature film shot in Super
8 to the home video market, but even before
he finished editing, other filmmakers were

realizing that

March 1989

new

technology had finally

made it possible to use Super 8 film to
originate a feature film and release it on
videotape. By 1986, Roger Evans had com¬
pleted Jet Benny, a 77 minute sci-fi comedy.
Like Pirro, Evans shot and edited his project
entirely on Super 8 and thus managed to
finish the film for less than $6000. Already,
the film has grossed more than $130,000 in
videocassette sales. Following the success
of Jet Benny, many doors were opened for
Evans. For instance, Evans accepted an offer
from United Entertainment to direct the

feature film Forever Evil. Thanks to the cost¬

cutting lessons learned by working in Super
8, Evans managed to deliver a finished film
for under $120,000. Shot on 16mm and

American

Cinematographer

79

a
American Cinematographer - March 1989

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