NoFilmSchool Interview with Medicine for Melancholy creator Barry Jenkins

Medicine For Melancholy – Official Trailer from Strike Anywhere on Vimeo.

Ryan Bilsborrow-Koo over at NoFilmSchool.com has a great interview with Barry Jenkins about his DIY production and the process of getting the film distributed. I don’t have any background info on what cameras were used but the reason I am posting this article is that Barry shares his experiences and insights from getting a small micro production released and distributed.
Read on for more from the interview…

from the interview:

The beauty of DIY is that you can make a film for the cost of a Taurus in three weeks with five friends. The drawback of DIY is that it’s a hell of a lot different than raising a couple million dollars over a number of years and shooting with a studio-light crew with a 35mm setup. . . .DIY is as fine a medium as any to showcase talent. It’s navigating the rigors of a Hollywood production that’s missing. People literally don’t know what to do with you (if they could make a couple million off you by tossing you another budget along the lines of a Ford Taurus, believe me, they would). But the kind of film you can make at a DIY budget is not going to bring a return large enough to move the needle at a studio, . . .

He goes on to say:

. . . the beauty of being a DIY guy just come to Hollywood is that if you can show you have the chops to pull off a film, you become a viable cog as it costs much less to hire one of us than it does one of the vets. I jokingly refer to myself as an undrafted free agent who beat the odds and made the team.

and

These are smart people, they’ll figure this out soon; they have to (hello iPad!). And when they do, smaller content creators will deliver projects at such conservative costs that the threshold for profiting from them will be extremely favorable.

I think that Ryan did a great job crafting the interview and the insights provide a road map for anyone interested in telling stories via micro productions and DIY films. Be sure to read the whole article and for god sake, watch the trailer.

From the film’s Vimeo page:

Barry Jenkins’s award-winning feature film debut was acquired for distribution and released in theaters by IFC Films. The film garnered three Spirit Award Nominations (including a cinematography nod for James Laxton alongside Gus Van Sant’s MILK and Darren Aranofsky’s THE WRESTLER), a Gotham Award nomination as well as awards from the San Francisco International, Sarasota and Woodstock Film Festivals. The picture also earned Barry a slot amongst Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 Faces of Independent Film” before embarking on an international festival tour highlighted by screenings at the Vienna, BFI Times London and Toronto International Film Festivals. After spotlighting the film as a critic’s pick upon it’s January release, A.O. Scott of the NY Times hailed the film one of the best releases of 2009 in his year-end review.