The Scariest Thing A Lazy Filmmaker Could Read

Okay, so someone made a 30-minute short with the iPhone.

That is scary.  Technology is cool and all, but this is getting ridiculous.

I've never seen any Park Chan-wook films; I somehow escaped film school without seeing Oldboy, don't ask me how (but if you were to ask me I'd tell you someone spoiled the twist for me and I got pretty damned discouraged).  I do know he's a good filmmaker according to most everyone, so he probably knows his shit, which is why his decision to make a movie on an iPhone is frightening.

This means other people will try to make movies on iPhones.  This is terrible.  Hear me out on this one.

This is where people will have to take sides.  Is the democratization of film a good thing?  An idealist would say yes; this opens up the world to auteurs-in-training who had no other means to do so.

But theoretically, that's what the Panasonic DVX line of cameras did on a smaller scale, too, and there's no real evidence that those things begot the new wave of filmmakers.  I guess the Duplass Brothers (they made that movie Cyrus most recently) are the only ones who really made a big name of themselves with that type of technology.

As someone who owned a DVX, knew other people who owned DVXs, and studied a buncha DVX films, I'm scared for what further democratization of cinema will do.

(And at this point, I sound really pretentious; I'm sorry about that.  I realize I've done nothing to separate myself from this group of people, but whatever, 8 or fewer people read this blog consistently)

Seriously, though, this new found technology is a lot like the Force (yep, I'm going there).  It can be used for good or evil.

The problem is, the evil manifests itself in shit like Fred.  If you don't know what Fred is, don't click this link*.  You'll never know what it is, and you'll never have to thank me for telling you what horrors you didn't see.  But you should still thank me.

What worries me, though, is that the evil will far outweigh the good.  I'd rather just leave the auteurism to the auteurs, and let everyone else do it the old fashioned way--through schmoozing, promising film school films, and tons and tons of cocaine and debauchery.

*I managed to watch half of that video.  It was the longest and most agonizing 1:36 of my life.