Christopher Guest is the, er, guest in an interview on Wired.Com today, and while he wasn’t talking about fan films, when the topic of democratizing the media comes up, his insightful views apply to all fan filmmakers:
Wired.com: Technology has democratized entertainment, but it also has saturated it with sameness.
Guest: Well, the fact that you have a camera doesn’t mean you can use it. Having GarageBand doesn’t make you a talented musician. Sure, if you have a song in your head, you can get it down. But it’s worse with video: People are wandering around with cameras shooting anything they see without learning the value of story. Giving people the means to do something doesn’t mean their stuff is going to be good, which is a cruel lesson. There has always been crap out there, but now there is just more of it. We’re at five to midnight in the Roman Empire right now.
Making sure that you actually have something to say with your film will always make it stand out from the crowd—a good lesson from the brains behind Spinal Tap.
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