Not at all. There are many films about sports figures and historical figures. They may be romanticized to make them more audience friendly, but they are "true" stories.
Why do indie filmmakers usually stay away from true story films?
- Thread starter harmonica44
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Not at all. There are many films about sports figures and historical figures. They may be romanticized to make them more audience friendly, but they are "true" stories.
Sure but aren't there way, way more documentaries.
Anyway I could see someone being interesting and it's much cheaper to make a doc with them than a narrative
You have to be careful with documentaries as well. Others on here may have experience with this, but my understanding is that sometimes the documentary subject retains their own life story rights. So, say you make the next Searching for Sugarman. Well, subsequently a fictionalized major motion picture with a big star may be made about the story you documented in your film. However, you won't make a penny off of it. Even though your documentary is what brought the interest about in the first place.
Here is an article talking about the importance of documentary filmmakers making sure they secure life rights from their subjects:
RTWT: http://www.documentary.org/content/whose-story-it-anyway-obtaining-subjects-life-story-rights
Here is an article talking about the importance of documentary filmmakers making sure they secure life rights from their subjects:
RTWT: http://www.documentary.org/content/whose-story-it-anyway-obtaining-subjects-life-story-rights
A documentary isn't necessarily cheaper than a narrative either. Documentaries typically involve a great deal of research, travel, shooting, and massive amounts of editing to get a polished final product. Whereas, a narrative, while you may shoot a lot of footage, you know what target you're trying to hit before you start editing, you don't have to "find" the story in the edit.. not as much, anyway.
H.H.Holmes, a fascinating serial killer.
The curse of James Dean's Car could easily be done for under a million.
A young soldier was the ONLY survivor of a plane crash in Algeria that
left 77 dead.
A teenager feared dead after he went missing for two months miraculously
turned up in the Australian bush. Matthew Allen, 18, was discovered partially
blind and covered in leeches and insect bites by two hikers nine weeks after
he walked out on his family on a "survival mission".
Any of THESE FIVE could be made into movies for under a million.
See? 'Rik has done his homework, and it probably didn't take him very long. The fact that he is intelligent, well read and a thorough professional may have something to do with it.....
This is a fascinating way of looking at.
Actually I was researching the series American Crime Story, and the segment they did on O.J. Simpson, they did not have to pay O.J. anything to own the rights to use him in or anyone else in the court case, in the story. So how did they manage to get through that law, if the law stipulates that you have to buy the permission to use people's names in the story?
The series (it's 10 parts, not a segment) is based on a book by Jeffrey Toobin, so they bought the rights to produce the movie from the book.
I'll state up front that I'm not a lawyer, but I suspect that in the case of the book they paid to use news footage and then interviewed people with releases. A good bit of it is public record. If they wanted to write the OJ Simpson Story, they would have needed the rights to his life. But this is about a very public event, which is different.
I'll state up front that I'm not a lawyer, but I suspect that in the case of the book they paid to use news footage and then interviewed people with releases. A good bit of it is public record. If they wanted to write the OJ Simpson Story, they would have needed the rights to his life. But this is about a very public event, which is different.
Interesting. Can you do a space adventure for under a million?
Yes. You can do a space adventure for under a million.
how is that indie?
i think everyone knows the op is talking about feauture films. ie real movies
It's not. I was talking about purchasing rights to a real life story.
Thanks. I know Darkstar was made for about $350,000 in today's dollars, but do you have other examples?
They simply dont have the resources or skill as well. you cant do a true story without the story being outstanding. Well all those stories are taken.
To anwser the question in the title:
I figured out why:
acquiring rights is too expensive
AND
lots of indiefilmmakers spend too much time on IT to have an exciting life, so they need to write fiction
(I am joking, btw)
But it was established that legally you don't need rights, and make a movie of any true story you want, especially since they did it with O.J. Simpson.
Not really. I watch a lot of shows like 48 Hours Mystery, 60 Minutes, and FBI Files for example, and there are tones of true stories, that are really interesting and compelling that you could do, that Hollywood has never bothered with.
and there's a reason its on 60 mins. not everything can be a movie or filll out a movie. They will make any lame story a movie now but that much harder if nothing happens for a true. U really gonna try to argue with what i said? i gave the best answer haha