191 - Is “No Budget Filmmaking” a Fantasy? Hosted by Carlos López Estrada

Recorded live at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, Academy Award®-nominated director (“Raya and the Last Dragon”) — and Dolby Institute Fellowship winner — Carlos López Estrada brings together another all-star panel of Hollywood talent, this time posing the question: Is “No Budget Filmmaking” even possible in this day and age?

“There's just so much pressure on a film and on a filmmaker that has nothing to do with the film being good, or them arriving at their artistic voice. I've worked on zero-dollar budgets, I've worked recently on $150 million budgets. And the problems on both ends of the spectrum are exactly the same. Your energy and your attention goes to so many places that have nothing to do with the actual movie, have nothing to do with the art, because of the capitalistic requirements of us, as artists. And if we really care about art and we really care about cinema… We have to change the way we talk about cinema… We want to advance the medium and we want to have a discourse around film that is not just, ‘did you like it? Did you hate it? Did it make money?’”

—Justin Simien, Film & Television Producer, Writer, and Director

Today’s panel includes independent filmmakers:

- Bao Nguyen (The Greatest Night in Pop, Be Water)

- Rishi Rajani (The Chi, Being Mary Tyler Moore, A Thousand and One)

- Justin Simien (Dear White People, Bad Hair, Hollywood Black)

Once again, this discussion was part of Antigravity Academy’s Satellite Sessions — free monthly conversations with high-level individuals in film and tv, whose objective is to decentralize resources/information and make them available to as many up-and-coming filmmakers as possible — co-presented by CAPE USA (Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment).

Many thanks to the co-presenter of this panel, MACRO: “a multiplatform media company representing the voice and perspectives of Black people and persons of color.”

Learn more about MACRO:

https://www.staymacro.com/

Learn more about Antigravity Academy:

https://antigravityacademy.co/

Learn more about CAPE — The Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment:

https://www.capeusa.org/

Be sure to follow @antigravityacademy and @capeusa for more information on even more upcoming panels.

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