We’ve all heard the phrase, “Everybody’s got to start somewhere,” but it’s important to keep in mind that everybody’s “somewhere” is in a different place. Great Directors aren’t born with a camera in their hand, but must be formed, molded and shaped over time. Some directors begin with a love of film at an early age in life and others find their interest in college when they are introduced to new perspectives. Others still may not discover their passion until they are years into their adulthood. There is no right or wrong way to become a director, but at some point you must actually “direct” something. How does one accomplish this?
Oftentimes, directors spend two years shooting on nights and weekends, begging their all volunteer cast and crew to return each shoot day with the promise of free food. Others sell their bodies to science for $7,000 and then use those funds as the budget for their next project. Some filmmakers max out their credit cards while others manage to work within the system to scrounge up $6 million for their passion project. Many directors even do different jobs-for-hire in order to earn enough studio trust to get a small project thrown their way.
Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi on the set of The Evil Dead (1981).
To begin our inaugural month here at The Cinematropolis, we’re focusing on “First Films by Great Directors.” I’ve always been fascinated by the filmmaking stories behind a long time director’s first feature length film. In the early 1980s, a young aspiring filmmaker named Sam Raimi ventured into the wilderness, along with his friends, to make a horror film on a shoestring budget that would later be titled The Evil Dead. In the 1970s, a young TV director named Steven Spielberg, who was hungry to prove himself, was given the opportunity to take on a TV Movie version of the Richard Matheson short story, Duel. The success of this Director-For-Hire gig allowed him to grow and evolve and later take on projects closer to his heart. In the 1950s, a film critic, disappointed with the overall output of cinema in France, wrote and directed a drama loosely based on his own childhood titled The 400 Blows, jumpstarting the directorial career of Francois Truffaut.
One of the great things about cinema is the chance to watch an artist evolve over the course of their career. Every director’s style, interests, and skillsets change over time, and there is value in looking back to see where they all began. Are there hints of Alfred Hitchcock’s future greatness hidden within his first feature film, The Pleasure Garden? Did Joel and Ethan Coen have a handle on their convoluted storytelling structure in Blood Simple? Does Badlands foretell of the image driven narratives that would later dominate Terrance Malik’s output? This month, our talented contributors will explore some of these first films and see what there is to learn from them. Not only about the directors but about the time in which they were made and their effect on popular culture in the years since they were released.
