Here is your assignment: spend a wild and sleepless weekend writing, shooting and editing a movie. Then enter it into a contest and hope you don't embarrass yourself.
That is exactly what Ben Ferrerr, the producer and director of photography for the movie "The Legend of Chloe," at the annual San Francisco 48 Hour Film Project.
“Starting with nothing and coming up with a winning film in 48 hours is no easy task," he said. "Usually when you work on a film, you do a lot of pre-production including script writing and pre-visualizing with storyboards. But with the 48 Hour Film Project the competition starts when the genre and required elements are handed out and it becomes a race from there.”
The martial arts movie tells the story of a little girl and her jealous brother, who steals her happiness from her.
On Friday night, each team received a character, a prop, a line of dialog and a genre, all to include in their movie. Just 48 hours later, the movie had to be completed before it was unveiled at a theater the next week.
“Each team was required to use a hat as a prop, one line of dialog, which was 'I believe anyone can change' and a character named Claude or Claudette Green, who is a guitarist,” Ferrerr said.
In 2008's contest, about 30,000 filmmakers made films in 70 cities. This year's event was even bigger, according to event organizers. And Ferrerr's Mountain View-based video production company Transvideo Studios was large enough for the task.
“We had a team of 21 people, only half who had worked together before," he said "But they were all able to jump right in and work efficiently. It really was this particular team that I believe led to our success. I feel very fortunate to have worked with each and every one of them.”
For more information on the 48 Hour Film Project visit the festival's website.
