While the movie (in limited release) may be a complete trash, it has an oscar-winning director and some of the biggest names in Hollywood. What makes it interesting, for me, is the way it is produced. The budget for the movie is $2m (compare that to $80m for Ocean’s Eleven).
This low budget movie is directed by Steven Soderbergh, his return to austere filmmaking after such projects as “Ocean’s Eleven,” “Erin Brockovich” and “Traffic,” which earned him the best-director Academy Award.
The movie stars: Julia Roberts, Blair Underwood, David Duchovny, Brad Pitt (cameoing as himself), David Hyde Pierce, Catherine Keener, and Terence Stamp.
More interesting thing is that movie is largely shot on actual location, with no special lighting, no sound station, no post-production dubbing, no ward-robe folks or make-up folks… just plain serious fim-making.
The director attached the following list of rules to the screenplay to his low budget ($2 M) film with a huge list of stars. These conditions were accepted by all the big stars, who appear in the movie.
- All sets are practical locations.
- You will drive yourself to the set. If you are unable to drive yourself, a driver will pick you up, but you will probably become the subject of ridicule. Either way, you must arrive alone.
- There will be no craft service, so you should arrive on set “having had”. Meals will vary in quality.
- You will pick, provide, and maintain your own wardrobe.
- You will create and maintain your own hair and make-up.
- There will be no trailers. The company will attempt to provide holding areas near a given location, but don’t count on it. If you need to be alone a lot, you’re pretty much screwed.
- Improvisation will be encouraged.
- You will be interviewed about your character, This material may end up in the film.
- You will be interviewed about the other characters. This material may end up in the finished film.
- You will have fun whether you want to or not.
If any of these guidelines are problematic for you, stop reading now and send this screenplay back where it came from.
Driving herself to the set on her first day of work, Roberts did not know where she was going and nearly got lost. “I was scared to ask anyone to drive me, like, if I showed up not in the driver’s seat they’d go, ‘All right, you’re out. Can someone get Meg Ryan on the phone?’” Roberts jokes.
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