ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — It's all about who you know and what you can get your hands on. New technology over the past decade has made it easier for filmmakers to shoot their own movies without having the need for big film cameras or even a big budget.
Take the new iPhone 13 Pro for example. The quality is beyond acceptable to make a quality film. Who knew 10 years ago that our cell phones could shoot 4K quality video in film format?
All you need is a good microphone, maybe some additional equipment but most of all you need a great story.
Brian Jalbert is a local filmmaker and he explains how he shot his film “Mind Game” during the pandemic "guerilla-style" and low budget in order to get it done.
"The film basically centers around an Army psychologist trapped in an RV [who] has to come up with a plan. It plays a lot with the mind and the psychological and how it can be manipulated," Jalbert said. "This movie is a feature-length project shot all in the Tampa Bay area."
Jalbert said one of the biggest difficulties is coming up with funding for a feature-length film.
"We shot very guerilla-style — I don't want to say a low budget because the quality is very good but the way we did it was very minimalistic," he said.
"Below budget row for the guerilla realm, it's like, 'oh man we got somebody over here with the lawnmower — how do we get around this?' So we get around and we ask and we talk to them instead of throwing money at [the problem]. Creative solutions instead of throwing mad money at it," he continued.
Jalbert said he shot the film at a local hotel and "kept people kind of secluded."
The result turned into more than 6 million streams on major platforms like Tubi TV and Amazon Prime Video.
To make movies, Jalbert says it's important to have credibility.
He said ways you can build credibility is to get a "bigger dog" who has credibility already established and work with them on your film project. Alternatively, you can build it by doing smaller projects — "whether if it's a low budget feature film, 90-page script, very simple, very minimalistic and you go shoot it and maybe you spend 5-grand to shoot the movie" he said.
Could you be the next big filmmaker?