Recently, I had the chance to sit down and interview the producer / director of the independent feature film, "The Bill Collector" Movie. I asked several questions about the making of The Bill Collector Movie and about alternative methods of distribution for independent filmmakers including YouTube Rentals. You can read the interview that follows. Or, if you prefer you can listen to the podcast of the interview.
Me: So what's different about the concept of the making of this independent feature film?
Oakes: The budget plays a major role in the making of this film ("The Bill Collector Movie"). This independent film was made with distribution in mind, using next-generation technologies such as video-on-demand over the internet. Video on demand has been around for awhile, but generally it's been done on your Comcast cable box or through your satellite television provider. And it's generally just studio movies, first run movies, etc. But the internet through Google, Amazon, [and] Yahoo! are opening up an avenue for independent filmmakers to start to market their films directly to the public without having to go through major studios. So now an independent producer can make a film, put it up on YouTube Rentals, a new service that just started a month ago - or on video-on-demand on Amazon, and anybody at home with a computer connection can rent that movie and watch it at home.
Me: So The Bill Collector Movie was filmed entirely in Placer County?
Oakes: The film was shot entirely in Placer County. It was shot in three towns in Placer County: Roseville, Loomis, and Auburn. It was done for a total budget, our production budget was $60,000.00. That's it. We brought it [the film] in under budget - we came in just under $55,000.00.
We had a total of 23 days of principal photography which is remarkable for a full-length feature film. [We] had a seasoned crew. Everybody worked on basically deferred compensation. They're [the crew] working toward getting a piece of the pie. Everybody believed in the project and the crew was amazing how they worked together. Everybody worked well. Everybody on the crew basically had 20 years of experience or more.
Me: So how did the idea of the film come around?
Oakes: The gentleman that wrote the film and financed the film is named Bruce Blumen. He is this year 77 years old and he's a first time film maker. In the past I've referred to young filmmakers. I don't do that anymore because [of Bruce] I refer to first time filmmakers.
Bruce's son got in trouble many years ago with getting into debt and bill collectors were harassing him. And one day a bill collector said, 'You know you have a life insurance policy which makes you worth more dead than alive.' Literally stole the line from It's a Wonderful Life, the movie back in the '40s. And Bruce thought, 'You know these guys are tele-terrorists.' They terrorize people over the phone and they do a lot of illegal, creepy things. And so he thought he'd write a movie, a script, around that concept of a bill collector gone bad, and thus was born the concept for this movie, The Bill Collector.
The script was written back in '99 [or] 2000, and Bruce spent the next, effectively, 10 years shopping the film trying to find somebody that could help him produce it. He started out with a very low budget - he figured about $15,000.00, pretty soon that became $30,000.00, $40,000.00 and ended up at $60,000.00 when we started.
Me: And the lead actor, Jason Bortz, is from Roseville?
Oakes: He's a Roseville resident. He has been trained in a number of large city venues, in Seattle, in New York. He's taught theater as well as performed in a number of independent short films and is currently writing and producing, or working on producing his own feature.
Me: And the lead female actor, Bonnie-Jean?
Oakes: Bonnie-Jean Shelton has been in many, many, many commercials and as an extra in a number of films including several films with Clint Eastwood.
Me: And she's in the Bay Area?
Oakes: She's located over in the Napa Valley area. She's in Santa Rosa.
Me: And this film started out in Auburn, then it was in Roseville and then was in Loomis?
Oakes: Correct.
Me: And the primary crew, the Director of Photography, Bret Allen, he also has experience with big feature films, Hollywood films…
Oakes: The two people who deserve the most credit for this [making of The Bill Collector Movie], barring the fact that Bruce wrote it and paid for it, are Bret Allen, our Director of Photography, and Jason Bortz, our lead actor. These two are what make this film look like a real Hollywood film. [They] make it look like a - it's an enjoyable film because of those two.
And the reason I say that is that Jason brought a performance that is both chilling, entertaining and even comedic in that he has a dark sense of humor that I don't think anyone else could have done this role justice. And his performance through this piece is what makes this an entertaining movie.
Having said that, the production value that Bret brought to the film is something that you only find in roles done in Hollywood. Bret has been a Hollywood cameraman for over 30 years. He's worked on feature films, episodic television shows, national commercials and [has] done a lot of local and regional work as well. So Bret knows how to light. He knows how to operate the camera, he knows how to direct crew. So as our Director of Photography, he was able to direct our Production Designer, Heidi Boucher how to build the sets so she did her job [and] built us beautiful sets and then Bret was able to move the camera, fly the camera through those sets to create an image that is flowing and looks like Hollywood.
Me: So none of this would have come together without your experience as producer and director. So you brought to the table the ability to negotiate all these different players to make sure everything happened and happened on time. And your experience that you bring to the table, how did you get into this situation?
Oakes: Well, Bret was brought on by Bruce as the Director of Photography but he needed a producer. He needed somebody that could bring all the various parts together and see the movie through its fruition, to get it done. And with such a low budget, Bret Allen our D.P. said, 'I only know one person that could get this done for such a low amount of money.' And that's how he suggested me.
I met with Bruce in February of 2008, went over the script and said, "Yeah I can do it, but we need to make a few changes." Those changes were primarily scenes that cost money. Everything else - as long as we can shoot a scene locally, or in a set that we built ourselves and didn't require special effects - no flying over bridges, blowing up cars, no aliens invading - that kind of stuff, because we had no budget for special effects or large elaborate sets. With Bruce's agreement to follow my advice on that, we were able to put together locations for $1.00. Bruce gets a lot of credit for he was relentless in finding us locations.
But the thing that's beautiful about this is everybody worked together. People brought in props, [provided] locations, friends [to volunteer as cast and crew], other crew members, and other cast members and extras, and everybody worked together to bring what we needed to get this done. It wasn't any one person. And everybody's performance was excellent - from the crew and the cast and it just made for a magical experience.
Me: And you said this film was unique from the beginning because it was designed and created with the end result in mind.
Oakes: That's correct.
Me: And that normally isn't the way it's done.
Oakes: Normally a movie is made based on here's a script, we have these scenes, we need these people, we need these tools and therefore it's going to cost X amount of dollars. In that regard, they don't often look at what the movie is going to make. They look at what it's going to cost to make it. And in our case we looked at how can we actually make money? What are we likely going to make if we market this in a new generation format and made sure that the budget was appropriate to that [end]. So we stand a very good chance, based on the quality of the film, to actually make a profit with this film.
Me: And I think one of the reasons that you're going to be able to do that also is because traditionally, filmmakers follow a path of getting their film produced and then shopping it out to Hollywood, doing the film festival circuit, and then trying to go for distribution. You seem to be turning the pyramid upside down.
Oakes: Yes. The traditional format is Hollywood - as an independent producer you are really limited to finding a studio that will pick your film up for distribution. So, a Lionsgate, or a TriStar, or a Paramount. When you go with a studio like that, they are going to expend a great deal of money marketing your product, getting you licensing agreements with theaters, with DVD distribution and with video-on-demand services like Starz network. They try and get you onto Starz or Showtime or Cinemax and they spend a great deal of time and money negotiating and finding places to put you.
The problem is that with a low budget independent film, you really don't have a lot of advertising dollars, therefore not many people know about your film and as a low budget if you don't have a name star or name producer people aren't automatically going to come to your film because they don't know anybody that's in it. So the problem becomes the studio spends a whole bunch of money [and] whatever money is made usually doesn't cover what they spent, therefore, as a producer, you never make any money. And that is a very classic, and growing problem, that Hollywood hasn't figured out how to get around.
The model is you have to use a studio. There are five major studios and about 15 minor studios and they carry all the weight, but none of them make any money for their producers. And that's not - I don't mean to say none. There are exceptions. You have something like a psychological or a horror movie that comes out of the gate and only cost $15,000.00 to make and makes $15 million dollars in theatrical release. But that is one in a million shot.
When there were more than 10,000 films submitted this year to the Sundance Film Festival - short and feature - for consideration, and only about 120 of those films actually made it to Sundance, and of those only about five really get any national attention, the odds of your film making it are very, very low. Taking the studio route means you're going to be one of thousands of films competing for the attention of the studios and the distribution.
Whereas, in our particular case we're relying on our own ability to market the film through public relations, through [smaller, local] film festivals, through search engine optimization, and a really fundamental course is social networking - using Facebook and Twitter and MySpace - those kinds of applications that go from friend to friend. The key component is, "Wow, I just saw a good film," and tell all my friends I just saw a good film and you should see it too. And that spreads virally through the internet. And as long as there's an easy way for someone to access the movie and view it - you can rent it on YouTube Rentals for $3.99 - that's pretty easy.
Me: Now you've been in the film business since the 1970s, so you've brought quite a bit of experience to the table already. You've produced several commercials, documentaries, and this is your first feature film, so what's some new experience that you've gained in that project going forward and what's your next move?
Oakes: Well, the movies I've produced in the past - and I've produced 15 movies altogether - the movies 
have always been more docu-entertainment, or outdoor life, drag racing movies, retrospectives, that kind of thing and they've all been an hour to two hours in length, so I've had the experience of producing long movies. But they haven't been where you've built sets and had actors - they have been more of a documentary style entertainment program.
I was fortunate back in the early '90s to be a Director of Photography on a feature film, and I watched how the Hollywood people did it, but they had to produce it in a low budget manner and they produced it up here in the Sacramento region, and that gave me some good insight. But, I've been producing television commercials for the last 25 years.
I've been producing corporate films for 30 years, infomercials, specialty programs, that type of thing. I've done more than 3,000 pieces in my career, and as a result I know how to get things done on the cheap. I know my equipment, I know what my editing system can do, therefore, I don't try and script beyond what I know we have the ability to achieve. And that's a real fundamental - is that you have to produce within your means. And if you do that, you can get an effective product. Don't try and produce Star Trek when all you can afford is … [I interject 'Star Placer County] Star Placer County.
Me: So, my understanding from the Director of the Sacramento Film Festival, or the Sacramento Film, I forget his exact title, but what he's saying is that they're trying to rejuvenate film-making here in the Sacramento area, as opposed to going down to L.A., Hollywood. What's your take on that?
Oakes: Well, Hollywood has become toxic. And what I mean by that is, everybody down there knows that it's the center of the movie world when it's not the center of the movie world anymore. More movies are made in Bollywood than Hollywood. India produces three times as many movies as L.A. does. And for the last two dozen years, movies have been moving out of Hollywood to South Carolina, North Carolina, to Mexico, to Canada, to Argentina, to Bollywood. They have been moving away from L.A. and the reason is that if you look for a location to shoot in Hollywood, they're going to ask a fortune. If you try and rent equipment, it's going to cost you a fortune. [Hollywood and L.A.] do not recognize low budget anymore.
When they started low budget, when [the] movie industry started down there in the '20s and '30s in earnest, they knew how to produce low budget because that's all they could do. They've forgotten how to do that. However, having been down there recently - there is an effort by a lot of filmmakers to rejuvenate low budget. High quality, low budget. What it comes back down to - and Hollywood has forgotten this - is that it's the story. It's not special effects. Right now when you go see the big blockbuster movies, a lot of them they spend $200 million dollars making the movie, but it's slewn [sic] with special effects.
Me: There's no substance.
Oakes: And when you see a good independent film that wins an Academy Award, it's because it's got a great story. It doesn't have a lot of special effects. They couldn't afford it. So it comes down to acting, and production value, and the fact that [the crew] lit [the flim] correctly, shot it correctly. They stayed to the basics of making a good film and didn't try to do more than they could afford.
Me: Do you think Sacramento has the opportunity, or the ability to become a major player in feature film and independent film making?
Oakes: Absolutely. It already has. Many, many, many films are produced in this region, but most people don't know that. There have been more than a hundred features done in the last couple years here. Portions of features. They may shoot a portion of it back east, they may shoot a portion of it in studios down in L.A., but they'll shoot a lot of locations up here because we have affordable locations.
We also have very aggressive, very helpful film commissioners in this area for each county. Sacramento, Placer, El Dorado, and Nevada counties are all very aggressive at helping bring movie productions into these counties. We have locations that you can rent for virtually nothing. Most of our locations that we rented in The Bill Collector cost us a dollar. And therefore, we didn't spend our resources on trying to secure a location. If we were doing the same thing in the L.A. or San Francisco areas, those locations would have cost us thousands of dollars for each location. The insurance and the requirements that go with it would have been exorbitant. Well past our budget just for the locations.
Me: And The Bill Collector Movie premieres this Friday, the 21st of May at The Crest Theater in downtown Sacramento.
Oakes: That's correct. And we'll have quite a turnout. We've got quite a bit of media coming. We have what we call our celebrities, Jason Bortz and Bonnie-Jean and Bret Allen. And, of course, our Executive Producer and writer, Bruce Blumen, will be there. We have a lot of good media coverage. Sacramento Bee, Channel 31 and 13 and the local papers that are doing features on us. So we're very excited about the opportunity to see this film on the big screen.
Me: And do you plan to shop The Bill Collector to Film Festivals or are you going straight to distribution?
Oakes: We'll be doing both simultaneously. In some cases, if you're in distribution, for example our video-on-demand through YouTube and through Amazon, you're not allowed then to go to certain film festivals. But there are more than 3000 film festivals worldwide, and the requirements vary from festival to festival. We will simply pick those that we are allowed to go to. And that will become a considerable portion of our public relations, marketing strategy.
As we go into a city and we enter a film festival, we will work towards getting people aware that the film exists and if we do well at that film festival we will then direct people to our YouTube or Amazon rental area to actually monetize that [opportunity]. And we'll go city to city to city to city and when we've achieved our goal of winning several festivals in whatever that means, we'll then start our international marketing and bring [the movie] to the masses outside the United States.
Don't miss the premiere of The Bill Collector Movie at The Crest Theatre in downtown Sacramento May 21, 2010 at 7:30pm. Tickets are being sold through tickets.com, thebillcollectormovie.com, or at The Crest Theatre Box Office.
The Bill Collector Movie is now available for rent through YouTube rentals.
Read my article on the making of an independent feature-length film in Placer County.
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