I noted a little while ago that the successful Veronica Mars Kickstarter was setting a dangerous precedent, although I will admit that I foolishly focused my attention on how the conglomerates could exploit us, the poor working humans.
But now, an even greater threat has emerged from the wilderness of the internet. I’m talking, of course, about this guy:
Yes, friends, the guy who people liked for a while when he was on Scrubs or maybe when he made Garden State* has decided that the time has come for Zach Braff to make a new movie, funded by, I’m presuming, the lovely people around the world who think 2006 was a banner year for movies, and that everyone else was dumb for not recognizing Braff’s leading man potential when they forgot to see The Ex and The Last Kiss.
He launched today, and is asking for $2 million. He’s already over $600K, which suggests that he’s probably going to hit his goal.
Meanwhile, in the dark corner of Kickstarter, Melissa Joan Hart’s rom-com quietly sobs over the unfairness of it all.
*Okay, you’re probably wondering what the footnote is about. Here’s the thing. In 2004 I shot a short film with some friends that ended up being accepted to a number of film festivals, which was, all in all, an amazing experience – it was a lot of fun, I got to travel and meet a lot of cool people, and ultimately it’s something that I’m still really, really proud of. But we had one emotional moment in the film that we overcranked (shot at a higher frame rate than normal) so that, in the film itself, it would play as a nice slow motion sequence. It took a lot of work, and a lot of luck, and we were almost out of film (I had to argue with my cinematographer about the shot, because he was afraid that we weren’t going to get it or that it wasn’t going to look right. I told him that this shot absolutely had to be in the film and had always been there in my brain since the first time I wrote it and that he was going to get it right. In the end he captured it exactly how I wanted. Thanks Brian!) but we were able to get it just right. When the film finally played at film festivals, it was a year later (2005), and I can’t tell you how many people came up to me and talked about how much they enjoyed the film, especially the “Garden State” shot – which they were referencing because Garden State was still a hot movie that a lot of people had just seen which also happened to employ a slow motion sequence at an emotional moment in the film. IT WAS NOT INSPIRED BY GARDEN STATE! WE CONCEIVED AND FILMED ALL OF THAT BEFORE THAT MOVIE RELEASED!
Man, that was nine years ago. Time flies, huh?
