Boiling down the 48 Hour Film Project to its simplest nature, it's one of the most challenging and most rewarding forms of art creation that you can do. For those that aren't indoctrinated already, the 48 Hour Film Project is a film-making contest. You pick a genre out of a hat (some simple and some sublime) at random, and then you have 48 hours to write, cast, shoot, edit, and submit your movie. You are given a character, a line of dialogue, and a prop that you must work into the film. Two weeks later, all the films are publicly screened, so that you and your tired-but-proud band of brothers and sisters can appreciate what you (and the other teams) made. I've done nine of these contests now (taking into account the 3K and Horror 48s), and while they're draining, they are fascinating in the processes themselves. So I wanted to take a look through drowsy eyes at what it's like to make one.
The first step to any 48 is the preparation. Everyone prepares differently for this beast. I'm usually a writer for this competition, and I believe "the readiness is all", as Shakespeare said. So I go through the entire list of genres every year, and create potential skeleton stories of every possible pick. I don't do any writing beforehand obviously, but I just go through my stack of randomly jotted ideas so that I have general arcs to pitch, no matter what type of film we pull. The more ideas you have for stories, the easier the Friday portion is. In my mind, Fridays are for writing, Saturdays are for filming, and Saturday night/Sundays are for editing. So as the writer, you end up chugging Coke or Pepsi all night to stay up until the writer's room is happy with what you've written. Anyone that knows me as a writer, is well aware that my biggest challenge on this day is not to over-write. You have a 7 minute limit on these films, so my intricate backstories and dialogue heavy style have to be hacked down quite a bit from my normal fare. After staying up until 3AM to make sure the entire cast has their finished scripts, I lay down fruitlessly and toss around like a flapjack until I wake up at 7AM to start the long shoot day.
Everyone that films anything knows that Murphy's Law is in effect. "Anything that can go wrong, will." That macabre proclamation is turned up to ten during the 48. You are exhausted before you even start filming (as the writer), and your time constraints are always in the back of your cranium. People show up late, locations change, it's 147 degrees, and every plane and train in the Tri-State area decides that the perfect time to roll by is as soon as you yell "action" on every take. I'm usually the Assistant Director on whatever team I'm on during this day, and I sometimes act as well. So now it's time to channel your combined energy to get the most creative and stylistic shots as quickly as possible. You always like to shoot for the edit, or even drop your SD Card files into your computer during the shoot if you can. Anything to save stress and time on Sunday. Generally if you start filming by 9AM, you'd like to get done between 6PM and 8PM, hoping that your coverage is complete and your story is coherent. By this point, you feel like you've had four bottles of cheap tequila in what I like to call "film drunk".
With my disabled body (I've got cerebral palsy, spinal stenosis, and three spinal fusions), I'm usually a useless pile of sweaty newspaper by the end of Saturday night. So while I can edit, I'm seeing three of every screen. So I go home, and my portion of the process is over. It's not so for the poor editors though, as they sit in a quiet room and piece together hours and hours of footage into seconds of transitions, while their helper throws granola bars at them and shakes them every half hour to make sure they're still awake. This is the point in the process where everyone who's not editing is either passed out for twelve hours, or feverishly wondering how the edit is coming along.
Then comes Sunday around 4PM. The announcements for teams turning their films in begin to be posted, and everyone else starts chomping off their fingernails. Four turns into five, and five turns into six. Rendering your film feels like waiting in line at the DMV. The "film drunk" haze wears off for a few minutes as everyone is glued to the group chat, anxiously awaiting that famous "the film is in on time" message. The "film drunk" doesn't really fade for a few days though. I'm writing this on Tuesday (three days after the process), and my sleep schedule is backwards and my ankles still feel like James Caan in Misery. But alas, the film is done and you and your crew have made a whole movie in one weekend!
Now I know I've had fun poking at the generalities and satirized the stereotypes of the negative side in this blog. But while a lot of those feelings are genuine, I want to end on the aspects that truly matter. You got down in the trenches with people you like, and you made something organic. You bonded together through discomfort and exhaustion and created something in three days that most people don't do in a lifetime. You were inspired by other creatives, and you probably made new connections for other work in the process. You accomplished something very difficult, and you overcame obstacles that probably made it seem impossible at times. Now you get to sit in a theater and watch your once-embryonic vision come to life on the big screen, and perhaps win awards for it. You get to appreciate the other teams' work and grow as an artist from their stories. You get lifelong memories and lessons that will help other films get made a lot easier in the future.
THESE are the reasons why we do this. These challenges build us, shape us, improve us. You won't always remember that exact stress or tiredness, but you will always remember fighting to make a movie. In these scary days of 2021 that we live in, art matters now more than ever. Using your energy to create, and give back, and make statements, matters now more than ever. That, my brothers and sisters in art, is the 48 Hour Film Project. I hope I see you all at the next one.
Love Yourselves, and Each Other
-Jason Burke
