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for: “I'm just making this part of my bigger idea, but I'm using this to sell it.” I'm always
disappointed when I fi nd out a short fi lm has done that, because it ignores what is so
wonderful about making short fi lms.
Q: When you're building the story, how do you stay focused on
one idea?
Andrew:
One of the most important parts is the pitch. When your students or any new
storyteller tells somebody else the idea, whoever is listening and/or the person pitching
should really pay attention to how he or she is pitching.
I'll use
One Man Band
as an example:
There's a guy on a corner, and he's playing music. He's pretty good, but not really
that good, and there is another musician that he is going to battle, musically. That's the
story. That's it. The second I start pitching and telling, or describing events to the story
that sort of breaks out of that little quad that this movie takes place in, that's the point
where I start to get a little worried. The entire pitch should never break from that initial
setup.
I think you should really be able to pitch your idea in 15 seconds. Even in
One Man
Band
, the fi lm never really breaks out away from what's presented in the fi rst 15 seconds
of the movie.
And it gets back to the joke analogy, which is a silly analogy, but I think it really makes
the point well.
If I'm telling a joke, every beat of the story has to be right on the spot. In the feature
fi lm I can wander a little bit, lose you a little bit, I have time to get you back, but in the
short fi lm, if I lose you, there is no time to get you back. In the short fi lm, if I go one
beat too long, I can ruin it.
For example, if I start setting up giving too much background and explaining too much,
then you, as an audience, start getting bored, and by the time I get to the punch line,
it's like, uh, OK, that wasn't funny because you gave me way too much information.
I keep using the analogy of telling a joke. That is not to say that a good short fi lm has to
be funny. It's just a way of illustrating how important timing is in the short fi lm format.
Q: Is it hard to be funny?
Andrew:
Yes, absolutely. I know if I'm really trying to be funny, then I should stop
right there. Stories are just like people. The funniest people never really try to be funny,
they're just really funny. And in story, the funniest stories come out of the situations.
