My thoughts as I do my indie

Dependently independent. These words are iconoclastic. These words also have no appeal to most indie filmmakers. I am a Filipino filmmaker, my contribution to the Filipino industry this year is to produce My Fake American Accent, dependent on the seed grant from the Cinemalaya.

Fact: in 2005, Ned Trespeces and myself screened our first full length indie “Trabaho”, completely produced out of our own meager resources. I’ve already done it that way. Now, we’re going to do it like most people since 2004 have been doing it, dependently indie. 

It’s still liberating (and I’m not just speaking to the purist indie filmmakers in Pinas) to be able to make manifest these ideas in a context such as this one. For me, independence is a huge umbrella of possibilities. And walls of indifference and statutes of limitations have been broken down in the name of independence. But just because I feel I can fly with these ideas doesn’t make the movie a whole, it doesn’t quite finish the process. I’ve to be grounded and waking up to realities in the process certainly grounds me. I admit, writing this, I feel like being in the vortex of whirling ideas and relationships forged with companies to be able to birth My Fake American Accent. It’s not like My Fake is the sun with planets orbiting around it. Quite far from that, it’s more like there are varied degrees of affinities whorling around to put out My Fake American Accent. I’m very open to energies inputed by many and I’m focused on coming out with the basic idea I began with late in 2007. It will all boil down to that basic idea, in the end. Today, it looks like a long ride, it does. But I’m learning to do this another way.

To clarify,  I’m not ringing up just anybody to aid us here. There’s just a core of people whom I can rely on to lend their energies to this process. And I believe in attracting forces that can do the project good rather than dissipate its chances of becoming manifest. These are people who, as the meetings prosper, I realize I needed to meet. People I get to finally meet for an important input. That’s comforting. That I’m not isolated. I know now that the indie way of filmmaking does not encourage isolation or exclusivity. But as I’m having to be open to be able to experience this, I guess not many indie filmmakers are familiar with this experience. But I’m pretty sure even those that have their personal bulging finances live in this Third World country of ours to know that indie filmmaking costs hefty money. 

There are many paths. Before, I thought of finishing a short film of my own and looking up two other female filmmakers who could do their respective short films for the three of us to come up with a menage a trois compilation. That’s in the backburner because, our resources are scant and we will not resort to prostitution just to get this done. And my point is, there are many paths as there are many many stories to tell. I’ve always believed that a good story is the point in making independent films.