Young Film Makers: Part 5: RAINDANCE: Saturday Film School By Tomo Kembery
Words: Tomo Kembery
As you guys know, for the past few months now I have been exploring the options out there how young film makers can train to become professionals. So far, the project has taken me to some of the best film schools that London and the UK has to offer. It’s been a pretty cool ride but there are still a lot of questions to answer.
Last week, I was invited to pop down to Raindance, an independent film school based in London. Raindance offers a small amount of specialist courses, as well as a few degrees. However, it’s mainly known for its film festival which has now been running for 25 years.
So picture this; You’re intrested in getting into the film industry, but you know nothing about it. You need a one-day crash course that will give you a quick overview about the industry to see if it’s right for you… Step forward, Saturday Film School.
The one-day film course covers screenwriting, directing and producing broken down into 4 parts with breaks and lunch in-between.
At first I've got to say I was a little bit sceptical. I thought to myself, how much can you really learn in a day about the industry? Was I about to endure a sales pitch masquerading as a film course? Yet, I decided to go with an open mind and if i wasn’t impressed, I would not spend my very valuable time writing this feature.
The course was held at King’s College in a one of the lecture rooms on the Strand, right next to Somerset house. Come 10am, the room was pretty busy with a bunch of eager film makers all looking to become the next Steven Spielberg.
Our first point of call was “ Writing for the Screen” taught by the founder of the school and festival Elliot Grove. He described himself as an amish, crafty Canadian, who dresses all in black and has a plastic eye (which is probably why he wears black sunglasses inside). An entertaining character, you can see Elliot’s passion for the film industry and business drive. Indeed, he did have some fantastic stories to tell, laced with a few subtle sales pitches for the school throughout the day…but hey we are all selling something, right, so nothing wrong with that.
The screen writing section of the course I felt was probably the wrong thing to start the day off. Although packed full of useful information, it was clear to me that the room was full of people that lacked simple knowledge about the industry and in such cases, I feel the course should have started off with the basics of the industry. Elliot did a fantastic talk after lunch about “Breaking into the Film Industry” where he covered just that and touched on subjects such as “ positions in the industry, budgeting, locations and licences” etc.
So I would swap that around and start with the structure of the industry, and then go into screen writing after. Just to make the flow of the course a little clearer for beginners as my brain was jumping around quite a lot at this point. Nevertheless, Elliot did a great job holding the room with his endearing personality and affectionate attitude towards the industry and truly believes that if you discover, you will be discovered.
After lunch, we were treated to another fantastic character in Patrick Tucker, a veteran Director of Stage and Screen, whose job was to give students an inside view into the basics of directing. This section was very good and so entertaining! Patrick really is one in a million and full of industry knowledge and wisdom. To enrol on 2 courses at Raindance (Directing part 1 and 2) with Patrick would be an absolute pleasure.
After another break, it was back to Elliot with some further talks on ”Making a Movie” which covered the likes of guerrilla filmmaking, camera equipment and permits. Again, very useful info for any new film maker.
Then it was down the pub for networking. However I would say that only half of the class attended the pub, which was probably for the best as it was pretty small. It would have been a lot better for Raindance to provide some drinks at the end of the course so that everyone could network together in the same room.
Overall, the course was fantastic as a crash course to the industry! Engaging, honest and encouraging, it turns out that you can learn quite a lot in a day and I look forward to speaking with Elliot more in the future.
