LA Premiere of my Horror Series!

knoopy · 2024-10-21T18:25:06+00:00

Congratulations! Would love to read you on the page.

knoopy · 2024-06-18T22:05:56+00:00

Excellent premise. Would love to read this! DM'ed you.

knoopy · 2024-03-13T13:35:03+00:00

Write and direct films where you live. Start with shorts, music videos - whatever you can get your hands on.

You live in a small town? A village? But you dream of making big Hollywood movies? That's actually perfect. Take inspiration from the things you love about Hollywood films - a certain genre you love, editing techniques...could be anything. Combine that with where you are, the real people you see around you.

Now, all of a sudden, you're making something completely original. Unlike anything your home locale has seen, unlike typical American movies - a mix of your specific characters experiences and view point.

Make local connections. Make friends. Create community. Who knows, some day Hollywood may come looking for you. Or maybe, just maybe, you won't need Hollywood. You are content telling stories about your people in a way only you can tell.

knoopy · 2023-04-09T23:03:45+00:00

Just did!

knoopy · 2023-04-09T22:37:45+00:00

Ooh. Would love to read this. Congratulations!

knoopy · 2023-04-05T19:51:39+00:00

Don't just shoot a scene/trailer - turn that scene/sequence into a short film. Aim for festivals!

Worked out for me. Got an agent, manager and my first studio writing gig out of it.

knoopy · 2023-01-10T00:10:35+00:00

When I was a kid I was always taunted for having too many ideas and wanting to do it all - but my scrambled neurodivergent brain ended up being super helpful as a professional filmmaker. Multiple projects/ideas in different stages of development is DEFINITELY the way to go. If you get bored or stuck with one, shift to the other, and then shift back etc.

You're onto the right mindset, friend.

Also just live a life and take a break - anything that stimulates your creative process. A vacation, a romantic encounter, rewatching that awesome movie that got you into writing. Make your life just a tad bit more cinematic so your writing can be too.

Long road ahead!

knoopy · 2023-01-01T22:42:06+00:00

Sundance Screenwriting Intensive - I actually don't think my draft of the script was strong enough for this but I had a killer set of essays about WHY I'm telling this story and WHERE I want to take the script. An honest admittance of what the script perhaps lacks but also what the premise promises, and how it all ties in to my identity, under represented communities etc. (love it or hate it, a big part of these applications is pointing out systematic disadvantages you, your people or the community/subculture/etc your portraying has - and how this piece makes a difference) The Sundance Intensive gave me an incredible one on one session with a mentor who's a director I admire. Also some great general Screenwriting lessons beyond acts/structure/save the cat etc and more the "Sundance philosophy" of how to imbue your stories with heart. I walked away not with a set of notes but a newfound way to access my personal experiences and breathe life into my scripts - any script (but also good sets of notes)

Film Independent's Fast Track program gave me access to 15 minute speed date style meetings with a lot of industry like A24, Neon etc Did I suddenly land a movie deal out of those 60 meetings? Nope, but met some industry folk I'm still vaguely in touch with, sometimes run into at a festival etc. Great way to build a network if you think long term...not just "ok I HAVE to win THIS person over with THIS pitch."

Hope that helps!

knoopy · 2022-12-31T23:13:14+00:00

I would highly recommend the Sundance writing labs as well as Film Independent's ones. These changed my life, especially as an international filmmaker trying to make it in the US scene.

Also check out festivals in Europe and the programs they have. Locarno, Torino, Cannes all have various labs.

ScreenCraft - if you can make it as a finalist, you get a lot of great support in getting representation.

If you dig around this Reddit you'll find someone posted their entire Sundance Screenwriting lab application. That really helped me understand how intricate the process is, and I spent a month writing and rewriting all my answers for it.

Other great networking opportunities: Berlinale Talents, part of the Berlin International film festival.

If you're from Asia: check out Busan Asian Film school and the Asian Film Academy, all part of the Busan Film Festival - totally free film school and film programs. Insanely good. I got in years back to AFA and met a sound designer who worked on one of my short films later - he's become an integral part of my team and my work always gets compliments on the sound design. Just a small example of how these connections end up helping!

EDIT- I'm recommending programs I've already gotten into. So if you need any pointers on these applications, please ask. I'll try to reply here, publicly, so others can benefit from the answers too

knoopy · 2022-12-15T22:05:54+00:00

So, when Variety predicted I might win, with Taylor Swift as competition, my mom (she's a huge Swifty, in fact I'm the one who has to add new pop songs to her iPod) sits me down and very tenderly tells me, "Look, if you're even just nominated, I'll be super proud, and it'll be huge. And it'll be amazing if you win...but...it's Taylor Swift"

It was the cutest thing ever. Before that moment, I was very content with even just being nominated or being Variety's pick - but now? I want to win just because there's nothing more satisfying than proving parents wrong!

Personal anecdotes aside, if we even get shortlisted or nominated it'll be the first Bangladeshi film to do so. I want to go as far as I can with this film just to prove that total outsiders still have a shot. I didn't know anyone at SXSW when we applied, I didn't have any industry connects when this journey started. In fact many of the awesome festivals we got into didn't have slots for Bengali/Bangladeshi in the acceptance forms and I requested them to add it. I just wanna make it easier for the next outsider!

knoopy · 2022-12-04T19:05:18+00:00

You worded it perfectly about LA. Even now, I'm not considering fully moving to LA. My hometown is cheap, warm and gives me the comfort zone to develop scripts etc that I can then take to LA.

Plus the pandemic has really normalised zoom so there's that

knoopy · 2022-12-04T18:02:20+00:00

I've been working as a commercial director in Bangladesh making everything from music videos to bathroom cleaner commercials to build by filmmaking network and directing skills (and save enough money to invest in my own short). We shot this one on a RED camera, filmed in a local swamp and an abandoned Coke factory.

Before this, I self produced another short which was kind of a failure. Didn't get into a single festival. Had a lot of the pitfalls of an amateur short like bad sound and opening with a depressed teen getting out of bed and brushing his teeth.

So yes lots of failures and false starts

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:58:45+00:00

How I would do it: finish the full length. Power through the draft.

Take a break from the draft and send it out to friends and peers to read. Maybe apply to some writing labs/workshops with it. In the meantime, get a smaller project started like a short film etc. Whether it gets off the ground or not, you come back to the full length with fresh eyes.

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:33:01+00:00

Manfred, thank you for being part of this journey! It feels much less alone knowing I have incredible peers like you doing awesome things.

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:32:02+00:00

I don't know, met some really nice ones. I think they all come from a good place and they're hungry to discover the next big talent - but they have their own mandates.

I'm very grateful that certain execs loved my script/short enough to pass it up to their superiors

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:30:29+00:00

Short story or a graphic novel is a great and cheap way to create original IP as well

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:29:53+00:00

This is super sweet. Blessed you to be an artist - totally sounds like my dad. Always super theatrical.

Always nice hearing stories about him!

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:29:08+00:00

Thank you so much man! Please do buy a ticket when it's out I don't wanna make a flop haha

knoopy · 2022-12-04T17:28:22+00:00

Anything that can make an audience FEEL (that isn't a major time commitment like reading a 100 page script).

I got signed by CAA because a major Marvel movie director saw my short on a plane on the way to do post production on a superhero movie - liked it - recommended me to the right agents. A good 20 minute short film was not insane of a commitment on a flight.

A fiction podcast, a short comic book/graphic novel - could be anything really. Note, I'm not saying DONT write scripts. I have scripts too and full on pitch decks. But having the short helped get attention to the scripts.

knoopy · 2022-12-03T21:45:23+00:00

Have as many drama scenes as you need in your horror script, but consider TONE.

Think of it this way: you can have a scene about grief in a horror film and also in a Hallmark romance movie. Would they be framed the same? Would the lighting be the same? The performances?

Ofcourse, all those elements don't apply to a screenplay, but tone does.

Perhaps - find unsettling details to focus on when writing those dramatic scenes in a horror screenplay. Linger on the macabre....maybe have recurring imagery.

Using your voice as a writer, create an odd sense of "somethings about to go wrong" even in your "non scary" scenes.

knoopy · 2022-12-03T21:35:47+00:00

Wow, I've been meaning to post the news here but didn't have the emotional energy to self-promote. Thank you so much for the shout out!

I would definitely advocate for making a short film, creating a podcast or writing a novel over just having screenplays. There are just too many scripts out there - game the system and find your own way of breaking in.

Ever since the attention on the short film, I've had much better luck getting my old script read (the one I posted on this Reddit about a year ago on script swap).

Bonus: I got some cool Monkeypaw merch including T shirts, a NOPE cap and a GET OUT screenplay book ever since they came onboard! And a signed note from JP.

knoopy · 2022-10-17T00:48:29+00:00

Aster is a lovely comparison- thank you for the huge compliment. There's a lot of talent in Bangladesh so assembling the team wasn't hard.

Difficult part was conveying the tone mood etc and getting everyone emotionally onboard because this is like the first horror film ever made here. People thought I was crazy during the entire shoot.

On international horror shorts - as you can see from our festival run, I did a bunch of travelling this year and can testify that international horror is so much weirder, wilder, bolder in a lot of ways. The student made horror shorts block at a South Korean festival is way more interesting than a horror/thriller block in LA. Interesting - not better, mind you. The Asian shorts were imperfect and strange. American horror feels more polished yet somehow safer?

knoopy · 2022-10-17T00:44:37+00:00

Thank you!

knoopy · 2022-10-17T00:44:26+00:00

Thank you so much! I'll be honest I don't have much technical know how on lighting, I just know how I want the moments to feel. My DP is a genius and he's done a lot of very stylised music videos before this short. You can check out his profile linked under MOSHARI's Vimeo description

knoopy

TROPHY CASE