Reel opportunity

MSU, students taking larger, proactive role in Michigan’s growing film industry

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The push for Michigan’s film students to stay in the state and lead the growth of its film industry has started with the development of the 2010 Creative Film Alliance Summer Film Institute.

The alliance is a group of 21 experienced film students from the state’s three largest universities, who met at Wayne State University on Friday to hold pre-production meetings to discuss plans and cast roles for their 20-25 minute short film, which will premiere at the Detroit Institute of Arts in spring 2011.

Before casting, each student was asked to look at one of the film’s main characters, Donny, and find a film clip demonstrating techniques on how the character can be shot to make the audience better understand him and his role, said Bob Albers, a senior video specialist in the MSU Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media and adviser to the project.

The students, who come from MSU, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University, are mostly upperclassmen or are pursuing their Master’s degrees, which is what enabled them to transition into the professional working environment quickly, Albers said.

“This isn’t a place where you learn basics, it’s a place where you apply basics,” he said.

The Creative Film Alliance Summer Film Institute is one of the ways MSU is taking part in the state’s burgeoning film industry, and for the students involved, it’s a firsthand experience in the field.

Taking the incentive

As they continue through the beginning stages of creating the film, Andy Kozlowski, an MSU telecommunication, information studies and media senior and the project’s coordinating producer, said members of the group have been influenced to stay in state after graduation by Michigan’s film incentive program, which was signed into law in 2008 by Gov. Jennifer Granholm.

The film incentive program offers up to a 42 percent refundable or transferable tax credit for producing a film in Michigan, and was designed by legislators to create jobs and more private investments.

“There’s an opportunity to stay in the state, work for companies that do freelance or get contacted by production companies, and you can make money by staying in the state you grew up in,” he said.

“The incentive shows me there’s an opportunity to grow as a filmmaker within my home state.”

Ken Droz, a spokesman for the Michigan Film Office, said the film incentive program has created 6,763 jobs on production sets alone and has raised nearly $380 million since 2008.

“In general, people need to remember it passed 147-1 just over two years ago,” Droz said. “The predominant majority of legislatures are in favor of this program and are happy with the way it’s going. There’s excitement in the state now after negative news daily of plant closures and so on.”

Between 2003-07, 23 movies were produced in Michigan. With help from the new film program, the 41 movies shot in 2009 alone nearly doubled that.

“There was never any considerable amount of films being shot in Michigan before the incentive, and now it’s like the floodgates have opened,” said Ben Sherman, an MSU senior in media arts who works with the alliance.

After Michigan raked in more than $230 million in 2009, Droz said he hopes the state will exceed $300 million in 2010.

One of the main reasons for Hollywood functioning as the capital of the film industry is warm weather facilitates year-long shooting, and for the film incentive program to reach its ideal goals, more infrastructure is required to accommodate productions during colder months, Kozlowski said.

“The incentive itself will really take off once we start, as a state, putting in production houses and studios you can use year-round,” he said. “There’s nine major films shooting right now this summer, but because of the weather, they’re limited to the summer unless they want to do a winter piece. If we don’t have these studios or the people working at production houses where they can go inside and shoot and do post-production, then it won’t take off like it needs to. ”

A broader presence

MSU has invested in the industry by altering its film studies courses with the arrival of the film incentive.

The new fiction film production and documentary expression specializations began in 2009 as two-year programs that enable 20 students to undergo a full year of hands-on training followed by a year of constructing an actual movie.

Although MSU, Wayne State University and U-M are the main influences for the film movement because of the schools’ alliance and new classes, other colleges statewide have revamped their curricula to meet the escalating demand, Droz said.

“There has been a huge effort to amp up programs, curriculum and course offerings to a growing student interest base to pursue filmmaking of some kind across the state,” he said.

“(Many) community colleges, Oakland (University) have all added different programs.”

Kozlowski said the Summer Film Institute is somewhat a classroom itself.

He said the pre-production meetings, which take place every Wednesday and Friday at one of the three universities, are incredibly important so the crew is on one accord.

“If you have piss-poor planning, you’re going to have a very bad production,” Kozlowski said. “Everything that can go wrong, will go wrong. Pre-production is the most important part of any movie or film that you’re shooting. Everything logistic-wise, story-wise, crew-wise (and) legal-wise happens in pre-production and if you don’t have that, you have nothing.”

Heading into its Friday meeting, the group already had made big pre-production decisions by cutting the original script down from 110 pages to 22 and planning several locations to shoot across Michigan, such as Detroit and U-M, in early August, Kozlowski said.

The film alliance is special because the students involved are establishing a network in Michigan’s emerging film community, Albers said.

“The film industry is based on connections, and people hire people that they know and they have worked with,” Albers said.

“This is the root of that in Michigan because these students, who will become filmmakers and part of the film culture, know each other and they’re going to get to know each really well over the next weeks. They’re going to call each other when one of them gets financing for a film. We hope to make this continue in subsequent summers.”

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