TRIANGLE 6 YEARS LATER MELBOURNE REPORT in CILECT
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CILECT NEWS Special Issue December 2002 Page 39 Conference Panel 3 Monday, April 8, 2002 Triangle, Six Yea rs La t er Panel Members Pavel Jech, FAMU, Prague, Czech Republic Renen Schorr, Director JSFS, Jerusalem, Israel Lauri Törhönen, Director, UIAH, Helsinki, Finland Malte Wadman, Director NFS, Lillehammer, Norway Page 40 December 2002 CILECT News Special Issue Malte Wadman Pavel Jech Renen Schorr Lauri Törhönen CILECT NEWS Special Issue December 2002 Page 41 Mexico I might have at least met the faces and seen the hair color of the people who were to become my international Monday, April 8, 2002 colleagues before they turned gray, in and during the Trian- gle process, but I missed the opportunity. So when the Conference Panel 3 original Triangle documentation started to arrive, I instinc- Triangle, Six Years Later tively went to Rome to attend the first meeting without knowing much about what was going to happen. I only In 1996, CILECT began to address the issue of communi- wanted to see the CILECT people. cation and collaboration among the creative triangle of writers, directors, and producers. Some viewed the Trian- The Rome meeting changed my life and my world, and gle project as a necessary corrective to the 1960’s auteur with that, the film school and my point of view towards ideology that dominated many film schools. Others saw it everything about it. Triangle, as it began, was everything I as diminishing the role of the individual film artist in an wanted to happen in the film industry in my country and in increasingly market-oriented system. How has Triangle the film school as well. affected the film and television school curriculum, and For those of you who don’t know anything about Triangle, what lessons can be learned from the process as well as this is a project sponsored by GEECT and CILECT and it’s the outcomes? a European response to Hollywood because some- body noticed that European cinema is over- Lauri Törhönen whelmed by the producer-driven American studio Dear friends and colleagues, I will present the panelist. First system, and the weak point in European film is the I present the empty chairs: Bob Nickson is on the agenda producer. Somebody had to do something about it. but couldn’t come. From the beginning Bob has been our I think it was a good idea for the film schools to outside point of view for the Triangle process. He brought pick up the ball, and in Rome, six years ago, we an American point of view to this European process. The decided that the right place to educate film produc- empty chair on the left is actually mine, and I am sitting in ers was in the film schools instead of the schools of the empty chair in the middle, which actually belongs to business or university departments of economics. Professor Dick Ross, who has been the soul, if not the body, We need film producers, not economists or corpo- of the Triangle Project. The poor man has already written rate managers. two books on Triangle meetings and a third one is coming. We will try to be brief and try to save some time Dick wasn’t able to attend, so I am sitting in for him. for discussion. I’d like the first round to be about The other panelists, who are in their chairs, are Renen what the film schools did before Triangle, and then Schorr, from the Sam Spiegel Film and Television School, we will go on to what happened during and after Jerusalem. Renen is both a producer and a director, so we Triangle. First, Renen Schorr. can describe him as a Triangle skeptic. Pavel Jech from Years Lat er Renen Schorr FAMU, Prague is a screenwriter, and Malte Wadman, from Lillehammer Norway is neither a producer nor a screen- I cannot give you a full report on the situation of writer nor a director. the schools before Triangle because our school in Jerusalem is not the typical “six pack” type of I am a director by profession, and I inherited an ancient, school by which I mean meaning admitting six old-fashioned film school in which there was a lot of analy- directing students, six screenwriting students, six sis and theory, but very little filmmaking. The motion pic- editing students, six cinematography students, six ture theater was the core of the film school, instead of the producing students, etc. to each of the six depart- studio. The students, who I also inherited, and some of ments. Our school, which is twelve years old, ad- them unfortunately are still there, wrote scripts by them- mits students who have not yet chosen a specialty. selves for the 10-minute films they were assigned to make, It is only during their studies that they evolve into which finally emerged as 52-minute features. As a result, directors, writers, editors, etc. and all students have just one student could ruin the budget for the whole year. the option to direct and to make a second year film So my taking the job of running the school was an act of or a diploma film, So it’s not a typical, European Triangle, Six true optimism. film school in that regard. Our philosophy is that, I missed my first CILECT General Assembly because my especially in small countries like ours, a school predecessor wanted to travel to Mexico with his wife. In should have a role in changing the industry, and I Page 42 December 2002 CILECT News Special Issue must say that after our twelve years of existence, from the ministry, from other film schools, who were set- it’s my belief that we have contributed to a subtle ting up the parameters within which we were supposed to change within the Israeli industry. Yet, without work. The groups and consultants had all been traveling doubt, we failed to bring producers to the indus- around the world for a long time looking at film schools, try. Our school, like most of the European but unfortunately, I could not get very much out of their schools taught students how to be production reports. managers, or line producers. We’ve still not suc- From my own experience of teaching at different schools, I ceeded in producing an executive producer. learned about the problems with the existing system. We Our thinking was that we should proceed one found that at many schools the cinematographers gradu- additional step and that’s where we are heading ated and went straight out to shoot commercials, the docu- Panel 3 now, maybe even one step ahead of Triangle. mentary people were all right because they were getting We wish to make the producer’s role in the work in television, and the scriptwriters also got nice jobs school more successful, and to when they graduated, but there wasn’t take the radical step of fully any producer training at all, and the role assimilating the role of the producer into of the directing students within the the organization of the school. In brief, this means that school was very different from what ex- the school will surrender isted in the industry. The film school Given that until now, the director is the its artistic power and its students were being trained as auteurs. person who is running the show, we funds to five, six, or seven The reason for these director-led schools would like to do something which is quite senior producers, with the had to do with the historical situation dangerous in a film school. We want to that existed when they were organized. hope of getting two really select in advance the most promising peo- The schools in Western Europe were outstanding producing ple to be producers and educate them not largely set up just after the introduction only in the basics of production, but espe- graduates. I think we can of television, which coincided with the cially in story editing, storytelling, cost- change the industry, not in invasion of the nouvelle vague, the “new ing, and scheduling, and then give them a cumulative way, but from wave,” and they were mostly school for the opportunity put their knowledge to above, because in Israel, directors and cinematographers. work and to select the projects to be made in the school and actually produce them. and I believe many small The introduction of screenwriting into countries, we lack real my school’s curriculum came in the In brief, this means that the school will producers who can identify 1980’s and producing didn’t come until surrender its artistic power and its funds a good story and go with it, the 1990’s, initially somewhat outside of to five, six, or seven senior producers, and find the right director, what one might consider the core cur- with the hope of getting two really out- the right writer and produc- riculum. This led, for example, to script- standing producing graduates. I think we writers, who were very much aware of tion team, and understand can change the industry, not in a cumula- the situation in the real world, writing a tive way, but from above, because in Is- costing and finance and lot of scripts, but they were never pro- rael, and I believe many small countries, marketing. If our school duced, because the directors, living in the we lack real producers who can identify a can educate one or two obsolete world of the auteur, were writing good story and go with it, and find the really good producers their own scripts and making their own right director, the right writer and produc- films.