Filmmakers Alliance Event
By David Geffner
Photos by Robert Hale
Director Terry Gilliam
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In a relaxed, fun-filled night, Filmmakers Alliance (FA), which describes itself as a collective of film and video artists, technicians and craftspeople dedicated to empowering, educating and supporting fellow filmmakers and aspirants, filled the DGA's main theater to showcase ten short films and videos directed by their members. The FA team was also there to present its second annual Vision Award (in a live Web Cast no less) to director Terry Gilliam. As FA President and DGA member Jacques Thelemaque said, "[Terry Gilliam] has embodied the fire and spirit of independent filmmaking throughout his entire career."
With Gilliam in attendance at a pre-event dinner reception, the good-natured irreverence present throughout the evening got off to a fast start. "I've been a DGA member for ten years and it's only now, when I come to California to be honored by Filmmakers Alliance, that I'm finally offered a DGA hat!" the London-based Gilliam cracked in response to DGA Assistant Executive Director Elizabeth Stanley's welcoming comments.
All kidding aside, Gilliam was obviously touched by the Filmmakers Alliance presentation. As the lights went down in the DGA's main theater, with Theater 2 pressed into service to handle the overflow crowds the sheer scope of Gilliam's filmmaking fire became clear. Every moment the FA team excerpted from the Gilliam pantheon--Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Time Bandits, The Meaning of Life, Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas --roared off the screen with stunning originality and independence.
"There are precious few people in our business who are true originals," said Mercedes Ruehl, who co-starred in Gilliam's The Fisher King (1991), and who was the Vision Award presenter. "Those people invariably have to do battle with the established forces. Brain-numbing, soul-affronting battle to bring a few of us manna in the desert. I understand this group honors those kinds of people. And I believe that's why we're all here tonight, in Terry's name, to honor such a man."
"Doing battle" also described Gilliam's inner struggle with speaking before a large group of strangers. Modest, despite the outlandish imagery he often creates, the director greeted the room with gentle sarcasm. "I really just came out here to meet a group of starving, struggling independent filmmakers who could afford to fly me and my wife out from London and put us up at the Four Seasons Hotel," the director laughed. "You could have made several independent films for what it cost to honor me and I'm here tonight to apologize for keeping those films from being made."
Ultimately, Gilliam served up a speech that was as passionate and hopeful as the films he's fought so hard to complete. "I've been very lucky to be part of Python," Gilliam said. "We were a little gang of six who gave each other support and were impossible to stop. Those same qualities are what's important about this organization you're supporting tonight.
"I made two important decisions after I quit working in a Chevrolet assembly plant in the San Fernando Valley," Gilliam continued. "One was that I would never again take a job just to make money. And the other was that I would always be in total control of my work. When Terry Jones and I made Holy Grail, we had never made a film before. We shot in five weeks and it was a total disaster. Yet we were lucky because we were allowed to make our own mistakes. I still fight for that on every film. Not the mistakes of a studio executive who's worrying about his career, but my mistakes. I'm very proud to say that all my films have been a product of my own mistakes, and I've been lucky to have fantastic people around who picked me up and showed me the way."
In many respects, Filmmakers Alliance is a youthful mirror of Gilliam's decades-long struggle for independence from Hollywood. Founded as Reverse Angle Production Alliance (RAPA) in June of 1993 by husband-and-wife team Jacques Thelemaque and Diane Gaidry, FA's early years were sustained by the earnings the couple made as Hollywood-area dog walkers. (Director Thelemaque was just recently awarded a Gordon Parks Award for his first feature film, Dogwalker.)
Like Gilliam, whose career took flight on the wings of his friends and co-workers from Monty Python's Flying Circus, Thelemaque and Gaidry relied on the help of their friends in the L.A. indie scene to keep the organization alive. Perhaps the most striking parallel to Gilliam can be seen in the group's current position: as FA has grown and offers of corporate sponsorship have increased, they have remained true to their roots. The DGA evening was its key community fundraiser, designed to educate and win over L.A. independents to the FA cause. The group's motto, "Greenlight Yourself," proudly screamed out from every trailer and short film at the screening.
Attendees at the Filmmakers Alliance reception.
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'When we started Filmmakers Alliance eight years ago," Diane Gaidry explained, "it was as a reaction to people telling us we could not make our own films without going through the system. This was before digital videotape made indie filmmaking much more acceptable. Our paradigm for this organization was always based on partnership, rather than domination. Supporting each other all the way through the film chain- financing, production, distribution and marketing. That's what we've always believed, and it's working."
FA President Thelemaque said, "People come at this industry from a lot of different angles, with a lot of different agendas. We simply try to create a home for filmmakers where the work itself, and the process, are the most important things.
"This is a tough business," he continued. "What sustains Filmmakers Alliance is our membership. Every time one of us completes a film, or helps pull off an event like this one, we're all recharged with fresh energy. Why? Because we know it took an army of people, donating their time and efforts, to make it happen. That spirit of support and cooperation is just the very best feeling."
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