Project Greenlight

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so are they releasing Project Greenlight 3 on DVD?

[MacGuffin]

Project Greenlight's Dim Future.
Damon talks about this past season and the future.

For those few people out there who followed Project Greenlight over to Bravo for season three, you know that Matt Damon was often the lone defender of the contest's original intent. While the first two season's had revolved around a more independent vibe, the lack of success for either of the first two features, Stolen Summer and The Battle of Shaker Heights, led to a different objective in season 3: Make a commercial film.

Damon was no great fan of the script the Greenlight group decided upon, a B-movie horror story entitled Feast. After that, he figured the least they could do is go with the most interesting director - but Damon wound up one of the few defenders of the meek but talented John Gulager. Damon won this battle and the film soon went into production, chronicalled through a microscope during the course of the season.

At the press day for Brothers Grimm, IGN asked Damon about his struggles this past season with Greenlight and whether he thought the show was done.

"Even though, by their own admission, the people who voted for that script didn't think it was the best script, it probably was the smartest movie to choose because it does, in an odd way, give the project the greatest chance of surviving, because the movie might actually make money."

Feast is set for release in the unlikely December slot. "Bob's gonna bring it out at Christmas and he was like, [imitating his accent] 'I released this movie The Darkness last year at Christmas. It's the worst movie I've ever seen in my life, this f****** Darkness, but it's a great slot. The Darkness made 22 million. So I'm putting Feast in the Darkness slot.' 'F****** Feast is Citizen Kane compared to The Darkness. (Laughs) So in an odd way, maybe it'll work out."

Besides the difficultly of the project within the show, Greenlight had a tough time convincing viewers to follow the show from HBO to Bravo. "Before, with HBO, because they promo the s*** out of what they run, they do so much great promotion that the show was always a big hit for their size viewership, even though they're not in that many homes, compared to Bravo. I defy anyone in this room to tell me what channel Bravo is."

"The show was really good this year and yet we had horrible, horrible ratings. When we were in conversation with Bravo, they were like, 'Look, the show is good. We got the best reviews of any show on television,' and they said, 'But there's a certain number,' and they showed us the number and I'm not a TV guy, but they said, 'Look, this number, no matter what, we can't bring the show back... This is just terrible, we can't justify keeping it on air.' So it looked like it was dead, but now we got nominated for an Emmy, so it might, if the show won the Emmy, maybe it would be enough juice..."

"It's up in the air right now. I suspect if the movie does well enough, maybe Bob would help with it, maybe there's some way to get them all to do it one more time, but it's on a respirator."

[MacGuffin]

'Project Greenlight' revived by Affleck and Damon at HBO

After more than a decade off the air, Project Greenlight is coming back. HBO just gave a, well, a greenlight to a new edition of the series, with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon back on board as executive producers.

"Project Greenlight was ahead of its time," Affleck said. "Now that technology has caught up to the concept, we thought it was a perfect time to bring it back. A whole new generation of filmmakers has grown up sharing everything, and the next big director could be just an upload away. It is really great having Project Greenlight back at HBO."

"Project Greenlight works — careers have been launched and sustained as a direct result of this contest," Damon added. "Pete Jones, John Gulager, Patrick Melton, and Marcus Dunstan are just a few of the PGL alums who've gone on to do great things in Hollywood, and Ben and I are really proud of that."

Project Greenlight originally ran for two seasons on HBO, in 2002 and 2003 (the photo above is from the show's original run). The show will once again provide an uncensored look at the challenges facing a first-time director. It will launch with a digital competition to find a director, then follows the winner through pre-production and casting, principal photography, and post-production of a full-length film. The movie will be made from a "Hollywood-vetted script" and the director will be assisted by a team of industry professionals. From the release: "The fledgling director must learn to cope with pressure from the studio and producers, survive on-set politics, and lead a veteran cast and crew, all while trying to deliver a viable movie — on schedule and on budget."

The news comes on the heels of HBO rival Starz ordering The Chair, which is billed as a Project Greenlight follow-up series, from executive producer Chris Moore. That series follows two directors as they take their first feature film to the big screen with both projects using the same script.

[Reel]

I immensely enjoyed Season 1, it's like a perfect storm of awful. You can tell the second Pete Jones comes onscreen that Matt & Ben are going to pick him because he's a "guy's guy" like them, NOT for his screenwriting talent. That was their first mistake, because he wrote a TERRIBLE script. I only vaguely know the plot, two 8 year old kids, one has leukemia. One's die hard catholic and the other jewish. So, the pasty irish one spends the entire movie trying to get the kid to convert so he'll get into heaven? Goooooooooooo FUCK YOURSELF! If they were serious about the competition, they'd make it mandatory that he rewrite this horseshit. AT LEAST take some notes, make the kids a little older for god's sake. How about spend some time on rehearsals, or make a shot list? It doesn't make any sense how swiftly this all moves into gear when none of the cast or crew believes in what they're doing! No one's in this for Pete, they're doing it for MIRAMAX, HBO, just to be able to work NEXT TO Matt & Ben.

It's ridiculous how the whole competition is setup because they pick a winner and then entrust him with waaaay too much control in an industry he's never even worked in. You don't just hand an inexperienced guy a directing job on a million dollar movie. So, you get exactly what you pay for: No planning, no structure, no rapport with the actors, and worst of all, a guy who's GUNG HO about his awful ideas. It was such a pleasure seeing everything go wrong, especially with how little went into pre-production. For a minute, it kind of discouraged me about ever attempting the filmmaking process, but then I realized how sloppily everything was done here. When you start out making movies, you're not prepared for all the hollywood bullshit that goes behind it. The ONLY THING that should concern you is to tell a great story. Not the politics of the business or the producer riding your ass or whether this is going to make you famous. So, I think it does us all a service to operate outside of that power structure early in our careers. We need to find out how we work on our terms without everyone fucking rushing us to a deadline. Above all, it reminded me how important it is to work with people you like. Everybody on the crew for this show is up eachother's ass at any given moment, talking complete trash behind their backs, and just in it for the  paycheck. It's disheartening to watch, but I really gained some insight into how this filmmaking process is not something that can be co-opted. If there isn't anyone ready to lead that charge over the mountain then you might as well all go home.


You can watch it Here