The Honest Filmmaker
Are you about to leave Uni with a filmmaking degree? Or want to change careers and work in a creative industry? We want to give you the tools you need to enter the real world of production or freelancing. Honest and open career advice from people in the business.
We also talk to those in other creative industries to discuss their careers, the potential cross over with film production and practical tips for a successful and fulfilling career.
http://www.thehonestfilmmaker.co.uk
The Honest Filmmaker
Writing, Acting, Directing & Producing your First Feature with Dzifa Mallet
#filmmaking #filmpodcast #tubi
This week on the podcast I talk to actor and director Dzifa Mallet. Dzifa decided he wanted to change careers and move into acting so made a short film and then turned this into his debut feature "Remedy for a Broken Heart".
I spoke to Dzifa about what it was like working on his debut feature for someone with very little experience behind a camera, the strains and stress of directing yourself as well as producing an entire production on your own on a shoestring.
We also talked about sales and distribution, how Dzifa ended up working with Indie Rights and how he promotes the film with a $0 marketing budget
Check out the re-release of Jim's first solo directing feature The Witches Hammer - out now on amazon
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/video/detail/B0F235F4T8/ref=atv_dp_share_cu_r
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HONEST, OPEN ADVICE ABOUT YOUR FILMMAKING CAREER
Are you about to leave Uni with a filmmaking degree? Or want to change careers and work in a creative industry? We want to give you the tools you need to enter the real world of production or freelancing. Honest and open career advice from people in the business.
We also talk to those in other creative industries to discuss their careers, the potential cross over with film production and practical tips for a successful and fulfilling career.
Join the community: http://www.thehonestfilmmaker.co.uk
[Music] hi Jim here and you're listening to the honest filmmaker podcast career advice from people in the business this week I'm speaking to actor and director gefa Mallet gefa decided he wanted to move into acting so made a short film and then later decided to make it into his first feature film the remedy for a broken heart I spoke to Geer about what it was like working on his debut feature especially as someone who didn't have much experience behind the camera uh the strains and stresses of directing yourself as well as producing an entire production on a shoe string uh we also talked about sales and distribution how we ended up working with Indie ws and also how he ended up promoting the film with a z marketing budget enjoy okay so I start where I start with most people tell me about your route into film making okay so um I started acting in 2020 I graduated college and I got a degree in kinesiology um I could go and Coach um and teach physical education um and I was like you know what I'll always have a job doing this so I was like you know what I'mma go 100% towards this acting stuff I always wanted to do it when I was younger but never had the money for the classes and stuff like that but you know what I'mma just give it a shot because I do not want to live a regret so I just joined a whole bunch of Facebook acting groups uh did a lot of research on YouTube and I just started there and and then um fast forward to 2022 um I would always get like ideas in my head so I put them in my notes app and I started off with this idea film about a homeless man and I end up making a short film called The Giver that's on YouTube um I wasn't supposed to write or direct that project I had found this lady that was a director and writer because I didn't know nothing about directing and writing and she gave me a price and I was like all right cool I'mma save up for that but it started taking me too long to save up to get to her to her price I was like you know what I'm going just write it and direct it myself and that's how we got the product The Giver that's on YouTube right now and then based off of that reaction and everybody asking oh a part two what happened to this and that and that they was like I want something longer because it's only 23 minutes that's how I came and I developed the remedy for a broken heart so I remade that short film into a full feature film a more developed product and and uh yeah that's pretty much how it started right and so so give us what's the pitch for your movie Give me the give me the plot okay um I'm trying to think how to give it without giving the film away uh basically a homeless man and a waitress build a bond for each other and the waitress's sister um who's sick doesn't approve of the relationship because of her past relationship and what she's dealt with with men and basically everybody finds out what um what it means what it means to to to give what what it looks like when somebody doesn't have anything but they they have the most to give if I'm trying to my mind is blanking a little bit yeah that's all right that's right it's a noise pitch try not to try not to give too away you know that's always a tough always a tough one and would you where would you class it so would you go drama would you go romantic drama where what I think it's definitely more uh drama drama based there is a little bit of romance in there too I'll say it's mostly I'll say about 70 7030 drama romance I would say uh in my opinion in my opinion yeah and do you ju jumping straight into this one so I interviewed Justin Milton who's a black filmmaker and he said the expectation from sales and Distributors were black director is going to be a drug movie it's going to be mean it's going to be a gang movie something like that have you ever experienced that assumption and is it a unique thing for a a romantic comedy yeah so I haven't experienced it like I haven't like experienced like oh they oh we want something like this but like you know you go on tuby and you go to the you know basically most tuby films are pretty much the same you know the drugs the sex everywhere the violence and the the trauma you know so I just wanted to make something different to be honest and you know it's it's you know you can make more money you know doing that you know just following but I'm trying to I'm I feel like I'm separating myself earlier so it's going to be harder to it'll be harder for people to press play on my stuff I don't have a gun on my poster that's what people you know when they click oh this looks good somebody holding a gun you know most most of those but that's something that they do to get people to click on that stuff because they gonna make more money you know and stuff like that but me I'm like you know what I'm gonna Separate Myself uh I just wanted to show black women in a better light I was raised by black women you know so I'm not g to have black women getting beat up slapped uh sexually assaulted you know uh depicted as strippers and dumb and just stuff like that I wanted to uplift black women and black men also you know and you can show conflict but I want to show us overcoming that conflict you know so I didn't want to get put in this box especially on tuis so yeah yeah and so you directed the film and wrote it yes sir yeah what's that like and and something I'd struggle with not being an actor how do you know when you're any good how do you how can you separate yourself and go oh that one was good and that wasn't good uh as far as the film or as far as like what I'm writing like scen I guess when you're when you're actually on set you're on location you're you've done a scene do you just go right that felt good I'm sticking with that one or do do you know I mean how do you critique yourself oh I critique myself because I'm very hard on myself people people anybody ask you that that's been on myself they know like I'm very hard on myself I'm I'm I'm the most I'm hard I'm harder on myself than I am on anybody else and cuz I expect the best from myself um it's just a feeling thing man like you know if I feel if if I've seen better from other people you know and I don't feel it in that moment I'm just like all right we'll just do another take you know I won't say it because some people can't take you know criticism or a certain uh some people just can't take criticism even if it's positive they feel like they they they'll feel offended a little bit so I just be like let's do a few let's do another take let's try it like this you know what I'm saying to kind of like let's just let's just try this way you know but it's just really a feeling thing and then when I get that feeling some people onet I'll be like God damn it that's it that's one of my things like I'm like happy I'm like okay cool that's the take you know so yeah it's just really a feeling and then as far as myself like there's one scene in the film that I'm most proud of like in my opinion my best acting um that I've ever done is one scene and I was yeah I was just really proud of myself like when I watched it like in the theaters and looking at it and it's a lot of people it got a lot of people uh I got a lot of reactions from that specific scene because of my performance in it and it really wasn't a performance because I internalized and and uh like it it was the situation that was in the scene and I had a real life situation going on I just put them together and I just let my feelings flow on camera and we got that out in one take so that must have been a good feeling um and I I agree with your point about sometimes with directing actors you can overd direct and you can over critique and sometimes if a scene doesn't work or the flow between the actors isn't quite working it doesn't actually need any changes it just needs to be done a couple more times and it some it clicks some magic happens and it it sort of just works um so back to uh you've done your short film you're now going into do a feature film how did you fund it so um a lot of I well I saved a lot of money myself and also I had help from my um my my late Aunt now um she helped me fund the film she believed in me so much so that was pretty much it it was my S and I had some assistance from my my aunt basically my mom right right and did you um when you'd finished the film how did you approach your sales and distribution did you go to Conventional Distributors did you go straight to streamers what was your what was your plan there yeah so what I did I did a lot of research man because I'm new to all of this film stuff like I'm very new so I did a lot of research I did a lot of YouTube uh like watching a lot of interviews on Distributors I joined some Facebook groups like oh protect yourself from predatory uh Distributors and stuff like that so I learned what's right and what sounds right and stuff like that and then I landed on this uh distributor called Indie wrs and uh you know I pretty much went to their site checked everything out um after watching the interviews with the lady uh she's the CEO Linda Nelson um she I was just like oh man she's I feel comfortable with them I would love to distribute with them and then I sent the email sent over my film and everything they asked for and and it just worked out they were excited you know to distribute my film and I was excited too you know so yeah it was a lot of research man right well well I think you've done well there to avoid because there are a lot of predators out there and having uh the one I've just done is my maybe seventh or eighth film and we've never had an easy ride with sales and distribution our latest film is with Indie RS as well and so far so good positive experience so you've locked out there by landing on your feet with a good one straight away um how long's the film been out uh it came out it's crazy it was the day of my aunt's funeral it came I got I had just got back I checked my email and um it was August 30th so it was pretty much it's been three months now three months a little over three months um so yeah and did she get a chance to see the film before it was finished yes yes yes we had a Premiere back in April uh April she was very excited she was in the film too so I always you know I had to I had to put her in the film and she was in my other short film too so had a little Cameo have something we'll always have forever you know so oh it's lovely and um with the film coming out how do you approach marketing how did you approach uh promoting the film so I have a Zer marketing budget me too yeah I know what that's like Yeah man so all I did was I was just like Facebook heavy Facebook had been my biggest blessing you know joining all those Facebook groups and best you know uh they have like best tuby movies we love tuby all of the groups where they watch tuby movies and stuff like that I got a lot of support from that um um I I I reached out to a lot of Tik Tok reviewers who review movies and stuff I hit them up and I got a few people I had one uh Tik Tok that blew up um about my movie it had like 500 something thousand views so that was good um but uh what else uh it did pretty it it did pretty decent on Instagram but Facebook I think Facebook I got a lot of lot of new fans on Facebook so uh yeah and right now I just got like another short trailer I'm G to start I say I got a little money saved so I'm G to do some paid advertising on social media like Instagram and uh Facebook again of course um because I I kind of know who my target audience is is is women 30 and up right my biggest audience is women 30 like late 20s to the 30s on on up that's my biggest support supporter so yeah I'm G make sure I keep doing what I can to keep them happy man keep marketing to them and um uh what was I gonna ask you so looking back on it now your film's out now if you could go back in time and sort of give yourself some advice what would you say to you just starting your project oh man um I'm trying to think of where to start uh I would say do better with um having minimal locations I had a bunch of locations we've literally filmed in like seven eight cities had I had too many locations which made me go over budget you know what I'm saying so uh I would say reducing my uh the amount of locations that I have or keeping them all like in you know within the same city same area U that helped me save some money uh communicating better um you know this I'm a firsttime filmmaker and I'm also somebody that struggles asking for help so that's that's another one right there asking for help and you know so uh I'll do better with my communication because you know I'm I'm thinking about the film I'm thinking about what what I'm gonna feed everybody so I forget to tell people oh snap oh I needed you on set today or I need did this or we're filming this scene we switched this up so I I'll do better with my communication and um you know uh just having more hands on set like taking more of a load off of me so I could focus more on my performance or focus more on uh other people's performance and talking to uh you know my cinematographer and stuff like that just just being able to think more clearly clearly and just being more of a director instead of being a I don't know sometimes I felt like a babysitter that's baby 200 people sometimes but yeah so um yeah for sure I I'll definitely go back and just like hey ask for help ask for help G there's a lot of people that want to help you you know so and stop just trying to carry this super load you know so yeah I would say those those things for those three things for sure yeah and do you so did you have a producer or were you producing everything yourself oh yeah that was me um yeah so that's that's tough that is tough because not only are you splitting yourself as a director actor having to worry about all the machinery and like you say I couldn't do that that would just completely ruin me um so yeah get get yourself a producer that'd be my advice for the next one um and then I was going to ask you some of my fun questions which would be have you got a motto have you got a mantra or anything like that uh I was just really ay uh I don't don't live with regret that's just my thing is just just go for it and don't live with regret I don't I don't want to live with regret at all so if I'm gonna do something I'mma go 100% if I'm gonna fail I'm g go 100% failing I ain't going halfway I'm I I just need to know I just need to know so hey that's one of the worst things so don't don't live a regret I'll say that I hope you enjoyed that episode if you'd like to hear from more industry professionals how they got into the business and how you can do the same or you just want to listen to some cool stories from movie sets around the world then please do subscribe to the honest filmmaker podcast [Music]
