Hollywood vs. tech: The young talent Bono will stymie
A young film-maker from Dallas went to the Sundance festival this year and won the Grand Jury Prize for the best drama by writing, directing and acting in his own film. Shane Carruth edited the 16-millimeter film digitally on a home computer. Meanwhile other film-makers were shooting digitally to begin with. In fact, this year almost half the film-makers at Sundance used digital video cameras to shoot films, far more than the 12 percent of three years ago. They enjoyed good technical quality at a fraction of previous costs.
So what does this mean in the context of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act? Plenty.
Imagine all the adaptations that could be made from modern classic novels, or obscure works whose owners now can’t be located, if Bono did not exist and young film-makers didn’t have to worry about royalties paid to heirs and megaconglomerates–as opposed to living writers. While Carruth wrote script from scratch, Hollywood has a long and honorable tradition of adaptations from novels, and the new technology could reinvigorate it. What’s more, young film-makers could use digital editing techniques inexpensively to create films from old archives. Furthermore, film-makers could use digital editing techniques inexpensively to create films from old archives.
In fact, the time may even come when scenes and actors could be created digitally at next to no cost–a prospect that scares old men like Jack Valenti and the rest of the Hollywood establishment, but excites those more comfortable with the new technology.
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