I was surprised by the question, not because I hadn’t thought of it myself, but because of who it came from. A filmmaker. A person who puts his lifeblood into creating his magnum opus.

What do we do when a film we’re featuring sucks?

After all, we are committed to promoting indigenous cinema. In that spirit, how can we honestly trash the work of someone who may be inexperienced, overextended, and lastly, is under funded—requiring him or her to write the scripts, edit the film, cast the actors—the entire process?

We aren’t Roger Ebert. And God help us, Gene Shalit (he’s still around somewhere, isn’t he?) Reviewers who deem themselves the prima authority on any art form are a tedious lot. Yeah, I read their stuff; but there’s something altogether arrogant about a person who dissects the lifeblood of someone else when we all know there is no way in hell they have the nachas or the talent to do it themselves. That being said, those of us who’ve wolfed down far too many tubs of sickly, slippery popcorn know something about movies—so how we react and what we enjoy certainly counts.

It’s not a question of money. It’s not a question of experience, which, to be fair, should always be considered. It’s a question of seriousness: we don’t want to bother with ersatz filmmakers who haven’t taken the time to learn to operate a camera or create salient dialogue. If a director’s lazy, it shows. Thankfully, the vast majority of those we’ve come across have demonstrated a passion for what they are doing. It shows.

Look at it another way. Is it realistic to compare what we’re doing at NativeVue to Newsweek, The New York Times, even People? (mmmm…scratch People. We don’t want to be compared to them.) It’s not about “quality,” because I firmly believe that some of the most inspired, innovative work in film and in communications is not being developed by Hollywood and old media. Even so, there is no way no how a low-budget enterprise, whether it be an internet magazine or indie filmmaker, can create the glitzy, never spontaneous, smooth-around-the-corners product a mega-billion conglomerate can. Johnny Tootall ain’t Pirates of the Carribean. That’s a good thing.

Indie filmmaking is grass-roots baby; dirt between your nails and all. It’s not the cleanest process for sure…but when the seeds grow and blossom. That’s a good thing.

Like The Doe Boy. From Cherry English. Sleepdancer. The Winter Chill.

Consider us fortunate. Only a few stinko productions by ersatz filmmakers have slipped under our keyboard. Oh, but rest assured a few gaseous McMovies by the Hollywood assembly lines have and you bet we’ll skewer their princely asses aplenty. And hope they get out of the way to make room for the little guy with the talent and the dream and the sparse bank account.

Who, by the way, makes a pretty ‘durn good movie.