The No Film School Podcast

Have you ever played a video game or watched a movie and wondered where did all these sounds come from? Well, it's not all sound libraries and foley stages. Sometimes, projects will hire a person whose sole responsibility is to go out into the world and get fresh sounds. Gunshots, cannons, engines, you name it, their job is to go out and find it and bring it back to be mixed in. Watson Wu is one o...

This week: Christopher Nolan and Steven Soderbergh both weigh in on Warner Bros’ decision to send their entire slate to HBO Max, while Mank harkens back to the yesteryear of studio filmmaking. In Tech News, Apple offers expensive monitors and stands; Charles offers his opinions. And for Ask No Film School we tackle a simple question that is never easy to answer: how does a screenwriter get an agen...

This week on the No Film School Podcast: a COVID testing site gets shut down to make way for a Hollywood film shoot, while The Crown takes liberties fictionalizing historical events and the public must be warned accordingly. We also discuss why the New York Times’ “Greatest Actors of the 21st Century" list is somewhat problematic by nature... and let’s be honest, a bit too early to call? In Tech N...

If anyone on this planet is a natural born cinematographer, it might just be Chris Menges. His earthiness and pragmatism combined with his uncanny, innate sensibility for the moving image are what makes his films special: Kes, The Killing Fields and The Mission, to name just a few. If you haven’t seen them, then trust us that they are among the most beautiful movies ever made. Chris Menges has see...

Luke Greenfield was a young boy with big dreams who wanted to make movies just like his hero Steven Spielberg. His concerned mother writes an impassioned letter to the big man himself, and Mr. Spielberg responded with an encouraging letter. Two decades later, Greenfield grows up to direct The Girl Next Door and guess who's a major fan? Greenfield's story is a heartwarming one, but it's not without...

The Climb is one of the biggest indie breakouts of 2020. The debut feature from filmmaking-and-acting duo Michael Angelo Covino and Kyle Marvin played every major film festival you can think of before finally hitting theaters this holiday season. Michael and Kyle sit down with NFS founder Ryan Koo to talk about how they pulled off a buddy comedy made up entirely of long oners; the underutilized po...

What does the new deal struck between Cinemark and Universal mean for the industry? How can movie-goers support theaters while they are closed? Also, this just in: Quentin Tarantino writes books (including a novelization of Once Upon A Time in Hollywood)?? In Tech News, we share our hands-on experience with the new Apple Silicon. For Ask No Film School: what is the best entry-level cinema camera t...

Phedon Papamichael's career as a cinematographer goes back to the 80's, but he's still a go-to DP for the best filmmakers in the business. You might call him an “actor’s cinematographer” or a stylistic chameleon. Phedon talks about his approach to the craft: rather than trying to put his visual stamp on a movie, his goal is to serve the story and overall vision. He compares his experiences working...

Though her most recent triumph is the highly-praised Netflix miniseries The Queen's Gambit, Michelle Tesoro has built a career working with A-list showrunners and directors, within both film and television. From mastering the art of the dialog scene with the HBO series In Treatment, to her collaborations with luminaries like Michael Mann, David Fincher, Ava DuVernay, Mimi Leder and David Milch, sh...

Eric Roth spent much of this year doing significant rewrites to the script of the upcoming Martin Scorsese film, Killers of the Flower Moon. The biggest notes came from co-star Leonardo DiCaprio. On this week's NoFilmSchool, we talk about why the actor chose to play a different role in the movie and is taking the story in a slightly different direction. For Tech News, we give you the lowdown on a...

After serving as a second unit director of photography on movies like The Matrix Trilogy and Dark City, Ross Emery was tapped to be one of the key cinematographers on the new series Raised By Wolves, where he got to work with one of his all-time film heroes: Ridley Scott. In fact, it was Scott's 1982 classic Blade Runner that made Emery fall in love with movies as visual art. Emery regales us with...

Producer/star Malin Akerman has had a wide-ranging career, having worked with everyone from the Farrelly Brothers to Zack Snyder on the largest scale projects as well as smaller indies. Recently she made the leap into producing her own films. Malin talks about what she looks for in a screenplay, and how finding that “third door” helps you break into the industry. She also explains the trials, chal...

On this week's No Film School Podcast, Charles Haine and George Edelman gaze into their crystal ball once again and speculate how the new wave of coronavirus might affect set life. We also offer a trifecta of Tech News updates: a Sony drone, Teradek's autofocus system for cinema lenses and DaVinci Resolve 17's many perks and innovations. In honor of Veteran’s Day, we give you our favorite Deep Cut...

Kami Asgar and Jessica Parks are post-production heavyweights who work with major studios, namely Sony. As a sound designer (Asgar) and as a post executive (Parks), their collective resume touches on everything from Apocalypto to Grandma's Boy to Venom. Parks has recently shifted her focus from supervisor to hands-on sound design, and we talk about how it’s never too late to pivot on your career p...

It’s the 20th anniversary of Requiem for a Dream and Matthew Libatique is here to tell us the whole story. Starting in early days at AFI doing student projects with Darren Aronofsky, on to the $30,000 "stunt" known as Pi, this great DP/director collaboration was born. Libatique talks at length about the impact of music and music videos on his filmmaking approach, influencing key creative choices i...

This week, joined once again by Oakley Anderson-Moore, we unpack the powerful, complicated legacy of the late Sean Connery. We also pick apart America’s political landscape in light of the obscure, inconsequential election taking place. We discuss what responsibilities we have as content creators who shape the national conversation. In Tech News, a deep dive into Blackmagic and their newly-release...

Glen Keane animated lead characters in Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, Pocahontas and many other classic Disney characters as he became a master of his craft. With his signature enthusiasm and optimism, Keane tells us the story of how this background led him to eventually directing his first feature film for Netflix: the heartwarming Over the Moon. Of course Keane had already become a di...

This week we take a very, very biased look at Shushgate perpetrator Jeffrey Katzenberg's fallen streaming platform Quibi and why this failure was perhaps an inevitability. Also, as the new Borat Subsequent Moviefilm is released, we examine how much our culture has changed since the first Borat and Netflix drops streaming and viewership data. For Tech News, Hollyland unveils its new wireless video...

In this informative, fascinating episode, we sit down with cinematographer Michael Watson to discuss his work on HBO’s genre-bending horror series Lovecraft Country. Watson details his process: finding the tone of a show that is both pulpy and thematically driven and getting on the same page with the entire HBO team. We also get into the nitty-gritty of on-set challenges as a television DP during...

Facing failure isn't scary. In fact, it might be exactly what you need. The ever-inspiring Jim Cummings joins us once again to discuss his new horror/comedy The Wolf of Snow Hollow, just in time for Halloween. As with his (proper) debut feature Thunder Road, Cummings writes, directs and stars. He tells us about the beauty of having a democratized film set, even on a production as large as Snow Hol...

This week on the No Film School Podcast, AMC follows Alamo Drafthouse's lead, letting consumers rent out their theaters for a low price -- and why this may be a sign of what the post-pandemic world will look like. For Tech News, a double whammy: Apple releases it's innovative, filmmaker-friendly iPhone 12 and DJI steps up it's gimbal game. And for this week's Ask No Film School, we discuss how a g...

Here to celebrate the 35th Anniversary 4K Blu-Ray release of the beloved Back to the Future trilogy is its writer and producer Bob Gale. He gives us his own origin story including his years of collaborating with Robert Zemeckis which led up to their big hit. He highlights the integrity of executive producer Steven Spielberg, who made Back to the Future the first Amblin production. Bob Gale has bee...

On this week's podcast, joined once again by Oakley Anderson-Moore, we discuss how the rise of streaming not only impacts how films are distributed, but how they're made as well. We also take on the egregious pay disparity between men and women in the industry, including the example of the writers for the Crazy Rich Asians sequel. For Tech News, Charles praises the innovative new Sachtler Activ tr...

Director Max Barbakow and writer Andy Siara tell us how their therapeutic writing process and friendship made Palm Springs what it is, and was ultimately the most rewarding part of the process. And why the fact that no one gave a sh*t about them was, in a way, their greatest strength. In case you've been living in a time-loop cave, Palm Springs, starring Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti, came out...

This week Oakley Anderson-Moore joins the podcast as we discuss who edited that strange video from Walter Reed and why they don't know how to use a morph cut. Since it's election season, we also cover a "get out the vote" contest from M Night Shayamalan. We also dive into a certain tactic used in development to take advantage of screenwriters. Plus the closing of UK's Cineworld theaters, the mirac...