10 Ways You're Thinking About The Movie Industry All Wrong

2. Directorial Freedom

What You Think: That film up on screen right now is the vision of the director. You can sit in a movie and immediately know if it's Tim Burton, Christopher Nolan or Quentin Tarantino film and many of their contemporaries have enough tics shine though that you know it's them behind camera. Heck, Michael Bay's films feel like Michael Bay. If that isn't morbid proof that directors, when they reach a certain point, can do whatever they want, we don't know what is. The Truth: All that is rubbish. Not only is film-making an innately collaborative process, requiring legions of skilled professionals to get the editing, lighting and catering just right, but so often the director doesn't even have control over those guys. There's an obscene amount of money in movies that studios are keen to keep close tabs on their investment. And if that involves taking over a little (or a lot), so be it. It's not inherently bad - Marvel is an example of where producers are as creatively-involved as the directors are - but it reveals big movies as the questionable artistic pieces they are. Even when you have a director with a unique voice given 'directorial freedom' on a project, they still have to answer to studio demands; make your film a suitable length, make your film have this age rating etc. The ones who really succeed are the ones who know which hoops to jump through.