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SF/F Movie Under $5 Million?

J

Jetfire

Guest
1.) Can a good Science Fiction/Fantasy film be made under $5,000,000 now-a-days?

2.) Briefly, If you could what SF/F movies would you make?(If you had $5,000,000 to blow on your idea)

I would hope so to question 1. and 2. I would love to do some sort of original Superhero movie or Time Travel story.
 
Moon was made for $5 million. Best science-fiction movie in a while. Primer was made for something like $7,000 and that was pretty sharp.
 
^
I heard alot of good stuff about Moon I need to check it out.

[edit] Just saw the trailer for it, looks interesting. :techman:
 
Primer was an excellent sci-fi movie, and a very low budget only $7000.00

A must see...
 
I forgot the name of it, but there is a film on youtube about giant robots and planes attacking a cioty. It was made for 300 bucks. Now the director has been given a chance to reshoot it with a huge budget. Saw a clip on CNN and it looks impressive.
 
You could make a sci-fi film for any amount of money and it could be good - though the less money, the more restricted you are in the kind of story you want to tell. It'd also be far more dependent on the performances of your leads and the strength of the idea. I mean, Stalker is basically a sci-fi film with three guys wandering around some grimy environs, there's no high tech doodads or alien monsters at all. So yeah, can be done.

I forgot the name of it, but there is a film on youtube about giant robots and planes attacking a cioty. It was made for 300 bucks. Now the director has been given a chance to reshoot it with a huge budget. Saw a clip on CNN and it looks impressive.
That's similar to what happened with Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and District 9, both of which were based on much cheaper shorts by the director.

As for Panic Attack, (link to short), well, it could be the next District 9 - or it could be a low-budget Transformers. The guy has honestly a better handle on keeping the action from the viewpoint of the humans while it remains comprehensible, unlike Transformers... and here's hoping the final film is still set in Uruguay because as a stomping ground the USA is a little overused.
 
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I forgot the name of it, but there is a film on youtube about giant robots and planes attacking a cioty. It was made for 300 bucks.
Damn this guy's team has talent! It looks great.
I really like the sunlight lighting on the rendering of the robots & buildings and the nice use of atmospheric effects in the start with the fog & the kid by the bridge. I skimmed most of it as the length and volume level of the music made the first 1/3 feel like a music video.

With all the handheld cinematography all that motion tracking was done really well for the CGI model integration.

and the big explosion...low budget CG fire is getting really good these days at mimicing what can be captured on analog motion picture film. Looks more like film and less like a PS3 videogame digital CG explosion.

The sound design wasn't overdone either.

Good work.
 
With $5mill, I'd make Clarke County, Space by Allen Steele. You'd only need to CGI the sky and a missle traversing space.
 
Moon only cost $5 million? I haven't seen it but the previews look good. The Stargate DVD movies cost $7 million and for the life of me I have no clue why.
 
I also wanna hear what movie you would make with $5,000,000 in hand???

:)
 
You could make a sci-fi film for any amount of money and it could be good - though the less money, the more restricted you are in the kind of story you want to tell. It'd also be far more dependent on the performances of your leads and the strength of the idea. I mean, Stalker is basically a sci-fi film with three guys wandering around some grimy environs, there's no high tech doodads or alien monsters at all. So yeah, can be done.

I love Stalker, but was it so cheap? I seem to recall that the director went through the entire process of production three times.

Still, it's basically three guys in the forest and an abandoned factory (no wonder everyone involved with the production died, considering the state of the place and how much time was spent there!).

Primer had a production budget of $7,000, but like the similarily budgeted El Mariachi, you can bet that blowing it up to a 35mm print and fixing the sound for that setting cost 1-2 more million dollars. Still, less than five million dollars.

I don't know how Moon was completed for so cheap, but it looks incredible for five million dollars.
 
I'm pretty sure Ascension was made for under 5 mil, as was Pi, Cube, The Man From Earth, many others.
 
I love Stalker, but was it so cheap? I seem to recall that the director went through the entire process of production three times.
Nope. Which is why I didn't bring it up in the other thread.

However, how expensive would the end result of the film be? Not factoring in the production of sets that wound up never seen and so on. My point is you can hypothetically make a good sci-fi movie with nothing but three actors wandering around a nearby location shoot.

I don't know how Moon was completed for so cheap, but it looks incredible for five million dollars.
I don't understand either. If I had to guess I would have assumed it had a reasonable budget, the effects work is very nice and the sets are great. That film is just an achievement, end story.
 
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