USC and the NY Times

A big article in the NY Times about film school. I thought this article was going to make me angry, but I actually agree with a lot of it. The school, as a whole, is a trade school. The deceiving part is that it markets itself as a school for auteurs, but then quickly changes face when you get here.

Waxman, of course, gets a whole lot of facts wrong - about the specifics of our class assignments, the cost per year of tuition, and the most egregious, calling Walter Murch a cinematographer. How stupid is that?

I just wish Mrs. Waxman had come to our Night at the Movies screening to see some really good work. I think it is an intellectual travesty that she neglects the changes digital video can bring to our education. We all whine about the high cost of shooting film, yet we have the answer right in front of us - digital video. It's cheap, it looks good. We haven't even explored the limits of DV because we still use the the PD-150. The Panasonic 24P is good, but limited with lens choice. The school doesn't even own a Canon XL2 and who knows what can be done with it's 24P combined with the ability to change lenses - which is the big secret to the film "look," I think.

And on and on we go...