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The World's Best Film School Is Free on YouTube

127 points by victorvation 9y ago

josephpmay 9y ago
Great article, but misleading title. These YouTube videos do a good job of teaching armatures (like myself) small details of movie making, but they don’t come close to a film school education (which itself is far away from getting experience making films and working under world-class movie makers)
- mentos 9y ago
  Yea I feel like a lot of these break downs of film overanalyze and make too cerebral the art of movies.. For example when Sam Mendes was filming American Beauty he said he did not realize the film he was making until they got into the editing room. From all of the youtube movie break downs you would believe that everything was intentional and deliberate and you should already know the movie you are going to make out of the gate instead of discovering and pivoting along the way
- stevewillows 9y ago
  For those interested in going deeper, MIT has 'The Film Experience' online and available for download from the Internet Archive [2]. edit: I should also give a shout out to The Story of Film: An Odyssey -- which is an excellent long-form timeline that connects some of the most important films of all time. Definitely worth a watch. [1] https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/literature/21l-011-the-film-experience-fall-2013 https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/literature/21l-011-the-film-expe... [2] https://archive.org/details/MIT21L.011F13 https://archive.org/details/MIT21L.011F13 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Film:_An_Odyssey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Film:_An_Odyssey
l33tbro 9y ago
While the fast paced editing and tone of these videos are good at seducing the layperson into the looking under the hood of a popular film, they rarely venture beyond the last 30 years of Hollywood film-making. I'd argue that videos like these could actually be kind of destructive to this new generation of 'content creators', as the narrow and populist gamut of films covered may give the impression that Darren Aronofsky created the jump cut and David Fincher was the first to use low-key lighting. That's perfectly fine for the casual hobbyist who just wants to make their Youtube videos better, but most great cinema is part of a dialogue with film history and you really need to dive a bit deeper and develop a personal relationship with the classics of the form.
ralfd 9y ago
> As of December, Every Frame a Painting is no longer. Ramos and Zhou got busy with other work, and couldn't figure out how to keep doing what they wanted within the confines of both their channel and YouTube's systems. Noooooooo!
ottomanbob 9y ago
Just rushed my way through a BFA from NYU Film. Got more valuable theory and guidance in my thinking from YouTube than most classes. But learning to light a scene on 35mm and other nuanced technical work requires detailed hands on instruction. College also helped me grow thicker skin and a healthy cynicism. That's about it.
- 1337biz 9y ago
  Any other channels on YouTube you can recommend?
- sureaboutthis 9y ago
  Maybe cause you rushed through your classes.
thanatropism 9y ago
Watch out for the film Lumière, which is reaching theaters worldwide. It's actually a commented compilation of 108 original reels by the Lumière brothers, but as an experience is so, so good.

127 points by victorvation 9y ago

Great article, but misleading title. These YouTube videos do a good job of teaching armatures (like myself) small details of movie making, but they don’t come close to a film school education (which itself is far away from getting experience making films and working under world-class movie makers)

mentos 9y ago
Yea I feel like a lot of these break downs of film overanalyze and make too cerebral the art of movies.. For example when Sam Mendes was filming American Beauty he said he did not realize the film he was making until they got into the editing room. From all of the youtube movie break downs you would believe that everything was intentional and deliberate and you should already know the movie you are going to make out of the gate instead of discovering and pivoting along the way
stevewillows 9y ago
For those interested in going deeper, MIT has 'The Film Experience' online and available for download from the Internet Archive [2]. edit: I should also give a shout out to The Story of Film: An Odyssey -- which is an excellent long-form timeline that connects some of the most important films of all time. Definitely worth a watch. [1] https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/literature/21l-011-the-film-experience-fall-2013 https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/literature/21l-011-the-film-expe... [2] https://archive.org/details/MIT21L.011F13 https://archive.org/details/MIT21L.011F13 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Film:_An_Odyssey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Film:_An_Odyssey

l33tbro 9y ago

While the fast paced editing and tone of these videos are good at seducing the layperson into the looking under the hood of a popular film, they rarely venture beyond the last 30 years of Hollywood film-making. I'd argue that videos like these could actually be kind of destructive to this new generation of 'content creators', as the narrow and populist gamut of films covered may give the impression that Darren Aronofsky created the jump cut and David Fincher was the first to use low-key lighting. That's perfectly fine for the casual hobbyist who just wants to make their Youtube videos better, but most great cinema is part of a dialogue with film history and you really need to dive a bit deeper and develop a personal relationship with the classics of the form.

ralfd 9y ago

> As of December, Every Frame a Painting is no longer. Ramos and Zhou got busy with other work, and couldn't figure out how to keep doing what they wanted within the confines of both their channel and YouTube's systems. Noooooooo!

ottomanbob 9y ago

Just rushed my way through a BFA from NYU Film. Got more valuable theory and guidance in my thinking from YouTube than most classes. But learning to light a scene on 35mm and other nuanced technical work requires detailed hands on instruction. College also helped me grow thicker skin and a healthy cynicism. That's about it.

1337biz 9y ago
Any other channels on YouTube you can recommend?
sureaboutthis 9y ago
Maybe cause you rushed through your classes.

thanatropism 9y ago

Watch out for the film Lumière, which is reaching theaters worldwide. It's actually a commented compilation of 108 original reels by the Lumière brothers, but as an experience is so, so good.