Marie Cantin, the producer of a broad range of mainstream and independent films, talks about emerging filmmaking technology, the eternal wrestling match between art and commerce, and her experiences producing Masked and Anonymous. The interview was conducted by Lee Purcell.

The inescapable business aspects of making a movie influence every stage of the process, but in the best of productions the art soars above the practical concerns and creative harmony upstages dour bookkeeping. Such was the case during the production of Masked and Anonymous, a movie with a stellar cast and seasoned production team that married emerging technology with a spirited, playful approach to moviemaking. Relying strongly on digital production techniques, Masked and Anonymous screened at Sundance as a digitally projected Microsoft Windows Media format file.

Marie Cantin, who served as both Executive Producer and Unit Production Manager during an intense 23-day shooting schedule, admits to feeling privileged to be involved in the project, which featured Larry Charles' directing, the music and acting presence of Bob Dylan, and a rich stable of cast members, including John Goodman, Jessica Lange, Jeff Bridges, Penélope Cruz, Luke Wilson, and others. In the question and answer session following the Sundance screening, Larry Charles said that he shot the movie almost the way you would coach a football game. Working with a series of plays, the team would call a play in the huddle and then they would go out with a series of cameras and shoot all the intersecting moments. In the midst of the talent and turmoil, Marie helped chart a steady course through the film's production, attending to the complex production details while contributing to the creative energy and the collaborative atmosphere.

With a production track record spanning nearly two decades, Marie Cantin professes a love for quirky films and her production credits include such diverse works as The Waterdance [1992], Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead [1995], The Book of Stars [2001], and Collateral [2004]. She is actively involved in teaching filmmaking techniques at the university level and often participates in seminars throughout the world to share her experiences and perspective on the film industry. Fresh from a presentation at a producer workshop co-sponsored by the Motion Picture Association and the U.S. Embassy (among others) in Mexico City, Marie offered her views and insights on a number of topics relevant to independent filmmaking.

Do you see technology as a liberating force for filmmakers?

This is one perspective of independent filmmaking we brought from the U.S. to the seminar in Mexico City„not necessarily at the level of the nuts and bolts, but more the creative and technical approach we use towards financing and making films. From my limited experience„having touched on some newer technologies recently„my feeling is that these technologies are tools. The creative issues are the ones that drive your technical decisions. If the technical decisions predominate, it changes the work. This is OK, but you have to understand the relationship between the two.

My feeling is that new technologies can open creative doors, especially if they are utilized in innovative ways that suit the technology itself.

Is it fair to say that with the new technologies, including DVD and digital production techniques, there are new markets emerging that better support more narrow, more specialized types of films?

I would hope so. Financing independent films is not easy, but I think the distribution mechanisms are even more difficult to fathom. I don't think there are as many venues available, at least theatrically, for releasing independent films as there have been in the past. It is kind of a closed system. So how do you utilize what is available to get people to see your work? And, how do you open up your mind and think outside the box in terms of what is a meaningful method of distributing work that you have done.

The theatrical release is a Tiffany business. But the truth is, more people will probably see your independent film if it airs on cable television. The documentary that Robert Greenwald released on DVD last year, Outfoxed , has been distributed successfully on the Internet. You have access to a much bigger audience. What interests me about the technology is, in fact, the doors that it opens. I just know that we are on the edges of seeing that the traditional methodology [targeting theatrical release] may not be something that is the most profitable or beneficial to the filmmaker.

Can you offer any other examples of alternate methods of distribution for independent films?

I produced a film called The Book of Stars that did not get a theatrical distribution. It has been on cable and it has also been available on VHS and DVD. Someone had seen The Book of Stars at a film festival and approached us. The director went to the distributor and worked out an agreement so the film became the pick of the month for Spiritual Cinema Circle. The Spiritual Cinema Circle is a membership organization that offers its members a monthly movie package featuring projects with themes that inspire personal growth and change. The organization licenses feature films, documentaries and shorts which are duplicated on a DVD and sent to each member in the mail. They even include some organic popcorn! This kind of direct-to-consumer distribution is possible primarily because DVD replication is affordable. I also think that identifying and targeting sub-cultures is a useful model in creating niche markets for alternate methods of distribution.

What were the major challenges of producing Masked and Anonymous?

Larry Charles, Bob Dylan and the producers Nigel Sinclair and Jeff Rosen had been working for almost two years on the project by the time I got involved. They had spent several months trying to patch together the financing, but their windows for mounting the production kept opening and closing. Finally, there was one open window. If they missed the window, everyone knew production would be delayed until the next break in Bob Dylan's touring schedule.

I hooked up with Larry and the producers once they knew that Bob Dylan was available on a specific date for exactly one month. It was immutable. We had to be shooting by that date, which was ten weeks away.

Larry Charles had been working on Curb Your Enthusiasm and had directed several episodes. He was comfortable with the two-camera, 24p format and wanted to utilize a similar kind of approach to Masked and Anonymous . Once I got a sense of what he wanted to do, we had a creative strategy that was driven by the material, which then dictated the technology. In Larry's mind, the script that he was working with had two parallel realities. One was the post apocalyptic generic urban environment that he wanted to shoot with one sort of style and then there was the stage environment, where the characters convened and where the concert pieces of the film happened. They were completely different realities. We wanted the interior stage environment to look very different from the outside world. The outside world wanted to be uncontrolled but the stage world wanted to very controlled. So Larry had this idea that we would shoot all the exteriors with digital video and all the stage scenes with Hi-Def. Using two formats would give the movie the two distinct ñlooksî that he wanted.

We shot the film in 23 days with a huge cast. We knew we would have to move quickly, so the whole digital video idea was really great. Larry said, ñLook, I don't want to make pretty pictures. That's not the intention.î The intention was to try to give it this raw feeling and work with the actors in a more theatrical way where we could stage really long sequences, string scenes together rather than chop them up in a more traditional way. Rather than breaking a scene up into pieces, we would shoot multiple cameras and run scenes one into the other. We could go from exteriors to interiors without cutting and just keep the flow going, so that we could let the actors stage it like a play and run these long monologues without a break.

This was one of the ways that we attracted the cast. They were very interested in working this way. We were trying to structure a production around an aesthetic that suited the material. This aesthetic would also provide a methodology for working„both for people in front of and behind the camera„that was really unique. I think that was something that attracted everyone involved in the project„the crew, the actors , and everybody.

Do you have any advice for independent filmmakers working with the newer technologies?

The first thing you have to determine when you're working with alternative technology is to decide what your end product will be. Once you decide you work backwards from the end. In a traditional film shoot, you start at the beginning and you rent a camera and you carry the process out through post-production, step-by-step until you end up with a film print.

When you work in digital formats you don't want post-production to inherit problems that were created in production because this can be very expensive. So it's important to assess you post-production needs very early in the digital filmmaking process.

With Masked and Anonymous , we knew that we would end up with a film print at the end. Given that, we did a lot of tests, all the way through the film output stages, including the answerprint and the IP. Because we wanted to see what the footage would look like when it was projected on film in a movie theater. We started looking at the digital video and realized that we had a conundrum over NTSC versus PAL. Obviously, for a blow-up, PAL would look better. When you consider PAL at 25 frames and Hi-Def video at 24 frames, right there you have a problem. Since we were recording Bob Dylan and his band live, 24-track, we decided to shoot the concert footage 24p, because it would synch frame-for-frame. But if we were also shooting PAL at 25 fps for the digital video portion, we would have to slip sync somewhere along the way. The sound people noted that some pitch correction would have to be made and, although it might not be noticeable to most people, if we were pitch correcting the music, we knew Bob would notice. That's why we decided to stick with one format.

We ended up shooting the whole project in Hi-Def 24p with the exception of some of the flashbacks that were done on mini-DV. Some of those DV sequences were shown through surveillance monitors and such.

What was your day-to-day work like on Masked and Anonymous?

In the case of Masked and Anonymous , it was the kind of situation that I really love. When we were in pre-production, I had my staff supporting me and taking care of the day-to-day nuts and bolts while I worked one-on-one with Larry, Nigel, Jeff, and the entire creative team.

Because it was a low-budget movie where my relationship to the creative forces behind it was very close, it allowed me to participate at a level that I enjoy, which is to navigate the maelstrom between art and commerce. I help people make their decisions based on the practical information, which is what informs my point of view. This makes me feel like I'm an integral part of the filmmaking process – offering a perspective that helps drive the creative decisions.

In terms of my day to day work on Masked and Anonymous , it would run the gamut from talking to agents to hiring crew to signing checks. Sometimes I would be involved in scheduling. Like figuring out how to accommodate Actress A (who had to be in London on certain dates) so she could be available when we needed her. I would also spend time with the camera people trying to figure out how to approach some of our technical problems. Overall, though, I would say that oversight for the budget and the shooting schedule is my primary responsibility.

So, it seems with this film in particular there some freedom to work in more creative directions?

Directors and producers have many different working styles. And movie budgets are all over the map. Some are independents and some are studio films. The requirements of each project determine how I work. The job that I do is a response to what the movie is – in terms of how it is going to be made. That involves not only creative and financial choices, but also the working style of the people who are basically in charge (the studio , or the financial entities, the producer and the director). I have to figure out very early in the process exactly where I fit in and how to plug in to the production mechanism in the most effective way possible, doing the things that I know how to do that maybe nobody else is doing.

What projects are currently in the works?

Michael Miner (who directed The Book of Stars ) and I are producing ïTill Niagara Falls , written by Katerie Morin. It's based on the true story of Annie Edson Taylor, a widow who celebrated her 50 th birthday on October 23, 1901 by successfully going over the Falls in a barrel she designed herself.

I'm also working on Push To Open with writer/director Gilberto Gazcon Fazi. Set in Reno, it's a redemption story about a father who sacrifices his life in order to give his teenaged daughter a second chance. Fazi is an award-winning filmmaker from Mexico City who received his MFA from the American Film Institute.

Finally, The Beggar's Waltz , which was written by Jay Floyd, tells the story of Lance, an ambitious farm boy, and Chrissy, a wealthy socialite, whose illusions of happiness are mirrored by the rituals of social class. Set in contemporary Greensboro, North Carolina, the story portrays a world where Tennessee Williams meets Magic Realism.

Any thoughts on the future of movies?

I'm not a futurist by any stretch of the imagination, but when you look at how everybody can make movies so cheaply and how it's getting so easy to view them, you wonder what the next step is. Plugging in your brain? You stick your finger in a portal and suddenly your dreams become movies for someone else's viewing enjoyment. Who knows?

Lee Purcell writes, runs an electronic publishing company ( www.lightspeedpub.com ), and rides motorcycles around the winding back roads of Vermont.