Flicks - You are there!

Back in the day, when movies were brand new, bare knees were scandalous and Coke was made with, well, coke, many early patrons of the medium were as intrigued by the hardware as by the software. The marvel of the machines themselves and the manipulations of the artists and technicians who operated them so fascinated filmgoers that in some places, the audience would be seated so as to take in both the projector (in profile) and the oblique image it cast on the screen. Knees don't shock us anymore, and Coca-Cola has removed the addictive narcotics from its brew, but the public's preoccupation with the process of making movies continues unabated. Hollywood and the indie community keep churning out film after film about film, from The Player to Bowfinger, and if all the director/producer/gaffer commentaries augmenting DVDs and the dizzying proliferation of "Makings of" and "True Hollywood Stories" and "Behind the Scenes" programs cropping up on cable are any indication, we are keener than ever to see how our cinema gets from the cranium to the can.

Now, one Atlanta indie is using new technology and this perennial preoccupation to give a big boost to Losing Grace, his debut feature. "It seemed to fit," says writer/director Michael Valverde, whose first feature production is being chronicled daily online. While Valverde and co. have been busy shooting the contemporary drama about two brothers coping with the death of a beloved sister, a crew of DV cameramen have been recording Grace's ups and downs and dishing them up in a series of impromptu interviews and unrehearsed, on-set "webisodes." "I don't think most people realize how many people it takes to make an independent feature film. It creates a real community — like summer camp with a lot more work. No one has really captured that," he says.

In addition to providing browsers with an almost as-it-happens peek at the production, Valverde is also using the Internet to connect directly with potential fans and consumers. The film's content-rich website, www.losinggrace.com, hosts interactive chats and opportunities to e-mail the crew and cast, which includes some mainstream middleweights including Lesley Ann Warren (Victor/Victoria, Clue) and Ronny Cox (Total Recall, Robocop) backed by a bevy of local talents.

Valverde hopes the strong web-presence will give the semi-autobiographical Grace a leg-up when the million-dollar, 35mm feature faces the often brutal competition found on the festival and film market circuits. He also hopes his tell-all technique will build a foundation for future undertakings. "We are developing a community," he says. "We'll be able to have a ready-made audience — [and] be able to use that audience to test-market projects. If people respond positively to something, we can go ahead. If not, we put it on the back-burner or re-package it."

The strategy seems to be working. The site gets about 7,800 hits a day. Many a commercial locus would have cause to envy losinggrace.com. Presented with such a candid camera cornucopia, visitors to the site are hanging around for an average of 45 minutes a go.

But there is another fusion of high-tech and high-concept at work even further behind the scenes of this behind-the-scenes buzz-builder. The folks behind Losing Grace looked to digital revolutionaries not only for innovative marketing tools, but as a route to independent cinema's rarest resource: capital. Valverde's Green Valley Entertainment teamed up with an Atlanta-based technology incubator, Incumaker Services, for technical and financial support for the project.

Valverde believes that the booming e-conomy will become a vital wellspring for filmmakers in the 21st century, both in terms of financing films and finding an audience for them. "A little education of our investment community and business leaders can show them that there are good opportunities in independent film ... we think that small pictures, with budgets under $2 million offer the least amount of risk and the greatest potential rewards."

With emerging media conduits like broadband opening new paths to consumers, the future for low-budget, local productions could be rosy. "There's a big case for supporting indigenous filmmakers in Georgia," says Valverde, who already has two more projects in the works, both of which, like Grace, will be Atlanta-L.A. hybrids to be documented on the Web. "Technology and entertainment are on a path of convergence, and someone is going to be able to take that to the bank when that convergence takes place. We wanna be the ones on that edge."

Those interested in seeing independent filmmaking up close and personal can peruse current and past "webisodes" from the production can check out www.losinggrace.com. For those of us still living in the kilobaud dark ages, Valverde promises that the best of the best of the behind-the-scenes scenes will be compiled for video or broadcast release. Hey, if everything pans out, we may even get to see the movie.