Short Film Causing The Buzzzzzzz
by Jennifer Champagne

Take two out of your mind, fun loving and highly professional men who are tired of working their asses off in multimedia waiting for their big break to direct feature films, mix it with a great script (that they wrote), lots of talent (Mark Snow, John A. Alonzo, to name a few) and a whole lotta SWEAT, determination and calling in favors -- what do you get?

A 20-minute directorial/producing debut with a production (donated) budget of a quarter of a million dollars called The Dancing Cow.

The Background

Built-d Media is a diverse independent production company that has served as a one-stop shop for clients ranging from regional ice cream chain Foster's Freeze to Sony, Inc. Built-d founders, Taz Goldstein + Robert Moniot both write, direct, and produce, and everything else needed such as graphics design, storyboards, or music. Clients have come to expect and appreciate this "hands on" approach from the principals.

The Resume

Recent projects include: The radio campaign for Universal Picture's Jim Carrey starrer Man On The Moon; The home video trailer for Columbia/Tristar's 20th anniversary re-release of Hollywood Knights, a product reel for Fuji Film; A behind the scenes featurette for the new Columbia Film Stuart Little; A documentary fund raising reel for Center Theater Group featuring Tom Hanks, Danny Glover and Al Pacino, and the radio campaign for last summer's smash hit comedy, American Pie.

Past clients include: Columbia Pictures, Miramax Films, The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, The Seiniger Advertising Group, Sony Signatures, Variety Magazine, Sony Pictures Imageworks, Hamon & Stern Communications, The Hotel Bel Air, Showtime, Mazda, and Wild Rivers Waterparks.

That Buzzed About Project

Built-d Pictures, the company's new film division, recently wrapped production on their first short comedy, The Dancing Cow. Goldstein directed and Moniot produced this dark comedy about a young indie filmmaker who's first movie has all of Hollywood's top brass in a feeding frenzy -- the only problem is, Hollywood's been watching the wrong film. The film stars Byrne Offutt, Butch Hammett, David Finkel, and Otto Coelho.

Goldstein + Moniot decided to shoot the film after their first feature screenplay The Minor Detail - an action movie about child spies -- received a positive response from Hollywood's development community early last year. Rather than be pigeonholed as "just writers," the duo set about raising support for their first film.

The Setup

The first victory came when Oscar nominated cinematographer John A. Alonzo (Chinatown, Scarface, Norma Rae, Star Trek Generations) read the script and offered to donate his services as Director of Photography.

Producer Moniot capitalized on Alonzo's involvement and procured goods and services donations to the tune of approximately a quarter of a million dollars from companies such as Panavision, Kodak, Fuji, Sony Studios, Imageworks, Deluxe Labs, and 4MC, to name a few.

In order to manage an incredibly daunting three-day shooting schedule, Director Goldstein rehearsed his actors for weeks, and used several pre-visualization applications including Walkthrough Pro, to create complete 3D storyboards.

Once the film was shot, a rough cut was passed to Emmy nominated composer Mark Snow (The X-Files), who loved the film and offered to score it for free. Among the other finishing touches added to the film was the creation of a corporate logo for Built-d Pictures, which was shot on High Definition Video with equipment donated by Bexel. John A. Alonzo lensed for director Robert Moniot, with visual effects for the piece provided by Max Ink Café, LLC.

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