Throughout my tenure at columbia's doc program I was constantly interested in being involved with an internship at Kartemquin films. They are the makers of Hoop Dreams recently rated the best documentary of all time by Documentary magazine. I applied twice over 2 different years and even had what I thought was a great interview and didnt get in. I even had a former interns reference and another pro filmmakers name in my references. Last fall I decided I would try once again to secure a position for the spring and after an interview where I stumbled over my own thoughts and was caught off guard with questions about stem cell research I thought, well- at least I tried. A few weeks passed and I got the email saying that had accepted my application with out any references.
I've been interning for 16 hours every week on thursday and friday at Kartemquins apartment building located off Damon and Diversey. I have to say it has been a very rewarding experience. There have been a few days were I was transcribing footage for the whole day but I knew that would come along with the internship. In the process of being there since January I have met and have great casual and professional conversations with directors, editors, producers, sound experts, tech guys who are all a room away for whatever questions I have. I do a lot of mailing, research for film festivals, production of dvd content, making phone calls to other directors and pretty much all the not so pretty things that go into filmmaking but are much so much a part of the business.
Don't kid yourselves, filmmaking is hard, nearly impossible to do by yourself and by doing these tasks and research really helps the filmmakers and it has helped me think about how much office work comes along with putting together a film.
On fridays all the interns get together for kartemquin workshops or meet and greets where we get hands on lessons from the pros, everything from fundraising, to licensing, to lighting and sound, and distribution. On the meet and greet days we meet with the staff and discuss, well, how they became the filmmakers that they are- what does it take to make it in the documentary world?
This is short and I might be rambling but I think Kartemquin is a great place to apply if you can afford to give away 20 hours a week and before you know it your brain will be full of new ideas, fresh perspectives, and some really great contacts.
www.kartemquin.com
http://kartemquin.com/about/internships
yep
-n
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