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What The
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Renaissance Man |
Film
Connection's Jimi
Petulla on apprenticing and educating. Call
him a revolutionary, but Jimi Petulla's method of learning by
doing is really just a "a throwback to the Renaissance period," where  you
learned your art by paying your dues and taking advice from a true
master. Through his Film Connection program, aspiring moviemakers all
over the country are becoming working moviemakers—and learning from the
best in the business. Here, Petulla talks about bringing the 12th
century into the 21st. |
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| Is Jimi Petulla the savior of
American adult education? One thing is certain: Petulla's
radical, yet time-honored approach to teaching could shake higher
learning to its unstable
core. He is founder and president of
Entertainment Connection, a California-based program that applies the
old world concept of "apprenticing" -- i.e., a learning experience
where students receive personal, on-the-job training from a seasoned
professional. |
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Launch a Film-making Career |
| What's the hot, new way to launch a
film-making career?
An old-fashioned apprenticeship. CyberFilm School gives an
enthusiastic
thumbs up to Entertainment Connection's educational method. "The
old adage is true--it's definitely who you know," says Sherwood
Jones, an editor and postproduction supervisor at Tapestry Films in
Beverly Hills. "This is why internships have become an increasingly
effective way to get the proverbial foot in the door. Many producers
and production managers no longer look to resumes but instead turn to
colleagues for their hiring recommendations," Jones notes. |
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EntertainmentConnection Works |
| It's your "in," your "foot in the door" to
the media
biz.
Entertainment Connection does what its name implies: "connects" you to
someone in the business. Which brings me back to my
original statement: College is a waste of
time and money. You want to do something with you life? You want to be
somebody? There's one sure fine way to reach that goal: apprentice
yourself with a pro.
Apprentice, Familiar sounding work, right? I guess the first image
that comes to mind is "The sorcerer's Apprentice." Remember that
episode from Fantasia, the Disney film with Mickey Mouse and the
walking brooms? The idea of an "apprentice" has been around for
centuries. Think about it. Could there be any better way to learn than
watching and being taught by a pro in his own environment? |
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College Won't Get You a Job |
| Four years at a university is no longer the
best path to
making a lot of money. It's not just cyberpunks who can
make it without a sheepskin. Being
booted from Brown didn't do much harm to Ted Turner's career. Nor did
dropping out of the University of California at Los Angeles hurt
show-business tycoon David Geffen, who was a multimillionaire at 25 and
is now, at 49, worth a billion dollars.
After a few semesters at
college, Geffen left to get some real training in the mailroom of the
William Morris talent agency. Of course, the Morris agency, like most
employers, did not hire people without college degrees. When Geffen's
transcript arrived in the mail, he intercepted it and substituted a
forged letter. Even the talent agency was more interested in the
credentials than the talent. |
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Steve Jobs: "Glad I dropped out" |
| Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer Inc.,
told Stanford
University graduates that dropping out of college was one of the best
decisions he ever made because it forced him to be innovative.
He said his real education started when he
"dropped in" on whatever classes interested him — including
calligraphy. He told the graduates that few friends could see the
value of
learning calligraphy at the time but that painstaking attention to
detail — including mastering different "fonts" — was what set Macintosh
apart from its competitors. "If I had never dropped out I might never
have dropped in on that calligraphy," Jobs said. |
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Learn Filmmaking from a
Professional Filmmaker
Benefits of Our Film School
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Chris, a Film Connection Student, talks about one of the biggest benefits of our Film School--you make contacts and industry connections while you apprentice on real film sets. Chris' first connection was a great one.
