"Just trying to get a film made which is always difficult no matter what kind of a budget you have. Not having a budget makes it even more difficult. Having nineteen days and no budget makes it extremely difficult"
About this Quote
The glamour of filmmaking collapses fast when Eriq La Salle starts counting: budget, then no budget, then the killer detail - nineteen days. It reads like a shrug, but it’s really a small manifesto about how movies actually get made: not by inspiration, but by logistics, bargaining, and time pressure that turns every creative choice into triage.
La Salle’s intent is pragmatic, almost defensive. He’s not romanticizing “indie grit” or turning scarcity into a brand. He’s normalizing struggle as the baseline, then tightening the vise: even with money it’s hard; without money it’s harder; with no money and an absurdly short schedule it borders on the impossible. The repetition works like a drumbeat, a rising stress test. Each clause strips away a comforting myth that there’s some budget threshold where filmmaking becomes smooth.
The subtext is also about authority. An actor saying this isn’t just complaining about conditions; he’s signaling credibility as someone who has been on the inside of production, where “we’ll figure it out” can mean fewer takes, compromised safety margins, and creative ideas abandoned because the sun is setting and locations are expiring. “Nineteen days” is a coded phrase in the industry: you’re sprinting, stealing shots, praying nothing breaks.
Contextually, it lands in a cultural moment that fetishizes hustle and content volume. La Salle quietly argues that art doesn’t scale the way audiences expect. What looks effortless on screen is often a negotiation with scarcity - and the clock always wins.
La Salle’s intent is pragmatic, almost defensive. He’s not romanticizing “indie grit” or turning scarcity into a brand. He’s normalizing struggle as the baseline, then tightening the vise: even with money it’s hard; without money it’s harder; with no money and an absurdly short schedule it borders on the impossible. The repetition works like a drumbeat, a rising stress test. Each clause strips away a comforting myth that there’s some budget threshold where filmmaking becomes smooth.
The subtext is also about authority. An actor saying this isn’t just complaining about conditions; he’s signaling credibility as someone who has been on the inside of production, where “we’ll figure it out” can mean fewer takes, compromised safety margins, and creative ideas abandoned because the sun is setting and locations are expiring. “Nineteen days” is a coded phrase in the industry: you’re sprinting, stealing shots, praying nothing breaks.
Contextually, it lands in a cultural moment that fetishizes hustle and content volume. La Salle quietly argues that art doesn’t scale the way audiences expect. What looks effortless on screen is often a negotiation with scarcity - and the clock always wins.
Quote Details
| Topic | Movie |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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