on the moon giving someone a new heart
when there’s fails sharing information
instantly around the world running a
mile in under four minutes all these
things at one time were an impossible
goal all once an insurmountable
challenge we’re living in challenging
times the theme of today’s talks facing
the future is particularly topical right
now whether that’s healing divisions
finding a new economic path educating
our kids now more than ever we need to
encourage our creative thinking we need
our institutions our companies
individuals our government to challenge
what they do and to be innovative but
there’s a problem with innovation so
often it constrained by tradition found
by trying to find new ways but to do the
same old thing we have to make sure that
what we call innovation really is not
just a reboot of our original thinking
cased in new technology or a newly
invented terminology because we’ll never
really make any progress if we do that
strange as it seems that’s where a group
of independent filmmakers comes in and
more specifically the 72 project the 72
is a unique feature film project that
was set up by a colleague of mine who I
established a company with the company
is called grand independent and we run
the 72 project myself and James fair
back in 2014 made our last film our last
72 project film and although the 72
project is about making feature films it
also has some interesting lessons for
how we go about looking at the
challenges that we face
because the 72 is about achieving what
seems to be impossible about not being
bound by tradition and about finding
value in new places it all started with
a problem that we face as independent
filmmakers and it’s a problem created by
technology technologies had some amazing
effects and impacts on what we can do as
filmmakers it’s allowed us to tell
stories that perhaps in the past we were
not able to tell it’s also democratized
the filmmaking process you know we have
access to cheap high quality technology
that means today we can all be
filmmakers I can shoot a movie on my
iPhone I can edit it on my laptop I can
do all the visual effects I can mix the
sound I can burn it onto a blu-ray disc
I can share it instantly with hundreds
of millions of people around the world
so technology has done some wonderful
films were made on celluloid strips of
film not many films got made because
access to the equipment to do it was not
readily available it was expensive
having the money to pay for the
processing to buy the film that was
expensive allied to that there were
hundreds of independent cinemas up and
down the land all he could show those
films all eager to show the movies and
the content studios and the production
companies were putting out so while it
was what it was difficult to make a film
getting an audience for that film was
quite easy you could get your film shown
you could get an audience to see the
value in it and be willing to pay to
come and see it but now come forward to
2016 the access to that technologies i
talked about means that making a film
now is easy we can get hold at the
equipment we don’t have to buy film that
little thing in my pocket allows me to
shoot a feature film so the access to
the technology is easy getting it made
is easy but the problem we have now is
that because of that thousands and
thousands of feature films literally
thousands of feature films get made
every year as independent filmmakers
then how do we engage in audience if all
of these films are getting made how do I
get an audience to engage with my film
enough to want to pay for it does the
ubiquity of that content mean we don’t
value it in the way that we used to in
an era perhaps when paying for content
seems rather last century how do I get
an audience to really engage with what
I’m doing and to see the value in it
well that was a question that James
posed back
in 2008 in a pub somewhere in Dublin and
I say somewhere because nobody can
really quite remember what pub it was
and I think that probably tells you
something about the evening but he posed
a question ok if we have a problem with
engaging an audience in our feature film
is there something that we can do with
the process behind it could we find
value in the process behind how we made
the film could we attract an audience to
that but there’s another problem there
because how many people now have seen
behind the scenes footage seeing those
DVD extras on the film’s seeing the
crews on set understand what the
director does and what the
cinematographer does and what the
producer does there’s no mystery in
making a feature film anymore there’s no
real lack of understanding from an
audience about what goes into making a
feature film so if we want to engage an
audience with the process how do we do
that when people readily understand so
it kind of moved on from that oh ok what
about we change that process what about
we do something different the thing is
the process of making a feature film is
very well established yeah we’ve been
making films for a hundred years and to
be honest most films that are made now
follow a pretty familiar pattern to what
they did 40 50 years ago you know we’ll
be on set and we’ll work with the actors
and we’ll shoot for probably six to
eight weeks will then take all that
footage and we will edit it and we’ll do
the sound mix and the visual effects and
get it completed another probably take
us five or six months short old maybe
six months maybe seven months
to complete the feature film so if
that’s well established and people
understand how that works we’re going to
have to do something different now I
said we were in a public Dublin and I
think at this stage they’d been a
certain amount of quite famous Irish
stout consumed because the next point
was why don’t we make a feature film in
72 hours that sounds like a really good
idea let’s not do it in seven months
let’s do it in three days if we did that
would that really engage an audience you
can imagine the kind of reaction that
that had when we talked to people about
it and that you are insane because
that’s not possible how can you take a
process that takes you several months
and do it in 72 hours it’s not possible
well the 72 project has now made three
feature films in Ireland in Australia
and here in the UK films have screened
to audiences around the world at major
festivals in in melbourne in berlin in
london in rome in galway garnering
critical success and disbelief in equal
measure the 72 project is highly
disruptive it needs a different way of
looking at an old model it needs a real
collaborative commitment by everyone
involved and it needs a certain ability
to forget what’s gone before to not take
account of the usual ways the usual
models for the young people that come
unto our films and work with us it’s
it’s an extraordinary and it’s an
empowering process but so what
you know I’m sure many of you are
sitting there thinking that’s great
Peter congratulations you’ve made your
movie but there are bigger issues in the
world today than how long it takes you
to shoot a movie and you’re absolutely
right just bear with me because the 72
process and the way that we thought
about dealing with an issue and a
problem that we had perhaps then can be
applicable to some of the other issues
that we face some of the other problems
that we’re dealing with because shooting
and editing a feature film in 72 hours
is utterly ridiculous you have to forget
about those usual models and that’s the
whole point behind it it makes you stop
and it makes you think about what you do
it makes you be innovative but it makes
you be innovative in a way that is not
bound by anything that’s gone before it
if we look at how we deal with some of
the problems that we face some of the
real big challenges that we face today
economic environmental societal economic
is there something that we can learn
from the 72 if we looked at those issues
with a slightly different eye with a
slightly more challenging vision is
there something that we could do there
that would make it better that would
make it more collaborative that would
make it more environmentally friendly
more successful thinking back through
those three films then perhaps the real
focus of the 72 project is starting to
emerge and it’s not necessarily about
filmmaking so the project is expanding
and it’s starting to change we’re still
going to make films but we’re going to
do something slightly different myself
and James are no longer going to be
making these what we want to do is hand
this on to a new generation of film
to see how they take on those challenges
and what they do with it so the plan is
we’re going to make a new film every
couple of years but do it in a different
country and with a different team
through making those films and the ones
we’ve already made we’re starting to
create a global network of 72
participants I’m tempted to call them
survivors but i don’t think that quite
appropriate but i think that’s really
exciting because we’ve already seen with
the people that we worked with here in
the UK and in australia in ireland that
they are starting to collaborate on
their own projects staying in touch
starting to build their own innovations
it’s time to do their own really
exciting things but alongside the film’s
we want to look at what else we can do
so we’re in the process of developing a
72-hour a three-day event that perhaps
could change your life your business
your community and perhaps if we
expanded out maybe even the world who
knows Albert Einstein said that we
cannot solve our problems with the same
thinking we used when we created them
and that’s what the 72 project is all
about it’s about not being bound by
tradition it’s about pushing beyond the
normal barriers of innovation because
when we do that something remarkable
might happen we might be able to find
value in new places we might be able to
find a new way forward and perhaps you
know we might face the future then with
a renewed optimism and perhaps a new
sense of where value really lies thank
you very much [Applause]