LATEST NEWS

Ridley Scott & YouTube Team for Sundance Doc 'Life in a Day'

by Ethan Anderton
July 7, 2010

By now we all know that Ridley Scott's future line-up is off the charts with a seemingly endless amount of different productions on the horizon. Luckily, THR is reporting his new endeavor will give him a break from directing as he hands over those responsibilities to you. That's right, you now have the chance to co-direct Life in a Day, a documentary that will combine footage from people like you all over the world to capture moments and events as they occur on July 24th (later this month). Scott will be teaming with YouTube and director Kevin Macdonald (State of Play) to create "the first user-generated feature-length documentary."

Macdonald will be pouring over what will likely become days of footage in order to find the best clips to put into the film. Everyone who is lucky enough to have their footage appear in the film will be credited as a co-director of the documentary (which could look good on the résumé) and 20 of those lucky people will be flown to the Sundance Film Festival in 2011 where Life in a Day will have its world premiere. And in order to maximize diversity, those who aren't fortunate enough to have their own cameras won't be left out. Scott Free will work with Against All Odds Productions, a California-based organization that specializes in the execution of large-scale global projects, to distribute cameras to individuals in remote regions of the world in an effort to ensure that the film is as inclusive and representative as possible.

Macdonald says, "Life in a Day is a time capsule that will tell future generations what it was like to be alive on the 24th of July, 2010. It is a unique experiment in social filmmaking, and what better way to gather a limitless array of footage than to engage the world's online community." However, that community is often vulgar and crude, and I can't help but think there will be plenty of people just trying to ham it up and make a name for themselves by doing anything and everything to get into the documentary. On the other hand, there's plenty of people who probably won't pleasure themselves on camera, and those are the ones who will make this a fascinating look into the rest of the world.

For more information on the project, some very non-restrictive guidelines for shooting your footage and more go to www.youtube.com/lifeinaday and start preparing for your shooting day on July 24th. We'll be at Comic-Con on that day, so maybe we can capture the the annual migration of the mysterious herd of geeks who come from all over the world to do anything but mate. As for the rest of you, good luck, and be sure to let us know if your footage gets selected down the road!

Filed under Movie News, Opinions

From around the web: