Bonus Material

It seems to be just as much work to prepare for bonus materials on a DVD than it is to prepare a film for a DVD. On this point I really commend the people behind those Lord of the Rings DVDs and the newer retrospective collections (Bond, Indiana Jones, etc) because they are so packed full of extra bonus special material features it's mind boggling.

For instance, it baffles me that they are STILL coming out with new behind the scenes of Star Wars books. More pictures show up, more production art, more storyboard sketches, more Behind the scenes footage. Is it fake? Is George Lucas just making ILM fabricate old-timey looking footage of Star Wars using anti-aging, re-bearding computer graphics? Aren't they running out of pictures to publish?

Apparently not- Garnaas came over and mentioned that someone at his workshop came into work with pictures from the Star Wars wrap party. The 1977 Star Wars wrap party. And it occured to me that certain cultural apexes will never diminish. The stuff that was produced, unearthed, and saved for that production THIRTY YEARS AGO has set the standard for what people are trying to accomplish now with millions of dollars.

I love behind the scenes documentaries, but they rarely actually show you what it's like on a set or what is really going on behind the scenes. As a filmlover and a filmmaker, some of my favorite aspects of filmmaking are the on-your-feet, seat-of-your-pants problem solving. Yet it feels like the ego of directors or producers say, "We can't show us fucking up. We can only show the stuff that worked really well." But it's always the sort of duct tape kind of stuff that's exceptionally clever and ingenius. That's the stuff that we like to see.

Going back to Star Wars, I've never seen all the featurettes and documentaries, endless though they are, but I know this: even for as much Star Wars stuff exists, they've never bored you or revealed the ALL the magic behind the production. Those Lord of the Rings mini-docs make you bored because they talk about being in New Zealand for three to five years working and working and it's cool and all, but you get tired for the people that were there.

I'm shooting this short and I want to package a DVD with a bunch of extra features, but I'm realizing that those bonus materials are such a full-time job, it's mind blowing.

What are your suggestions for special features? What are your favorite special features or behind the scenes docs or commentaries on DVDs?