Philly Ranked #3 for Movie Making

[city guy]

Movie Maker Magazine The best selling independent movie magazine has moved Philly up from 4 to 3 in their annual Best Cities Ranking for 2005.

Read the list: for 2004

movie maker magazine

Read the list for: 2005

2005 rankings

[PghUSA]

Thats a great preformance two years running now. Not to take anything away from that accomplishment, I would have thought that home sweet home though would have placed somewhere on there, no we're not Hollywood or New York but even 10th and Wolf chose Pittsburgh, "An Incident in Baltimore" as well as standing in for Memphis for "Silence of the Lambs", Pittsburgh is now not even in the same class as Baltimore or Philly. I am sure in many aspects Philly and other cities have some great benefits for filmmaking, just have this Forbes redux feeling on yet another "ranking" snubbing the weststate stereotype. Ok I'll stop being a homer and congratulate you for placing, it is worth celebrating .

[city guy]

Pittsburgh is now not even in the same class as Baltimore or Philly...just have this Forbes redux feeling on yet another "ranking" snubbing the weststate stereotype. 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

No Forbes Redux Here! I don't know how the others made the list but it is not fair to compare Pittsburgh and Philly. Here is where I think our location near New York really helps us. And the philly film office had a 5 year head start on pittsburgh film office plus philly sponsors the annual SIP, Set in Philly Screenwriters Awards. Film people love that stuff...why, because you get money!

Plus Philly has 6 annual film festivals, one being the third largest. For example the annual Three Rivers Film Festival screens 50 films, Philly screens 300. philly film festivals Philly's independent film festival screens the same as your major festival, just to give you an idea.

Well, if you haven't already guessed, I am a film major. Why are film festivals so important to me... because you want to try to enter your film in as many jury shows as possible all over the place. By having festivals etc., you create a film making culture and a community that can share ideas and learn from other directors when they screen their movies.

Hollywood can come knocking on a cities door maybe once a year if your lucky. The independents come knocking 24-7 if you let them in.

[TheGerbil]

I do think Pittsburgh should be on that list, and I think it's a huge oversight that it's not. Lots of movies have been made here, and countless times I have heard it described as a great place for making movies because of its varied scenery and architecture, and availability of local talent for various jobs related to making films. This isn't just local pride talking, it's facts.

I wonder what criteria were used to decide what cities to put on that list. I would also like to see a list of how many movies have been filmed in Austin versus Pittsburgh. I'll just bet our list is longer. So how come they make the list but not us?

Overlooked as usual, that's all I can say.

[PghUSA]

This thread is on Philadelphia's accomplishment as a film hub so I would like to hear from east staters (and especially those in film like CG) on their experience and congratulate them on the accomplishment, Philly does deserve it.

I agree with Gerbil though that this might be another Forbesesque oversight . . . what you might be viewing as paranoia on our part is well nurtured, everything from Prof. Florida viewing what makes us stand out as "non-creative" to the number cruncher for a key Forbes survey a few years ago not ranking Pittsburgh at all as though we didn't exist, the local press calls him on it mentioning all the academia we have here and his reply is "What is Carnegie-Mellon?". These rankings do matter and it does take much hard work to earn a spot on them so in that way I am glad to see a Pennsylvanian city achieve that great accomplishment, just that we are used to these "experts" feeding off of the vicious cycle of pop culture and reguretating it into some kind of "ranking" instead of doing the research or even a google on arguably one of the top 10 universities in the world. Inexcusable.

CG never realized you were a film major, your insights on Philly and it's regions are impressive. Philly has the critical mass and the deep roots of its cultural and academic communities to really sustain a great film industry. You might have already seen these sites given your expertise in the area, http://www.pittinhollywood.org, http://www.pghfilm.org, as I am sure you know Pittsburgh is relatively "young" with film only really getting the ball rolling in the mid 1980's (though we have had some great luck with on-location films in the 70's and 60's thanks to people like Romeo and Cimino not to mention both WB and MGM as well as the modern "movie theater" all started here). History doesn't translate to 2006 success, but we have some legacies some of those cities on the list can't compete with.

As far as film festivals, I always realized they were integral but given your experience they sound vital. Although 50 or less Pittsburgh does have several, the Three Rivers, a High School one through TR, The Gay-Lesbian, Asian-American of Pittsburgh, and Jewish Federation of Pittsburgh and one of only 5 host cities for the Amnesty International Film Festival!

Again congratulations on the consistent rankings, and not taking anything away from the survey, it is usually more a stereotype and the pretension that those towns don't count--similar to the "expert" that didn't know what CMU was--then false methodology. You have gotten us thinking over here in Pittsburgh though, but Philly should be proud to represent the whole state.

[mjcatl2]

Philly, Boston and other East Coast locales like Pgh, and DC should rank on some list. I totally agree with Philly being on this list. However I have a problem with Austin and Houston... really????

[city guy]

This thread is on Philadelphia's accomplishment as a film hub so I would like to hear from east staters

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

First off I am no expert and none of this is a slam on Pittsburgh.

To create a culture of film people or artists or dancers or anything else there have to be lots of venues to showcase your work. You might still be poor and waiting tables but atleast your in a climate where you can share ideas with others of like interest.

For example check out these two websites. And type in the word...Pittsburgh and see how few opportunities there are for film projects. Then type in Austin, Boston, Philly - well forget New York, it fills the whole page. But you get the idea.

U.S. Film Festivals

International Festivals

[PghUSA]

^^ CG, no offense taken, Philly should be proud to rank consistently. Sorry us Pittsburghers have turned this into a "why not us" thread, the question is a legit one and I would like to get more into how these rankings come about, your right on the "grass roots" types of things Pittsburgh is lagging some, but then they come here to film Memphis and Philadelphia in Silence of the Lambs and 10th and Wolf?!? There is a difference between having a few friendly producers out in Hollywood that throw some projects your way and the "community" of film artists so Pittsburgh does have some work to do--and it is doing it or at least starting to. This thread really should be a celebration of Philly's achievement so as you put it none of this is intended to be a "slam" on Philly's achievement or raining on this thread. I would like to hear more from the eaststaters on the achievement, Gerbil, I and others over here are indeed scratching our heads on it but that shouldn't take anything away from Philly's achievement.

By the way thanks for the links and the expertise.