By Robert Goldrich

Eleven days before several of its artisans won the Visual Effects Oscar for the Ang Lee-directed Life of Pi, visual effects studio Rhythm & Hues declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Some 45 seconds into his 2013 Oscar ceremony acceptance speech–just when he was about to address the hard times suffered by Rhythm & Hues–Bill Westenhofer, VFX supervisor at the studio and on Life Of Pi, was cut off as the orchestra began to play the ominous theme from Jaws.

For many in the VFX industry, Westenhofer being stopped in mid-sentence added insult to injury, particularly for the rank and file at Rhythm & Hues, a company which had just endured a first round of 254 layoffs. After those staffers were informed they had lost their jobs, Scott Leberecht–who is still an art director at Rhythm & Hues–said, “For a week we were walking around in a daze. Then the Oscars happened. Everyone knows what took place on stage that night with Bill Westenhofer. It snapped everyone out of the daze and got people thinking about what they could do to address the situation.”

Leberecht and his then Rhythm & Hues colleague, manager of digital production Christina Lee Storm (who’s now at non-profit industry organization Act One), did just that, deciding to make a documentary short filmed largely at the company’s former El Segundo, Calif. facility during the weeks following the bankruptcy filing.

Life After Pi shows the impact of layoffs and labor uncertainty on people and their families. Artisans at the studio shared their thoughts and feelings. The documentary captures executives talking openly about what happened and why they think it happened. And the significance goes beyond Rhythm & Hues, affirmed Leberecht, noting that some 20 VFX houses–most of them in California–have closed or declared bankruptcy over the past decade. These include accomplished shops–Rhythm & Hues, for example, which managed to survive after its bankruptcy declaration, is a three-time VFX Oscar winner, the first coming for Babe in 1995, then The Golden Compass in 2008, and Life of Pi in 2013. (Following its bankruptcy declaration, Rhythm & Hues was acquired in March 2013 by a company with ties to VFX/animation house Prana Studios, which has offices in L.A. and a subsidiary in Mumbai, India.)

Now Leberecht and Storm hope that Life After Pi will serve as a bridge to a feature-length documentary that will delve more deeply into the erosion of the movie business, including VFX, in California, particularly Los Angeles.

SHOOT: Life After Pi encouraged the VFX community to recently turn out for the pre-Oscar ceremony protest in Hollywood that was organized by the Association of Digital Artists, Professionals and Technicians (A.D.A.P.T.). As the red carpet was unfurled that afternoon, more than 500 turned out to demonstrate at nearby Hollywood and Vine to voice their concerns and call attention to factors that are hurting the visual effects industry and the many talented artists in that discipline trying and at times struggling to make a living in California. What was your take on that protest?

Leberecht: I was there along with Christina. There was a sense of purpose and energy there. I didn’t start A.D.A.P.T. but am a member and supporter. Even though it was raining that first hour, people were out in force, dressed in green–representing the blank green screen that would be left without the work of visual effects artists. We educated people about the problems, raising awareness of what the visual effects industry is dealing with. We’re finding our voice and getting heard.

SHOOT: What’s the message you want Life After Pi to impart?

Leberecht: Most importantly, that there is a two-fold problem. One is that the subsidies and tax breaks being offered by other states and countries are drawing business away from California. We’re losing business and jobs and that will continue unless we can figure out how to level the playing field in terms of incentives.

The other problem is the relationship between visual effects houses and the movie studios–it’s a flawed business model where visual effects houses are expected to deliver no matter what, even if there’s a major change in creative vision or eleventh hour changes. There are overages for clear changes–adding 100 shots, for example–but problems occur when for instance we’re being inadvertently used to design the work, debating over the color of the sky, resulting in a process that costs time and money that aren’t recouped. First it’s supposed to be orange, then purplish orange. We’re going through colors, changing them constantly because they don’t know what they want. Once they finally know, we have spent a week for a shot that should have already been done.

And the power of the visual effects vendor is almost zero. It’s so competitive. Nobody wants to make waves for fear of not getting the business. What many don’t realize is that this jeopardizes even the vendors in a well subsidized region. A lot of people in Vancouver and the U.K. where incentives are strong now probably feel safe. But if they watch our documentary, they should be more concerned about the business models and what they will ultimately mean for them.

SHOOT: Did you encounter roadblocks in making Life After Pi?

Leberecht: No. We got permission from the company’s owners [John Hughes and Keith Goldfarb] to document what was happening. I think because they felt so badly about what the employees were going through, John and Keith wanted to help in any way so we could all better deal with the situation. I felt our making this documentary short was part of a therapy thing, putting our feelings down in a permanent way on video. And then maybe somebody could use it as a tool to understand what’s going on.

SHOOT: What’s next?

Leberecht: Christina and I are in the process of talking with potential financing partners for Hollywood Ending, a feature-length documentary that will dig deeper into what’s behind the loss of business in California. In making Life After Pi, we connected with friends and colleagues in other sectors–camera, makeup and so on. When I told them about Life After Pi, they said they have many of the same problems.

They said, “We don’t work as much either anymore.”

Also, Life After Pi is generating feedback. People are coming out of the woodwork to tell us their stories, which are relevant to the plight of the industry here. We’d like to share some of those stories in Hollywood Ending. We hope that production on the long-form documentary can get underway in the next couple of months.

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