By Robert Goldrich

NEW YORK --

In-house ad agency filmmaking talent made its mark at the recently concluded South By Southwest Film Festival. As earlier reported (SHOOTonline, 2/27), Beginning With The End–one of just eight films chosen by SXSW from nearly 900 entries to compete in the Documentary competition–was directed, shot and produced by Dave Marshall, the resident filmmaker at Content Central, the production/post division of agency Partners + Napier.

Now SHOOT looks into Big Significant Things from director/screenwriter Bryan Reisberg, assistant editor at Mr. Editorial, the in-house production/post arm of Deutsch New York. Selected for SXSW’s Visions program–which focuses on risk-taking artists in the new cinema narrative and documentary filmmaking landscape–Big Significant Things stars Harry Lloyd (Game Of Thrones) as a 26 year old who seemingly has everything neatly in place in his life–job stability, a supportive family, a blossoming relationship with his girlfriend. Yet he lies to the latter so he can go on a road trip by himself through the South.

Garnering favorable reviews, Big Significant Things marks Reisberg’s feature directorial debut and made its world premiere at SXSW, the start of its own road trip on the festival circuit. April will kick off with the film hitting film festivals in Mississippi, Kansas and South Carolina.

Reisberg credited Deutsch and its head of integrated production Joe Calabrese with being supportive of his filmmaking. The agency gave Reisberg time off to shoot Big Significant Things once financing for the picture came through.

Reisberg continues his work at Deutsch NY, which he joined a couple of years ago. Meanwhile he separately maintains Uncorked Productions with partner/producer Andrew Corkin (co-producer of Martha Marcy May Marlene). Uncorked produced Big Significant Things as well as such Reisberg-directed fare as the shorts Father/Son, which debuted at the 2012 BFI London Film Festival, and Funny Or Die’s Kiss My A$$ starring Denis Leary, as well as the soon-to-be-released web series The Walker starring Carey Mulligan, Zoe Kazan and Rightor Doyle.

Formal, real-world educations
Reisberg received his formal film education at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Even more valuable, though, has been his education in the marketplace, which began with internships at commercial production house Smuggler and then the NY office of ad agency Mother. He later joined Mother full time, working on smaller in-house productions and assistant producing for the shop.

“The first internship was during the summer of my freshman year [at NYU],” recalled Reisberg. “Smuggler presented a great experience–a small shop doing the best work in the commercial industry. I interned there for two summers, including the year they won the Palme d’Or at Cannes. I was fortunate to see such highly talented people at work. The same was true at Mother which had a high standard for design, aesthetic and quality. Working at Smuggler and Mother was more important in preparing me to be a filmmaker than film school ever was. I was able to get a look at what people were creating and I saw the limitations that can exist in the commercialmaking world–but even with those limitations, they managed to create great work.”

Reisberg in his spare time broke into music video and spot directing via Uncorked, diversifying into short films and now his first feature with Big Significant Things. The SXSW exposure has given him a major career boost. “Having your film appear in that kind of arena is surreal. What Janet Pierson [head of SXSW Film] does with the festival is quite impressive. They put together a slate of films from the low end of the spectrum to big studio films. You meet a lot of good people and it was a privilege to be part of a wonderful Visions lineup.”

With the momentum of SXSW and the continuing festival tour for Big Significant Things, Reisberg is mulling over film distribution options where are constantly evolving in the industry. “What’s most important,” he affirmed, “is figuring out what’s best for the film to reach the largest audience–and getting the opportunity to make the next film.”

Reisberg has taken a proactive approach to what’s next as Uncorked is in development on films for him to direct as well as prospective projects he would produce for other filmmakers.

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