Wow, he actually has an amazingly abbreviated IMDb for someone worth $22mil. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0103785/ Guess those Scrubs royalties really bring in the big bucks.

I just find it all deeply tacky. So he needs the $2 million to pay himself to write, direct and star in another vanity project? If he has that much faith in the project, he should fund it himself -- he can afford to do that, especially with the guarantee of all profits going directly into his pocket.

I'd be more interested in this kind of celebrity begging if it came with a profit-sharing model -- crowdfunding with a potential return on investments.

Ah, here we go -- as always, AV Club says it better than I could hope to. http://www.avclub.com/articles/zach-braff-…

+1. It bugs me when the people who otherwise ought to be able to get things done go to Kickstarter. If a star can't even convince a studio to shit out a sequel to movie that did very well (which seems to be the easiest thing to accomplish in Hollywood), why should I be optimistic about what he's pitching?

The Times Magazine article about Curt Shilling's doomed video game business illustrates why for me: Shilling was turned down by every savvy venture capital firm in Boston (Boston! Where he is a demigod athlete!) before he went to Providence and got Rhode Island to sink a ton of oversight-free money into his dream company.

The company failed because of a combination of all the reasons that made the VC firms pass, so the citizens of RI got screwed.

I'm not saying I want big money determining whether ALL things get a chance in the marketplace. I'm saying that if channels of funding are already in place for the project someone wants to Kickstart and the project people have either come through those channels empty-handed or chosen to skip them entirely, a) they should have a very good reason, and b) people who contribute should realize that they are taking a larger gamble supporting something, so they should be doubly sure their funds are provided mostly out of love for the proposed project and less for reasons of return-on-investment.

As far as not supporting a Kickstarter movie because they don't promise you a DVD, I don't really get that, but once again, I don't really get a lot of things. Seriously, how many times does anyone plan to re-watch anything, let alone a currently-entirely-hypothetical film? If I support a Kickstarter movie, I'm fine with nothing more than a free ticket to see it in theaters.

I'm giving Zach a dollar just because it takes less time than writing a well-worded response to either of you.

(This is plainly a joke).

Aside from two or three cloyingly cheesy parts, i thought 'Garden State' was pretty good and i would probably enjoy seeing a sequel.

Anyway, i agree with both CC and Melogna. (And Erik, with my eyes a'rollin'.)

In reference to CC's bit about the worth of receiving a physical copy: If i think a film is good enough to own (I try to be pretty picky), it's likely that i'll re-watch it plenty in the coming years, especially if the DVD includes juicy stuff like director's commentary that isn't offered via streaming mediums. However, i seem to be in the minority when it comes to enjoying commentary tracks and the like, so i can totally understand the virtual pointlessness of owning DVDs if one isn't into all of the bonus features offered.

(Incidentally, for anyone who has yet to give commentaries a chance, i would recommend starting with one of the ones (there are 4 or 5!) included on the 'Fight Club' disc -- the one with Pitt, Norton, and Fincher playing off of each other -- great stuff.)

And, Melogna, your idea about the profit-sharing thing will surely become reality in no time. People will contribute to a Kickstarter campaign and then, even many years later, they'll be getting checks in the mail for $0.07 every once in a while. It'll add up.

Zach Braff hasn't made a movie because he's on Reddit 24/7 creeping on girls.

Never seen Garden State, no urge to.

The Kickstarter thing is annoying until someone explained it to me this way: I heard that Richard Garriott (that's Lord British to you nerds out there) has a Kickstarter to make a new Ultima game. The guy is a zillionaire, why does he need money to make a new game, just fucking do it. But, as I understand it, he's doing it to gauge interest in the game. If it succeeds, then he'll fund the shit on his own dime and the superfans get something cool along with their game. Maybe Zac Braff is working with a similar principle in mind.

Or maybe not, I don't care enough about him or his movie to bother.

Agree with Melogna, CC, and human in training. Something that seems relevant: As a shall-not-be-named movie producer once lectured me, the number one rule in Hollywood is "Never gamble with your own money." It used to be creators would only gamble with producers' money; now they have the chance to gamble with fans' money. (While I don't know this for a fact, I'd guess the second rule in Hollywood is "All projects are vanity projects.")

I don't doubt that a profit-sharing model will spring up sometime soon (if Kickstarter's smart, they'll be the ones to implement it); when it does, it'll make these things feel a lot less sketchy. Right now, projects like these take advantage of fans' goodwill as much as fans' wallets. This probably works fine... until some crowdfunded movie becomes a huge hit, at which point donors might be a little less satisfied with their crappy t-shirt or DVD.

As for traditional funding channels, like CC mentioned, I'll only note that those change, especially in film. Studios once financed everything. Then independent films started to get made. Then studios co-opted that and started funding low-budget, indie-minded pictures as well as blockbusters. Then they realized this made terrible business sense and shuttered all their low-budget houses. And now they have to get in bed with Chinese investors—not to mention Chinese censors—in order to make just about anything, whether it's Looper or Iron Man 3. Traditional funding channels change: Sometimes it's someone like Megan Ellison who changes them, sometimes it's multinational corporations, sometimes it's fanfic-crazed Veronica Mars fans.

The problem with the profit-sharing model is that equity crowdfunding isn't legal, and even the version passed into law in the past couple of years (for which the SEC has yet to implement rules) would still be limited to people who are "accredited investors" under the law, which means a massive, public, willy-nilly Kickstarter version will still be out of the question.

And that doesn't even reach the inevitability that anyone who outright invests in a crowdfunded film will feel they have a right to dictate to the creatives just how they should go about making it.

AND THUS CONTINUED THE DECLINE OF CROWDFUNDING.

[ignores previous comments]

OR MAYBE GARDEN STATE JUST WASN'T A VERY GOOD MOVIE.

[throws mic off a cliff, walks away]