The problem is that to be a producer, one must be a gambler, and the greatest French producers were gamblers.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
And in movies you must be a gambler. To produce films is to gamble.
Once you become a producer, you're really selling something. It is a control issue, because you don't really know how it's going to pan out, but the creative control makes it work it.
Most of the producers don't know what they do. The misconception of the producers' function is really not a misconception. Most producers don't do a very good job.
If there is a public perception at all, they see the producer as a big old guy who smokes a cigar and has lots of money and lots of power. That's not what a producer is and, if it ever was what a producer was, it certainly hasn't been for a long time.
For the producers, there was no reason to produce. You get money, but you couldn't use this money. For consumers, you could have money, but you have no way to use it because you go to the shop and see nothing.
Not many French producers work the American way. In France, the director decides everything, he has final cut. I'm trying to do things differently, without the Luc Besson solution.
As a producer or financier, you are going to go where you get the best bang for your buck.
The beauty about being a producer is you sit there, and you explore ideas which become a passion, which slowly becomes a reality.
You know, what a producer does is one of the great mysteries in life, so anyone can be one.
Producers are not gamblers. They want a good return on their investment.