It's Not Quite Coppola Talking About the Fat Girl and Mozart, But...

Lots of people remember this sorta bizarre prediction from Francis Ford Coppola about the democratization of film, when he says that cheap video cameras will allow just about anyone to make movies: "Some fat girl in Ohio is going to be the new Mozart, you know, and make a beautiful film with her little father's camera."

Peter Jackson has his own riff on democratization in an interview published today by Reuters to promote "District 9," which he produced.:

You know, in the old days it was very difficult to make movies 'cause you had to have 35 millimeter cameras, which were phenomenally expensive. Or you had to have rich parents that could send you to film school. Nowadays, anybody, any kid or young person with a desire to make films ... (has) access to this equipment. You have great video cameras and the quality's fantastic. You can make soundtracks and do visual effects. You can do very competent computer effects quite easily."

..."There are no excuses anymore. If people really want to make movies, they can go out and do it. And I think we're going see in the next 20 or 30 years a real influx of creativity to the world of entertainment because I believe a lot in the young generation coming along ... the pop culture generation who now can grab these cameras and go make films with them.