Kickstarted (2015)

In just a few short years, crowdfunding has changed the face of creativity and opened the doors of opportunity to millions of people with great ideas. Kickstarted follows three dramatic and... See full summary »

Directors:

Jay Armitage, Jason Maxwell Cooper

Writers:

Jay Armitage, Jason Cooper

Stars:

LeVar Burton, Brad Carter, Amanda Palmer

Cast

Credited cast, sorted by IMDb STARmeter:
LeVar Burton	...	Himself
Brad Carter	...	Himself
Amanda Palmer	...	Herself
Zane Lamprey	...	Himself - Host
Leah Ann Cevoli	...	Herself
Dallas King	...	Himself
Emily Best	...	Herself
Fred Vreeman	...	Himself
Dale Constable	...	Himself

Storyline

In just a few short years, crowdfunding has changed the face of creativity and opened the doors of opportunity to millions of people with great ideas. Kickstarted follows three dramatic and inspiring crowdfunding stories to explore how this phenomenon is changing the world. Despite the newness of crowdfunding, we find our that passion, perseverance and hard work are still the keys to success.

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Plot Keywords:

crowdfunding | kickstarter | 

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Genres:

Documentary | Music | News

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Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Box Office

Budget:

$86,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

King Toledo Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

98 min

Color:

Color

User Reviews

Late to the crowdfunding party.

It doesn't feel like it's been long, but three years ago crowdfunding was on a white-hot tear. Spearheaded by pioneers like Kickstarter and Indiegogo, the idea that you could pay to make an average person's dreams come to life was quickly cloned for all kinds of purposes, helpful or malicious. Eventually, big players who didn't want to risk their own skin on creative gambles, like Hollywood actor/producer Zach Braff, clogged the scene and pushed a lot of small players out of the limelight. Kickstarted was pitched and funded before this mood swing and, three years since its very own crowdfunding campaign successfully wrapped, it feels oddly anachronistic.

While originally pitched as an opportunity to meet a variety of game developers (who were the kings of the crowdfunding hill in the early half of 2013), this doc focuses on musician Brad Carter and his struggles to fund an album before his tremors disable his ability to make music. Alongside Carter's story is aspiring UCLA filmmaker Dallas King and Hozon, his campy and extremely violent martial arts film, as well as a pair of inventors who bumble through one crowdfunding campaign after another, coming across as a bunch of grifters than passionate dreamers.

All of this would have been well and good had the film released in those halcyon debut days of crowdfunding, but three years later, it feels like a time capsule. The producers state that post-production issues kept them behind - there certainly are a lot of interviews here and some guests are weirdly unmic-ed, coming off as awfully amateurish - but they also wanted to finish filming the arc of Carter as he weaves in and out of surgery to reduce his tremors. His story winds up being the anchor of the film, but would it have had quite the effect if the doc had informed us he was already a somewhat famous actor with appearances in critically-acclaimed series like True Detective and Sons of Anarchy? I genuinely don't know.

After Carter, there isn't much weight to the movie. The plight of King and our rural inventing schemers are decent stories, but there's no emotional heft to them. The film barely runs 70 minutes as-is and it seems the opportunity to pivot and cover the industry shift that came after this documentary was funded was limited by the budget. It would've been genuinely cool to see a Gibney-style investigative flick that dove into why some campaigns failed to materialize after funding. I have nothing against a documentary about very real human stories involving crowdfunding, but it feels like a much smaller film than the one I pledged my dollars into so many years ago.