The Myth of the Solo Filmmaker

Recently I’ve been surrounding myself with other producers, directors, writers, performers - creators. Most of them operate as a “solo filmmaker”.

One person, one laptop, one dream.

I get it. I've been that person too. (I am that person too?)

But here's what I've learned: the Australian film industry doesn't survive on solo operators. It survives on collaboration. And if we keep burning out our solo creators, we don't have an industry left.

Carrying DOP Peter Szilveszter's camera on the set of Matthew Holmes's The Sundowner S.A Oct 2025

I spent my mid to late 30s convinced I had to do everything myself. Act, produce, direct, shoot, edit, fund it. Be the vision. Be the voice. Be everything. Once my production partner Matt left the business, I had to teach myself everything from basically scratch. (Doing commercial work as a videographer is very different to making home movies with my siblings, cousins - even my Nan back in the 90’s.)

When I was doing it all on my own, it actually became exhaustion, mediocrity, and a lot of half-finished projects started gathering dust.

But here's the thing that concerns me: we've built a mythology around the solo filmmaker. The lone auteur. The one person fighting the system and winning. It's a good story, but it's killing our industry slowly.

Why? Because even the best, most driven solo producers eventually burn out. And when they do, we lose them. Not just them, we lose their networks, their projects, their mentorship of up and coming filmmakers.

The Australian film and TV sector is too small and too collaborative to afford that loss.

Sustainability isn't just about the budget or the funding or the distribution deal. It's about the people. It's about building structures where more than one person knows where the project lives, more than one person has decision-making power, more than one person carries the risk.

Some of the best work I've seen come out of regional Australia in the last five years came from people who took a big step. They stopped trying to do it all and started building actual teams. Even if those teams are just two or three people with complementary skills.

The sustainability question for Australian producers isn't "how do I fund my next project?" It's "how do I build something that doesn't depend entirely on me not sleeping?"

That might mean partnering with someone. It might mean joining a production collective. It might mean finding one person you trust enough to share the load with.

I’m currently doing this now with a number of friends in the industry. A filmmaker friend and I are starting a podcast - and he’s doing an enormous amount of the work on it (watch this space).

With another friend I’m starting a TV Production business for unscripted content (watch this space).

And with a group of friends we are starting an entire eco-system committed to collaboration, funding opportunities and IP world building (you guessed it - watch this space.)

The best part is - I’m not doing any of it solo! There’s a tribe of people with common goals coming together to solve problems, create projects, publish content.

And the days of the lone operator being our industry's ideal, need to end. Not because solo producers aren't valuable. They are. But because an industry built on burnout isn't sustainable. 

What's your biggest barrier to collaborating on your next project? And what would it take to overcome it?

Reach out if you’d like to talk all things screen in Australia - I’m up for the chat!