We Asked the Director of 'A Minecraft Movie' for Advice and Got These 11 Tips

There are a few cinematic milestones that I can point to in my life, and the morning that a school friend attempted to explain the plot of a weird little movie she had just watched called Napoleon Dynamite is one of them. Unable to pin down specific beats, she said it was about a couple of high school kids and had a hilarious dance sequence at the end. So I sought it out, and it remains a favorite childhood watch.

Jared Hess, co-writer/director of that wacky little indie, has been an inspiration to filmmakers everywhere since then, putting together projects with unique sensibilities and a singular, rosy perspective of the world.

Looking at the landscape of his career, to see him go from a shoestring-budgeted film like Dynamite to big studio IP like Warner Bros.' new picture A Minecraft Movie is kind of wild and certainly aspirational.

The adaptation of the block-building, monster-filled game Minecraft has been in the works for a long time. Hess came on around 2020.

The story follows siblings Natalie (Emma Myers) and Henry (Sebastian Hansen), who have just lost their mother. They meet real-estate agent Dawn (Danielle Brooks) and old-school gamer Garett “The Garbage Man” Garrison (Jason Momoa).

They're all magically transported into the Overworld (Minecraft's primary environment), where they meet Steve (Jack Black). Steve is the customizable player-character of Minecraft and here helps these fish-out-of-water survive. Adventures ensue.

- YouTube Get ready for the greatest adventure ever built. ⛏️ Tickets are on sale NOW for #MinecraftMovie – only in theaters April 4.

Hess was kind enough to take some time to get on Zoom with No Film School and speak to us about A Minecraft Movie and his experience as a filmmaker. We asked him about how his background in indies and animation helped him with Minecraft, his best advice for directors, and more.

Enjoy!

Start with Strong Writing and Characters You Genuinely Care About

The foundation of every successful film starts with the screenplay. Hess emphasized that connecting emotionally with your characters is essential before you even think about cameras or locations.

"It all begins with the writing, and I think being a writer/director, for me, it always starts on the page," he said. " And I think just having characters that I genuinely care about and love, that's the first, most important thing."

Make sure you know how to write fully fleshed-out characters as you start your next script.

Use Location Scouting for Inspiration

I asked Hess about his process when he comes onto a project. Does he put together lookbooks, start storyboarding, or something else?

"I think when I've done my own independent films, one of the first things I do after something is scripted is I will go and immediately start looking at locations and really being inspired by the space that you're in, and just starting to kind of map out, doing rough blocking, kind of imagining just how everything could play out," he said. "That's something I love to do, just get in the car and go for a drive, start taking pictures, start even reimagining things that I may have written, and really being open to the best idea."

Don't underestimate how physical spaces can transform your vision. Getting out into potential filming locations early can spark creative possibilities you might never have imagined while sitting at your desk.

A Minecraft Movie was filmed in Canada and New Zealand, standing in for the fictional town of Chuglass, Idaho—a state near and dear to Hess.

Consider Physical Space When Visualizing Your Scenes

During the scout, locations can offer creative possibilities that imagination alone cannot provide.

Hess told us how unexpected discoveries during scouting can transform a scene for the better.

"You may be driving out in the desert somewhere and go, 'Oh my gosh, this looks amazing. There's this crazy rock outcropping. What if I reimagine the scene here, just because visually it's so striking?' Or whatever it may be. It's just being open to the creative process and being inspired by life and by things."

Prepare Extensively With Storyboards and Shot Lists

After locations, Hess said he does go to storyboards.

In 1969, Alfred Hitchcock told an interviewer, "I don't believe in improvisation on the set. I can visualize an entire picture on paper from the beginning. It's better to improvise in your office before the film starts."

Hess said he follows Hitchcock's approach of doing the loose creative work early so production can run smoothly.

"I try and storyboard the heck out of everything that I've done, trying to do as much improvising in the office, as Hitchcock said—that he'd like to improvise in the office, and that's something I stand by," Hess said. "It's just trying to be as prepared as possible, and then allowing yourself to be spontaneous and shift to something that might be better during pre-production or during production or during the edit, wherever it may be."​

Working in Other Media Can Shape Your Perspective

Hess and his wife, Jerusha Hess, have collaborated extensively, and in recent years expanded into animation, a body of work that includes the feature Thelma the Unicorn and the animated short Ninety-Five Senses, which landed them a 2024 Oscar nomination.

I asked Hess if his time in animation helped him prepare for A Minecraft Movie, which has a few CG characters of its own. He said yes.

Animation is inherently iterative. Hess said embracing this continuous refinement process leads to stronger final results than rigidly sticking with initial ideas.

"The process in animation is so unique because ultimately you make your movie almost eight times before it's completely done...It's like you're storyboarding constantly. You're constantly writing and rewriting, and nothing is precious. You're just constantly collaborating and chasing the best idea with an amazing group of artists."

Keep the Project Personal, Regardless of Budget

Hess, an indie voice coming onto a large-scale IP project, said one lesson he took away from the movie is the value of voice and finding what makes a film personal for you.

"Filmmaking, at its core, it doesn't matter if it's a small indie film or a big-scale studio thing. I think the key is to really hold onto your personality, your voice, as you do," he said. "Generally speaking, the bigger the budget, the less creative control people have. And that goes for everything, pretty much. But even when that's the case, I think the only way that you can stay engaged and excited about something is when it's personal for you and you're bringing your life experience, what you love about filmmaking, what you love about story, and all of those details to whatever it is that you're working on and trying to maintain that."

Don't Wait for Permission or Perfect Conditions to Make Your Film

The film industry rewards action, and even though many indie filmmakers are limited by resources, Hess said we should just go for it. His experience with Napoleon Dynamite demonstrates how working within constraints often leads to more creative solutions than waiting for ideal circumstances.

"I think the main thing when you're starting out is, don't ask for permission from anyone," he said. "We made the film. We weren't going to wait for everything to be perfect before we made our first film. We wrote the script, we got together the amount of money that we could get to do it, and it was like, 'Okay, this is the budget. This is how we can do it. We're going to shoot it in 23 days.'"

Write Something You Can Execute with the Resources You Have

Which takes us to his next bit of advice. Be honest about your current capabilities and what you have on hand.

Hess advised us to create projects that match what we can actually produce rather than attempting overambitious concepts that will fall short.

"Everything that we had written, we knew that we could pull off," he said of Napoleon Dynamite. "We had the resources to pull off. We weren't doing a big action film that was out of our league. We were doing something that was personal. And again, that started on the page, but we knew that we had to be able to write something that we could execute tomorrow."

Don't Focus on Production Value

Many emerging filmmakers obsess over technical polish at the expense of what truly connects with audiences. We want the fanciest cameras and the new gear. And that's understandable because we want our projects to look good. But even low-tech productions can thrive when they get the fundamentals right.

"I think when you go to film school, everybody's super excited to make their stuff look as professional as possible," Hess said. "We obsess over production value, and more emphasis gets put on that than actually what matters, which is story, character, and original ideas.

"And that's, I think, the world of characters that we made in Napoleon Dynamite. That's what resonated with people. That ended up being the superpower of that film. And it wasn't because we had amazing production value, although we cared about all of it."

Embrace Failure as Your Greatest Learning Opportunity

The fear of failure prevents many filmmakers from taking creative risks. Hess reframed failure as an essential part of artistic growth.

"Nothing is ever, ever going to be perfect, and you've got to be okay with failure, too," he said. "That's the most amazing gift ever, is to do things that fall flat on their face. That's when you learn the absolute most. And just being willing to get up and get back after it and try something different and new, it's an amazing thing. And when you're starting out, you really have nothing to lose."

Failure is a natural part of being creative, and messing up is a big part of everyone's day-to-day in the industry. But you can deal with failure, and continue to grow.

Be Willing to Let Go of Ideas That Aren't Working

Even your favorite concepts sometimes need to be abandoned. Hess encouraged directors to maintain objectivity about what's serving the project, regardless of personal attachment.

"You're always going to gravitate toward what you love and what you think works, but it's okay to let stuff go that doesn't work," he said, "whether that's a joke, whether that's a bit of dialogue, whatever it may be."

When you get notes as a writer or director, your ego can prevent you from seeing the benefits from a new creative perspective. Try to put that aside when it makes sense and see the larger picture (but also be ready to fight for the moments that are really important to you).

A Minecraft Movie is in theaters on April 4th.