Credit Check

Ah IMDb. It's the only resume that even counts in this town. Getting a credit up there is the reason so many of us will work for free on stuff when starting out (or later). Once you're up there for a while it's no big deal - but it's HUGE when you start out. I remember looking myself up when it first happened and being extremely proud. It was if I had finally "made it" and was accepted as being legitimately in the business. I could say I was six degrees from Kevin Bacon. Plus it's got a ton of eyes looking at it each and every day, so you can brag and show off to people back home that you're Hollywood now. So what if you worked on "KILLER MUTANT MONSTERS TAKE MANHATTAN PART 3"? Baby, you've arrived.

Another bonus for those who are financially and business motivated - you can promote your film through the site by uploading your film via withoutabox to be streamed by viewers, and you can sell the film through its owner/partner Amazon - the only reason the site exists in the first place. (OK that's not true, it was started as a noble enterprise to categorize film information in one place for movie buffs, but, surprise, Hollywood caught on and money drives Hollywood! On that note, please check out one of my films, also for sale on Amazon - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0839753/ )

But is the upgrade to the "behind the scenes" worth it for IMDbPro? Friends, I have seen behind the curtain and let me tell you the answer is - it depends. If you can get it for free through work or someone you know (which is how I still do it), use that. Hey, you have to stretch every cent you got - especially when you aren't even being paid to work on a film whose business information you can't see on IMDbPro.

That being said, there's tons of valuable information up there on IMDbPro. Mainly contact info, which is useful before you have an interview so you can research the people and company before you go in. Of course, you could search for free on google or yahoo, but the information might also be outdated or not available. Plus it's all in one place. And it is used daily by industry professionals as well, so it's legit.

But IMDb is not 100 % accurate or even close, though they try bless their profit-motivated geeky hearts. There's millions of movies these programmers are trying to track, in addition to monitoring the message boards of dorks and trolls with nothing better to do. It's also not that hard for people to make themselves look bigger than they were (ie an extra pretends he's an actor and changes the credit to "MAN DRINKING COFFEE IN BAR"), remove their own credits or others' - assuming they're not major celebrities whose credits are easily verifiable - or simply get the wrong spelling or credit up there for the world to see. In fact, I'm missing a few credits for some godawful straight to DVD no budget "movies" as are a few of my friends (thank God for me - but information purists may cry). So it's no wonder many of these credits are not 100% true - especially the smaller, less viewed/legit ones.

But some record is better than no record... at least it can be fixed once up there.

On the upside to IMDbPro, you can also add your own resume, photos and a reel to the site. People can see if you're really an actor on the film when you say you worked on a film, or if you were just an extra trying to pull a fast one. And you can see what projects are in the works (PacMan The Movie? Really??!) though StudioSystem is a lot more reliable - and expensive.

Personally, if you're just using IMDbPro to find work, I don't think it is worth paying the price of IMDb as your credits should speak for themselves. Yes there are job boards up there but I've never seen anything there except desperate writers trying to sell their scripts to whoever stumbles across their post. However, if you do have a good headshot, it IS worth the price to put it on IMDb - it's a 1 year thing, so you can change it if you don't like it and it's not expensive either. It will separate you from the wannabes and sleazebags who have no real credits.

Point is, IMDb credits are awesome when you start out - unless your name is really generic, then you will end in Roman numerals - take that John Smith (XIV)! Just see if you can find a friend who can get you access to their account first. If not, don't worry about IMDb and just work on a few films - odds are you're bound to end up there. Just be careful which film it is so it doesn't follow you around for years to come.