Categories
Issues and Actions My Films

Read Some Excerpts From My New Book

I know what you are thinking. You are wondering “why should I go buy a book when I can just download a movie illegally for free?” right?  Well there is a price to pay for everything.  One of the reasons I wrote this book is to advance and preserve the film art and culture that I love — and that other option certainly does not do that! I wrote the book “Hope For Film” (with Anthony Kaufman) because I wanted to share some of the many lessons I have learned producing indie film.

Two recent excerpts give you

Categories
Truly Free Film

The San Francisco Film Community’s Continual Rise

The best things in life bring multiple rewards.  

If you can solve a problem by improving other things simultaneously, you know everyone is going to win.  Besides, we all have way too much to get done, that it only makes sense to kill two birds with one stone whenever humanly possible.  I think the San Francisco Film Society and I may have just accomplished this remarkable feat.  Let’s see

Categories
Truly Free Film

Remembering The Past, Segueing Into The Future

Today’s guest post is from filmmaker Bette Gordon (whose Luminous Motion I produced, and will screen at the IFC Center in NYC on Monday night.  I plan on being there, and hope to see you there).  Everything old is new again!

In the current culture of independent filmmaking, most of us are plugged in to the idea of DIY distribution. This is not a totally new idea.

In 1983, I had just made my first feature film, VARIETY. Its about a woman who sells tickets at a pornographic movie theatre and becomes obsessed with following one of the clients from the theatre into the world of men, money and lower Manhattan. We shot on a very very low budget, with friends and friends of friends. The theatre I used as a location, The Variety Theatre, was a porn theatre on 13th Street and Third Avenue, and after a week of shooting there from 11pm at night until 9am the next morning, we had developed a good relationship with the owner. The projectionist even played the part of “the projectionist” in the movie.

Categories
Truly Free Film

New TOOLS Column

Check out below on the right-hand column.  We’ve added a TOOLS column.  The Variety plug on Friday is something to try to live up to.

It’s a pretty good list to start off with, but we need your help to make it a great one.  Additionally please let us know what tools have worked well for you and what hasn’t.
Categories
Truly Free Film

The Post-Fest Era

In September, Christian Gaines wrote a provocative two-part article for Variety speculating on a new business models for film rights holders in terms of how they use film festivals.  It’s required reading, and certainly got me thinking.

In this month’s Independent, Paul Devlin has a piece on lessons he learned on the film fest circuit with his film BLAST.  He definitely has some good information for all, but again it was  ‘s last paragraph that got me thinking again:

Of course, the film festival model will always serve some film very well. But diverging interests may mean that film festivals necessarily become a much less essential element of a filmmaker’s strategy for promotion and distribution. Just as we seem to be entering a “post-distributor” environment in which filmmakers eschew rotten deals and embrace DIY, we may be witnessing the emergence of a “post-film festival” environment as well.

A new model needs to be found for filmmakers choosing (or having no other option than) to hold onto their rights.
Festivals can be a great way to heighten awareness for your film, but generally only in the local community where the film is playing.  To make matters worse, many festivals these days are over-programed and as a result the films simply get lost and overlooked.  The festivals and the communities make money on the sold out shows but not the filmmakers.  With only a few sales happening and then only at the highest festival level, filmmakers can’t be attending with the hopes of a deal?  So how can festivals be utilized by the Truly Free Filmmaker?
It would be ideal for local festivals to initiate deals with local theaters so that prize winning films would get an automatic one or two week booking three or four months after the festival.  I have to imagine this is done somewhere already but frankly I am clueless as to where.
It would be ideal for colleges and community centers in and around the local festivals to agree to bring filmmakers and their films out to lecture one or two months after winning at the festival.  This would allow for some local publicity to be done in advance of a future booking.
The most natural fit for regional festivals and TFFilmakers is for the filmmakers to use the festival to launch a specific DVD sale directly at the festival.  At the very least they could take pre-orders.
I found it very exciting when Slamdance announced this year that certain films would be available for streaming directly after their festival premiere.  When I have heard of a film playing a major festival, that is when my “want-to-see” is at its highest.  Six months later another 50 films have moved ahead of it on my queue.  TFFilmakers have to strike when audience desire is highest.