Angela Watercutter, writing for Wired:
From crowd-funding to the visual language of online video, internet culture is slowly but surely seeping into independent film.
Nothing illustrates the web’s growing influence on filmmakers more effectively than Me @the Zoo, a feature-length documentary that premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
A rare glance behind the scenes at the Sundance Film Festival from Roger Tinch. If this wall works anything like the scheduling walls I've seen at other festivals, each sticky note represents a film in a particular venue at a particular time. Unsurprisingly, this one is a bit more complicated than most of the others I've seen.
Science documentarians take note: this touring science film festival may be the place for your film, particularly if it caters to children.
From the Jakarta Post:
The Science Film Festival is a roadshow of 16 science-themed documentaries geared to children and youth. This year, the Goethe Institute, as the organizers of the event, has settled on 20 venues across 12 cities stretching from Jakarta to Gowa and Jayapura in which to screen the free movies.
Agus added that the movies highlighted not only matters of the environment, but also spoke of poverty and justice in a softer light.
“There were not many special cinematographic techniques used but the method of storytelling was adapted to children,” he said.
The movies were indeed geared to a more boisterous audience. One of the documentaries, a nearly 10-minute German film called Nine and a Half: Bees in Danger featured high school students speaking on the importance of bees and a comical woman dressed in a bee costume, complete with a detachable stinger.
The festival is held by the Goethe-Institut in Germany and select films tour Cambodia, Indonesia, and Thailand. The next call for entries opens in January.
Cinekink ranks as one of my favorite festivals despite the fact that I've never made it to one of their fests. In fact, Cinekink's visit to Austin later this month will mark the first time I'll be able to see Cinekink's programming. So how do I know it's a great fest? Three reasons: passionate people (pun fully intended), a specific focus on their subject matter, and happy filmmakers.
1. Passionate people: Cinekink is more or less a one-woman show – there are scores of people who help make it happen, but it represents the vision of Lisa Vandever, who founded the fest almost a decade ago. When people approach me about starting a new film festival I generally discourage them from doing so, but Lisa is proof that there's always room for a great idea. Vandever's personality, persistence, and razor-sharp sense of humor make every interaction with Cinkekink memorable.
2. A specific focus: Cinekink promotes itself as "the kinky film festival," but its insistence on representing "the positive depiction of sexuality and kink in film and television" makes it more than just kink. Sex has so many negative connotations in the media – particularly the American media – that it actually ranks above graphic violence in the pantheon of things parents worry about. A defender of good old-fashioned makin' whoopie (of both wholesome and unwholesome varieties) is needed, and Cinekink fills that void. So to speak. At any rate, if your film has a specific audience or content slant, a specialty festival like Cinekink may be on the hunt for exactly your kind of film, which drives your chances of acceptance way, way up. Even if it's not Cinekink, be on the lookout for your specialty festival.
3. Happy filmmakers. Whenever I talk to filmmakers whose films played Cinekink or people who have just attended the fest, they get the same coy smiles on their faces as they talk about how much they loved it. I get the feeling that even if there weren't a special connection in the subject matter, Cinekink's brand of hospitality and community would still draw rave reviews.
Cinekink's regular deadline is this Friday, November 18th. If you've got a sex-positive film, you should submit. Your film, submit your film! Get your mind out of the gutter.
There are plenty of filmmakers who rush to finish their film for Sundance, fill out the paperwork, send off the DVD, and then... stop. There's nothing wrong with waiting anxiously to hear from what is arguably the world's most famous film festival, but if you're not submitting to other festivals while you wait you could miss out on the entire Spring season. Break out your list of target festivals (see chapter one of Film Festival Secrets for more on this) and get cracking. Here's a handy (but by no means complete) list of festivals with upcoming deadlines. Check each festival's web site for their late deadlines, submission rules, etc.
I picked these festivals for their relative prominence and for the fact that their deadlines come before the Sundance notification date (around Thanksgiving). If you're a festival director and would like to post your own upcoming deadline in the comments, please feel free.
From Brooks Barnes the New York Times Arts Beat blog:
New Route to Sundance
Playboy on Wednesday is announcing a competition intended to give budding film directors a new spotlight at the Sundance Film Festival – along, of course, with the bunny itself. The adult entertainment and publishing company will operate its contest, called the Playboy Shorts Series, viaTalenthouse.com, a social networking site that aims to foster artistic collaboration.
By "at the Sundance Film Festival" the contest producers really mean "at an event in Park City during the Sundance Film Festival." The "New Route to Sundance" headline implies that winning films will be part of the official Sundance program. They won't.
A quick check with the Sundance Institute last week confirmed that the contest isn't sponsored or endorsed by the Festival. I'm sure Talenthouse and Playboy aren't at all disappointed with the "New Route to Sundance" headline, which implies that the fest is involved. This is confusing at best and deliberately misleading at worst.
Just a word of warning folks – read the fine print on contests like these.
Calling Mr. Leggat's six-year tenure "transformative," Society board President Pat McBaine cited his "irrepressible determination, dash and design. His vision, leadership, passion, work ethic, tenacity, imagination and daring, along with his colorful language and wicked Scottish sense of humor, have indelibly marked our organization with a valuable legacy and left it in the best shape - artistically, organizationally and financially - in its 54-year history."
I only met Graham twice but it's easy to see he left big shoes to fill.
Todd McCarthy, writing for the Hollywood Reporter:
Virtually from the beginning, Telluride has performed an exquisite balancing act: Between old and new, foreign and American, the esoteric and the accessible, the expected and the unknown. As at a great restaurant, it's best to just place yourself in the chef's hands and sample what's served up. Some dishes are better than others, of course, but you can rarely say something was bad or a waste of time. Because of its limited duration, Telluride can afford to be picky and discriminating, which only works to the benefit of the viewer.
Read the rest at The Hollywood Reporter.
There's a nice message on the deadCENTER Film Festival blog to the filmmakers who submitted to them.
You didn’t drop your film into a vacuum – someone who loves independent film will be watching your movie. In fact, several people who love independent film will see your film. Every year, we have dozens of very enthusiastic, passionate and informed volunteers who want nothing more than to see the next Winter’s Bone before anyone else, and they’re convinced it’s hiding among the hundreds of films we receive for screening.
For filmmakers who find the "black hole" aspect of film festival submissions frustrating (and I don't know many who don't feel that way), this is a comforting message to receive. It doesn't change the fact that it's near-impossible to get useful feedback from a festival as to why one was rejected, but it's good to know that the screening committee at a particular festival is passionate about what they do.
Feeling left behind because you're not going to Park City this week? Here are a few ideas on how to keep yourself occupied -- either by distracting yourself with other business or by taking part vicariously. In no particular order:
If you're headed to Sundance you'll appreciate the organizational genius of Erin McCarthy's Sundance Binder.
I used to go nuts with a similar binder (folder, actually) on trips, stuffed with Yahoo maps directions of each place I needed to be during the trip. The iPhone has replaced those folders for me (GPS + internet = awesome) and I've tried to move away from paper as much as possible. During Sundance, however, with its terrible cell signal and GPS-ruining snow, binders still rule supreme. I've got mine ready.
Read How to create a Sundance binder of epic epicness.
(Via @cinejoe.)
MovieMaker puts this list out every year but this is the first year I can remember agreeing this much with their choices. I don't know all of these fests but there's a lot of overlap with my personal favorites here: Cinekink, deadCENTER, Florida Film Fest, Friars Club Comedy Fest, Traverse City – it's a great list.
Check out the 20 Coolest Film Festivals: 2010 from MovieMaker Magazine.
Charles Judson, communications director for the Atlanta Film Festival, in CinemaATL magazine:
It’s much easier to start a festival than it is to maintain a festival. Starting a festival really requires a commitment that has to go beyond just the three or four people who will bust ass to bring that inaugural event to fruition again and again and again. If a festival is really to have any shot at being a self-sustaining entity, it’s not just funds that have to be constantly flowing in, you need a constant stream of man power, and self-renewing passion that translates into a mission that folks instantly get.
Now, instead of using that same man power and determination to create a festival, why not suggest filmmakers create one off events around their films? If you’re a filmmaker, there’s absolutely no shame in doing something that only benefits your film. Being self-less is great, but if you’re not paying back your investors or creating any momentum to start your next film, what is that virtuousness really gaining you? And unless your goal is to stop making films, doing a festival will not be the wisest of career moves.
For years I've been kicking around the idea for a book for people who want to start a film festival. The first chapter is titled "Don't."
Hop on over to the Sundance Film Festival Facebook page for the link to a streaming web broadcast of the Sundance programming team, answering questions about submitting your film to the festival. Should be illuminating.
Ready to submit your questions? Join us tomorrow 9/8 at 12PST for a 30 min live Q&A with programming staff. Come prepared with any questions about submitting your film to the 2011 Festival.
It's that time again: South By SouthWest PanelPicker voting is open, which means you get a say in the panels that appear at the Film, Music, and Interactive Conferences. Voting closes on Friday so get yourself over to the site and vote.
For your approval I humbly submit the following:
Both Sides of the Fence - Festival Programmers Who are Also Filmmakers: When you watch hundreds of films a year it makes you want to grab a camera and make one of your own. Programmer/filmmakers discuss the how working in the festival world affects their filmmaking and vice-versa. Proposed by Jesse Trussell and me. Vote for it.
Regional Filmmaking: Revenge of the Flyover States - The best film festival in the U.S. is in Texas, so why should the best filmmakers in the country have to live in New York or Los Angeles? Working filmmakers from the so-called "flyover states" talk about the challenges and advantages of making movies outside of the cities traditionally associated with filmmaking. Also proposed by me and Jesse. Vote for it.
Sex it Up! - What’s the difference between art and porn? The old joke is that “one is in focus,” but it’s also an aesthetic distinction that is increasingly irrelevant. Just as more “mainstream” indie filmmakers are utilizing explicit themes and imagery in their works, a new school of directors working on the adult side of the industry are creating works that defy the porn clichés. Even if you’re not looking to bare all, here’s your chance to learn from each and tell stories that move past the bedroom door to embrace the full range of our experiences. Proposed by Lisa Vandever of Cinekink. Vote for it!
Jennifer Amman, Festival Production Manager for the Telluride Film Festival, leaves her position with this rather public message. I've never met Jennifer or been to Telluride, but the video provides a glimpse into the problems (and backstage tensions) that exist at many film festivals these days. Sponsors are harder to come by these days and money is tight all over. It's tempting to side automatically with Jennifer, but as Sarasota Film Festival programming director Tom Hall rightfully points out:
. . . cutbacks to festival budgets are an absolute reality right now, and that one of the main issues facing any non-profit at this time is setting new, adjusted priorities and getting organizational buy-in for those changes. I don’t think there is anyone working at festival today, from a Board President to a volunteer, who has faced down a change to the landscape and hasn’t thought to themselves “This is the last straw.” I know I have, I know everyone has; it’s all part of being under-paid, over-worked and deeply passionate about the integrity of the event you’re putting on.
That said, finding savings in the morning meals of your volunteers (if true) makes you an easy target for ridicule.
I suppose it was only a matter of time before someone struck on the idea of a film fest at Burning Man. Luckily for potential attendees, the folks who organized this one have a ton of experience. They're going to need it – the conditions they'll face are unlike those at any other film festival.
I have a ton of notes on this and I'll be writing a longer entry soon, but the festival's call for entries ends tomorrow (Thursday, July 15th) so I wanted to get the word out today. If you have a short film that would be cool to show at Burning Man, now's your chance. Here's the link to submit. There's also an official Facebook page for the festival.
I just got word that the festival will be screening their films on "The Engine," a 1000-pound "light and steel sculpture" that is essentially a portable projection system. Sounds cool.
Tomorrow is the last day to get your film submission postmarked for consideration at the Austin Film Festival, one of the world's largest and most prestigious events dedicated to the craft of cinematic storytelling. (And I don't just say that because I used to work there!)
If the lure of a laid-back film festival in one of the world's most dynamic cities isn't enough, pile on the festival's Screenwriting Conference, which features intimate conversations and workshops with working screenwriters like Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine, Toy Story 3), John Lee Hancock (The Blind Side), and David Simon (The Wire). (Personally I'm looking forward to hearing from Jon Lucas, who wrote The Hangover.)
Naturally attending a festival like this one is better (and cheaper) when you're a participating filmmaker, so get your film in today. Details on submitting to the festival can be found on the AFF web site.
An insightful interview with one of my favorite festival directors.
I know that when I think of DIY filmmaking, one of the first filmmakers who comes to mind is Tony Comstock, whose wonderful film, ‘Damon and Hunter: Doing it Together,’ played at CineKink a few years back. He and his wife, Peggy, have been producing and distributing explicit documentaries for the past decade – and they regularly top Amazon sales lists for number of DVDs sold. Obviously, they’re doing something right – during a recent distribution/marketing panel I attended, Tony was tweeting me from a sailing excursion through the Caribbean, prodding me to ask the participants how many of them owned a yacht.
Overall, I think Comstock Films exemplifies how many filmmakers on the “porn/erotica” side have—largely through necessity—become proficient in getting their work out there and noticed once it’s been produced. Rather than waiting on the hope of some distributor picking them up, the need is there to reach out to an audience directly, bringing with it a front-running understanding of all the tools necessary to do so, especially staying on top of reaching out through the internet, including supreme mastery of SEO and finding ways to circumvent the many technical road-blocks that are intended to inhibit sexual content.
Read Peep Show Interview with Cinekink Director Lisa Vandever Part One at FilmSnobbery.
Be sure to check out the Programmer Profile of Lisa Vandever too.
"At festival screenings in the Palais, folks are deadly serious, dressed to the nines and behave with a generally austere manner befitting the most respectful film-going audience in the world," League said. "Just 100 meters away, appropriately through the back door of the same building, dozens of tiny rooms are outfitted with 6-foot screens, cheap video projectors and home-grade sound systems. This is the Marche du Film, where I spend the bulk of my time. Instead of tuxedos, folks are wearing sweat pants and T-shirts. Buyers are talking at full volume on cell phones during the screenings. At any given time, one-third of the audience will be either texting or snoring. If a film doesn't deliver in the first five minutes, half of the room clears out and buyers move on to the next room. I start watching about eight movies a day; I usually finish three of them. If you are a filmmaker with a movie in the [Market], do not attend your screenings. It might break your soul."
James Rocchi interviews Fantastic Fest director Tim League for an exploration of the fascinating (and terrifying) Cannes Marché du Film (Film Market).
 | The Better Film Festival Submissions Toolkit has a very simple purpose: to help you improve the way you submit your work to film festivals.
Divided into 7 core tasks with a discussion of each task, the 16-page Toolkit is designed for quick reading and gives you concrete, actionable tasks to make your film submissions package better. Best of all, you'll get the insight you need to better understand what programmers look for and how to submit with confidence. |