CLICK HERE TO FOLLOW THE ENTIRE PANEL DISCUSSION ON “MANAGING EXPECTATIONS ON THE FESTIVAL CIRCUIT”.
So, we’ve talked a lot about the pros and cons of film festivals. Here’s the real question…what would it take to improve festivals? We know that festival directors will wander around to this blog eventually. I’d love for them to read a list of suggestions for improving festivals. I hate mentioning a problem without presenting a solution. Here are my ideas:
1.) ELIMINATE PAY FOR PLAY.
Festivals should refund submission fees to accepted movies. This would solve many problems. This would dramatically impact filmmaker’s festival application budgets with only a minimal impact to festivals. Let’s run the numbers. Festival X gets 3,000 applications @ $50.00 each and accepts 300 movies. They have a total budget of $150,000.00. That’s $15,000.00 gross (or, roughly 10% of their budget). If they refunded the $50.00 fee to the 300 accepted, they’d still gross $13,500.00 (which means this impacts their total budget by 1%). And, they’d be sending a powerful message…if you’re film is worthy of our festival, you don’t have to pay to play here. This would have ancillary benefits as well. It would eliminate the shadowy practice of waivers. A complicated dance exists between the filmmakers who know how to get waivers and the festival directors who want to give as few as possible. It’s a nuisance to festival directors. It’s time consuming for both sides. And, it creates animosity. Filmmakers look like their gaming the system. Festivals look like the only thing they care about are submission fees. If festivals eliminated Pay For Play, they’d be able to tell every filmmaker “If you get into our festival we’ll refund your submission fee” and eliminate the shadowy waiver system.
Now, I know some filmmakers believe that rejected films shouldn’t have to pay. I strongly disagree. While no movie is accepted to 100% of the festivals they apply to, the cream most certainly rises to the top. I’ve been in the back rooms of festivals and seen the shelves of DVD’s. I’ve seen how much of the submissions are amateurish junk. If someone wants to submit a $300.00 feature film shot on a consumer camcorder with bad acting, bad sound and a bad script they most certainly should pay the submission fee.
2.) 20% PROFIT SHARE FOR FILMMAKERS FROM SCREENINGS
Festivals always talk about how poor they are. However, we filmmakers have you trumped. We’re not just poor…we’re in debt. Why does a movie like Gospel Hill, which cost five million, not get a share of its box office revenue from festivals? It sells out nearly every showing. Gospel Hill has played at least 15 festivals. The average theatre seats 200 people. It usually screens twice. And, it has sold out nearly every screening. Tickets are almost universally $10.00 each. That’s $60,000.00. Can’t festivals afford to share 20% of that with the film’s production company?
3.) ELIMINATE AWARDS
Being an official selection should be the only award given at festivals. The politics, gossip and infighting that surround awards is noise that detracts from screening movies. Telluride has this policy. Is there a filmmaker on the planet who wouldn’t give their right eye to be an official selection of Telluride?
I like awards. They make me feel good. They look good in my office. But, when I’m honest with myself I realize that festivals shouldn’t be a contest. They’re an exhibition. And, I get almost as much value from being an Official Selection as I do from getting another shiny medal to put on my shelf.
Now, until awards are eliminated you bet I’m going to pursue them. They become a vital part of my business plans. They prove to investors that I’m good at what I do. But, if you as a collective whole eliminated awards and I explained to investors that awards are a thing of the past and the reward is being an official selection they’d understand that.
How do you eliminate awards as a collective whole? Well, we got this thing called the internet. You could send email messages to each other and…you know…talk about it.
4.) ADOPT A UNIVERSAL PROJECTION FORMAT
Have you ever been in the projection room of a festival? The number of decks and projectors is dizzying. BetaSp, DigiBeta, DVCam, HDCam, DVD, 16mm, 35mm…the choices are too numerous and they drive up the cost of festivals. Personally, I vote for the immediate adoption of Blu-Ray. Decks are only $200.00 and the cost of duplication is $40.00 for a filmmaker. I can already hear people howling. “Sound will fall out of sync.” My answer: You’re applying an antiquated argument that beleaguered DVD players from a decade ago. I had one of those DVD players…when Clinton was President. Every time I hear someone talk about how DVD-R’s are unreliable, the audio falls out of sync, the discs don’t play I notice they have an unusual amount of white hair and remember the Vietnam War. The sync problem from the 1990’s was a hardware issue, not a codec issue. Maybe it’s time to buy a new DVD player…you know, one that was made in the 21st century. Besides, we’re not suggesting you screen DVD-R’s. We’re talking about Blu-Ray, which is a significantly better technology. Technology marches on, flaws are eliminated, quality improves and Blu-Ray is a fantastic format that would mean every festival in the world could afford to project in 1080P with surround sound.
And, I’d buy into the argument that we need five video tape formats and two celluloid formats if festivals consistently demonstrated the ability to screen well. I have yet to attend a festival that isn’t constantly struggling with projection. It’s too many machines. It’s too much gear. This isn’t a case of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” The system is most definitely broken and your techs are holding the system together with bailing wire and chewing gum.
The cost savings would be tremendous. You’d be able to reduce the number of techs needed for a festival. You’d eliminate the need to rent decks. You’d be able to prep a theatre far faster. You could require every filmmaker provide two copies to a festival, giving you greater screening flexibility. The cost to filmmakers would be reduced significantly. Festivals would make a greater profit, filmmakers wouldn’t hemorrhage money on multiple copies of their film in multiple (expensive) formats and the audience would benefit from an enhanced technical experience.
5.)STREAMLINE FILMMAKER COMPENSATION
Get rid of the gift bags. We filmmakers exploit you and grab as many as we can. You resent the process, anyways. And, it isn’t the kind of compensation a filmmaker needs. None of us need another denim bag with soap crystals from Debbie’s New Age Soap Emporium and 20% off coupons for a hot rock massage at Danubi Spa. Give us a hotel room and meal vouchers for local restaurants. Smaller festivals would triple the number of filmmakers who attend if a filmmaker knew they would have a hotel room and food. And, for festivals that struggle with getting free hotel rooms don’t fret. You’ve had an easy solution staring you in the face since the beginning of this ad hoc festival explosion…house filmmakers in volunteers homes. Seriously. Gather your volunteers together and give them one free festival pass to whomever will allow a filmmaker to stay in their guest bedroom for two nights. No, it’s not as simple as hotel rooms…but, if you are a festival struggling to house filmmakers this is a viable solution. As your festival gathers steam you can upgrade to hotels in the future.
If you can’t get restaurants to give you comps, get coupons for a discount. Don’t tell me you can’t convince a local restaurant to give you festival coupons for 25% off. In this economy or any other, what restaurant wouldn’t want 50 filmmakers coming into their restaurant? Turn it into an event…let them put a sign up that says “Unofficial Filmmmakers Lounge” or “We Support Independent Film - 25% Off For All Festival Filmmakers!” My guess is they’ll see an increase in revenue from residents as well as filmmakers during festival season.
6.) ELIMINATE FEATURE FILM Q&A BIAS
Most festivals pair a short with a feature. And, the short is completely neglected in the Q&A. The festival chose the short for a reason. The audience watched the short for a reason. Sometimes, the short is better than the feature. By holding a Q&A for the short before the feature begins, all filmmakers are treated equally.
7.) SPEED DATE FILMMAKERS & LOCAL INVESTORS
My sales agent is a blunt man. “Festivals are for your ego. Markets are for business.” He’s right. And, while every festival can’t make itself a market, they can create a market opportunity by holding the equivalent of speed dating lunches with filmmakers and potential investors. Most festivals hold “filmmaker mixers” (although, I have yet to understand what we’re really doing at these mixers considering how loud the music is). Why not structure an event that truly gives purpose to having residents meet touring filmmakers? If you read my articles on investment, it takes very little effort to educate small investors on the tax benefits of investing in motion pictures. We’re a tax shelter, my friend. We’re the safest investment in America. We’re backed by the Federal Government and subsidized by your state legislature. Require filmmakers to attend with a 10 page business plan and 1 page executive summary and speed-date filmmakers past local investors. You’ll see filmmaker attendance climb, ticket sales rise and your festival will suddenly have a strong business model.
8.) ADOPT A UNIVERSAL ONLINE SCHEDULE PLATFORM
I have to submit a synopsis, pictures and film details to every festival’s website. www.withoutabox.com was supposed to eliminate that, but it hasn’t. www.bside.com has the potential to do this. What I personally like about B-side is that I can email their staff and have them copy my materials from one festival to another. I did this for Delray Beach. I had B-side copy and past my materials from Durango to Delray Beach. B-side’s interface needs work. It’s UI isn’t intuitive, which creates more work for B-side’s staff. They’d save money if they upgraded their UI. Despite the UI problems, B-Side is a massive step in the right direction. This saves festivals and filmmakers time while creating a consistent user experience from festival to festival…which is a good thing! Why would every festival want to reinvent the wheel?
If you’re a festival director please consider these eight suggestions. I truly believe that these suggestions will increase the profitability of your festival, streamline your operations and compensate filmmakers in the manner they really wish to be compensated. Most of us (the sane ones) don’t want to be treated like celebrities. We just want to be treated with respect. And, you’ll find that many of us get that this is a business. We want your business to be profitable…but, not at our expense. I’d do away with all the free backrubs in filmmakers lounges and frou-frou schwag for a simple, streamlined relationship with a festival in which both of us profited from my movie and your venue.
CLICK HERE TO FOLLOW THE ENTIRE PANEL DISCUSSION ON “MANAGING EXPECTATIONS ON THE FESTIVAL CIRCUIT”.
JUSTIN EVANS began his first theatre company at 14 and began making films at 15. He is the only undergraduate in NYU’s history to complete a feature film while in school. Justin is the founder, former CEO & Creative Director of Mystic Arts in Beijing. He has been a film professor and art director in the video game industry. He recently finished the feature film, A Lonely Place For Dying – the preview screening of which won the Heineken Red Star at The Santa Fe Film Festival. He has been featured twice in Variety, twice in Moviemaker Magazine, and a mini-doc about his film will be airing on IFC throughout January 2009. Justin is a skilled graphic designer, photographer, production designer, screenwriter, cinematographer, director & producer and currently resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
April 28th, 2009 at 7:15 am
I think a Universal Projection format is an excellent suggestion. If the fests adopt Blu Ray they can even promote that all of their films are “shown in HD!”. I think the way to get this into effect is to go through WAB (and B-Side). Maybe WAB can come up with a marketing agreement with Blu Ray, I’m sure Blu Ray would like their name bandied about so that people see they can get the “same great quality at home that they see in the theater!” And the WAB can require or incentivise the Blu Ray projection fests. I don’t think this will be easily adopted if it’s left up to the individual fest programmers (despite the overwhelming validity and logic of the suggestion).
Profit sharing would be great but unfortunately I don’t think the fest programmers are going to see any benefit for them in it. Plus there would probably be some issues with opening the accounting books to verify the revenue, profit, etc as well as the need to pull profit from one section of the screenings to cover costs in other sections of the fest. This would probably almost virtually eliminate (more so than already) the possibility of a fest programming a “risky” movie that is going to have difficulty drawing a crowd. However a fest that gives out “bonuses” to the films that pack the house would probably be a fest with a good reputation.
#8) I have tried to understand and use B-Side and it just seems to be beyond my comprehension. I’m going to have to take a longer, better look at it to see if I can figure out how to use that tool.
Justin, once again, another great list. I’m going to have to go back and read your blogs regarding investors. Thanks!
April 28th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Nathan, the way they’ll resist this is by arguing it isn’t a mature technology. This is, of course, a ridiculous argument. Something doesn’t need to be from the days of the Reagan Administration to be a mature technology. But, that will be their argument. And, the festival directors will come to this conclusion because their techs will tell them this.
I’ve been thinking of starting a film festival, and if I did it would live by these 8 principles. I bet we’d get submissions like crazy if we did a 20% box office split with filmmakers.
But, you are right…most festivals will resist this. I don’t think it will be out of greed…I think it will be fear. They’ll be afraid they can’t pay for the festival if they lose 20% of their box office. It will take a few brave festivals to give it a shot and prove it can work for the rest to be convinced it is a viable option.
April 28th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Nathan -
Oh, I’m with you on B-side. Their interface is frustrating. It took me about 90 minutes to figure out how to upload 10 photos and some text. That’s the sign of a counter-intuitive interface. But, right now it is better than nothing.
April 28th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
I just spent a long damn time at B-side and I can’t figure out how to use it as a filmmaker or a viewer. There must be something wrong with me.
April 28th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
How present-day are these suggestions? Blu-Ray as universal platform seems a little pie-in-the-sky. How many people do you know authoring to Blu-Ray? I don’t know any. But mostly I think it’s a terrible choice because it’s still an optical disc format.
I organized a small festival for a few years and for two of those years we projected from DVD. Never again. We’d create and test the screening discs but every time something went wrong at the actual screening. Whether it was a scratch that had somehow magically developed between the office and the projector, or a bitrate problem, every time we ended up having problems worse than tape. Not all DVD players are created equal, and that’s only different for Blu-Ray because there are so few players currently. We moved on to file-based solutions (with DVCAM backup) and it was a far better way to operate. Of course this festival was short-films only.
As for festivals giving back 20%… what’s the upside from the festival perspective? Most festivals are hardly short on content, so attracting a flood of filmmakers with incentives isn’t really necessary, is it?
April 28th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
This could be a book. A good book. Keep writing!
1.) ELIMINATE PAY FOR PLAY. I hate to start with the only point I disagree with (you said we would though). The terrible film shot badly is only screened for about 20 seconds before the programmer hits eject. I don’t think even bad artists should pay for that “privilege.” I just don’t want to punish bad artists for being bad. Life will be cruel enough to them when their dreams go down the toilet. You had it dead-on in your first go-round: submission fees are an unethical way for a festival to pay for their costs.
2.) 20% PROFIT SHARE FOR FILMMAKERS FROM SCREENINGS Like, duh. Totally agree.
3.) ELIMINATE AWARDS Tote, dude, tote.
4.) ADOPT A UNIVERSAL PROJECTION FORMAT Blu-Ray is 1080p, hello. That’s like not so far away from a 2K film scan. I seriously hope this becomes a standard soon. There’s just no reason for it not to be. And I love your diatribe about the dudes who complain about DVDs not playing. Would you believe a broadcaster here in Toronto still insists on VHS submissions of director reels for fear the DVDs won’t play?! Ugh.
5.)STREAMLINE FILMMAKER COMPENSATION Wow. I’ve just never heard of this grab-as-many-bags-as-you-can thing. It just has never crossed my mind. I’m always thrilled with the gift bag–like a stocking at Christmas. But it sounds like I’ve been missing out on the real score!
And rooming with someone at a fest to lower costs is a cool idea. In fact, I’d love to host a (polite, clean, non-smoking, gay-friendly, left-leaning, please provide references) filmmaker in my own home. We could stay up late in our PJs and talk about movies. I’m not being sarcastic. I think it’s a great idea. Next time a New Breed filmmaker is coming to a fest in Toronto, we have a really nice guest room. Shoot me a note sean(at)rocketship(dot)com to inquire.
6.) ELIMINATE FEATURE FILM Q&A BIAS Yeah, I felt like the skunk at the garden party when my short screened before a feature. The opportunity to take even one or two questions would have been very flattering.
7.) SPEED DATE FILMMAKERS & LOCAL INVESTORS What’s investors?
8.) ADOPT A UNIVERSAL ONLINE SCHEDULE PLATFORM Great idea.
April 29th, 2009 at 9:44 am
Charles -
I don’t deny your experience is real. I’m certain you had major problems with DVD’s. However, I have a few questions:
1.) When did you do this? What years?
2.) Did you require filmmakers to get a glass master and then replicate their DVD rather than burn one from their computer?
3.) How high-end were the DVD players?
Lastly, Blu-Ray is not the same thing as a DVD. Just because the disc is the same size does not mean it is the same technology. It has a protective layer that prevents scratching. That alone makes a big difference. And, if festivals required filmmakers to make a glass master and only submit duplicates rather than burns from their home computer it would make all the difference in the world.
Consumer Reports does an annual review of DVD and Blu-Ray players. There is no need to “shoot in the dark” and randomly guess which player might be reliable. All we gotta do is research.
I’ve advocated hard drive storage before, as well. That freaked people out. They insisted that the hard drives would randomly crash and reliability would go out the window.
The bottom line is every festival director is afraid to adopt new technologies (as in, technologies from the last 10 years) because their techs feed them horror stories. No one has taken the time to reason through how to trouble shoot new technologies and build in enough redundancy that failure isn’t possible.
I dealt with this while shooting on The Red. Everyone told us it would be a nightmare. Dude, it was so freakin’ easy. And, that’s because we designed our technology pipeline two months before we shot. Then, it was as easy as hitting the button on the back of the camera.
April 29th, 2009 at 11:22 am
One small issue with the Blu Ray format is the $1500 AACS certification cost. That’s a little prohibitive at the “ultra-low-budget” level.
April 29th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Nathan -
That’s an excellent point! Can you think of a way around this?
April 29th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
I think that if you’re planning on self-distributing on Blu Ray then it’s no big deal, you’re gonna have to pay it anyway. But if you work in shorts or “experimental” films where there might not be any intention to do anything with it (at least not on its own or not on BD) after the festival run, then that $1500 is probably going to prevent the film from playing, which would put reduce diversity and programming would be restricted to only those films with deep enough pockets to pay.
Possible solutions?
I don’t think the AACS LA is going to budge on this so:
Fests create their own “Festival Screening BD” with 2 or 3 features (or a dozen shorts) per disc and cover the cost themselves? (Still looking at about $500 per feature if you can get 3 per disc. For each feature added, the cost goes down per movie). There goes the profit sharing.
Or the fests can purchase their own Blu Ray burners (about $1,000 each?) and make their own Blu Ray discs but then you run into the issue of the Blu Ray tech making bad copies with bad codecs or bad settings (and that’s what we’re trying to avoid)
Any other thoughts?
April 29th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
These are great points. I agree with just about everything, and some of these points are long overdue for thoughtful discussion like this.
A note on universal formats. This is something I’ve been discussing with Lance, Arin, et al for a couple years. Yes, the current state of things sucks, but there are a few problems with a standard format. First, it stifles innovation. Second, it tends to give control to a small group of corporations. That’s why you have these certification fees and why people are still using crappy old formats like DVDs.
I think a good solution might be a middle ground. For example, allow films to screen on any format playable in Quicktime player or VLC. That ought to be enough to handle high definition. It’s easy enough to hook a low-end Mac or mid-range PC to a projector with a $20 HDMI cable (depending on where you buy them). It will natively handle different aspect ratios and a far wider range of bit rates. It will also handle new codecs as they evolve. And you have a much wider range of options for delivery - FTP, hard drive, optical disc, etc.
Ogg Theora might be a good candidate for this in the next year or two. It’s open source, so no one company can control it, and I’ve heard good things about the quality. Quicktime doesn’t handle it yet, but Firefox 3.5 will support it, and it should start to gain wider acceptance soon after that.
Also, once these theaters are screening off computers, this opens it up to non-linear formats like Flash, allowing some crazy innovative stuff. Imagine, for example, having elements of your film modified in real time based on an xml feed, perhaps based on the current weather or what people in your audience are twittering.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:27 am
Agree on almost everything here, great post, but I disagree with the 205 payback. Basing this solely on my experience with regional festivals like Atlanta (and not my current sister fest, because I don’t run it) you really can’t argue that filmmakers beat the fests on being poor. We’re all poor. Most workers at most regional fests make less per hour than they could make at a chain-store because they love the work. The only fests that could afford to make any less money are precisely the same ones that don’t need to do it because everyone will pay to play - the big fests. Even those are struggling.
More importantly, I’m against it because it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of their value. Most films lose money on theatrical - it’s a loss leader to get attention to the film and make it back on DVD, etc AND an ego boost to the filmmaker. It’s also great for audiences, of course. If, and only if, you are a smart filmmaker looking to capitalize on your festival circuit tour, then you can use these to great advantage, selling DVDs at the fest, pushing to get emails, etc. enlist the fest’s volunteers to sell your DVD, tshirt, stickers, etc. If done right, you’ll surely make more than that 20%. If you are a lazy filmmaker who just wants to ship your film and hope it finds an audience then I guess that 20% could make sense.
There are two arenas where filmmakers have successfully pushed for screening fees - LGBT Fests where even shorts get paid a fee, and Jewish festivals. While this has been very good for filmmakers, I think it’s often bad for audiences. In Atlanta, perpetually underfunded, we often had to turn down many great films because the fees being charged were higher than our budget and we could barely break even. Audiences lost out by not seeing these films, the fest suffered and filmmakers missed a chance to be seen by more people. This has been especially true with foreign cinema, meaning less venues for access to quality foreign films because agents charge too much. And that’s usually who is making the money from these fees - distributors and agents, with filmmakers seeing very little of it.
I am all for reforming the system, but think we should talk about systems that help all three parties - audiences, filmmakers and fests.
May 5th, 2009 at 10:06 am
Justin great points and ideas.
for scheduling, I hope to have the guys from http://www.Sched.org involved. They do the SXSW schedules. genius.
and for filmmaker pay/credit/ etc Kris at http://www.scred.com has built a pretty awesome way of exchanging money etc.
excited to see where everything goes!
Mike