Friday, September 21, 2012

IFP Film Week

Each year the IFP (Independent Filmmaker Project) holds a film week/Conference. This year's Film Week is at NY's Lincoln Center, with some satellite meetings at other venues....and this year Oroloro was in attendance. We had done our homework in researching the listed speakers - some of whom we have already been in touch with.

The first panel was comprised of the filmmakers who made Beasts of the Southern Wild, an ambitious indie film made for only $1.5 million.

The second panel was about the art of the pitch - how to entice people to want to know more about your project in 2-3 minutes. This panel was moderated by Darrien Gipson, the head of SAGIndie, with Winnie Lau (ExVP of Acquisitions for Fortissimo Films), producer Lisa Cortes, and casting director Paul Schnee. This panel had four people in attendance give their pitch, then highlight the good points of what they said and make recommendations of how to improve it. Two of the pitches were fairly good! Based on what we saw, we're convinced our pitch for MegaBall$ is solid.

The next panel discussed writers and screenplays that were good yet not produced. The Black List was started only a few years ago by Franklin Leonard of OverBrook Entertainment (who moderated the panel), and titles on that list went on to win major awards. Here writers talked about their struggles and successes, and how being on the Black List helped them.

The finally panel was a keynote, with speakers Christine Vachon and James Schamus, moderated by the IFP Exec. Dir,  Joana Vicente.  James coined a great phrase that best describes today's world on Internet connection as a "surveillance culture." Another panel was with J.C., Chandor, writer and director of the film Margin Call, talking about the process of getting that film onto the screen.

Dylan Marchetti, of Variance Films spoke about today's world of independent film distribution and marketing, as did Josh Braun of Submarine Entertainment. There was talk of crowdfunding by Stephen Paternot of Slated.com, Elizabeth Holm of Kickstarter, Paolo Freccero of Crowdstarter, moderated by Janet Brown of FilmBuff.

Another panel talked of methods of bringing eyeballs to your project with Marc Schiller, of Bond Strategy and Influence, Caspar Newbolt, a designer with Version Industries, moderated by Jon Reiss of Hybrid Films. There panels on self-distribution with guests Amanda McCormick of Jelly Bean Boom, Pablo Gonzales of TUGG, Erick Opeka of Cinedigm, moderated by Christopher Horton of the Sundance Institute.

On Tuesday, we had a 'speed dating' situation, where we were able meet several industry people in smalls groups to better understand what they could do, and how our projects might fit. Our meetings with Melissa Wells of United Talent Agency, Ryan Harrington of Tribeca Film Institute, Dan Berger of Oscilloscope Labs, Dylan Leiner of Sony Picture Classics, and Jon van Thaden of Magnolia Pictures all were helpful. We walked away with a better understanding of their needs and how Megaball$ would fit in - and how it was best to approach them. We handed each person a #10 envelope with our logo on it; inside was a simple one sheet on our film, a business card, and a bona fide lotto ticket. Hey, since MegaBall$ is about the lotto real tickets make great attention getter's.

After each day we'd reach out to these guest and connect via Twitter, Facebook, email and/or LinkedIn, thereby starting the process of branding our project to keep their interest. In the case of the Tribeca Institute, we were invited to apply for some of their film grants,  are filling a submission now! The grants not only include money (up to $50,000) but some mentoring along the long road to the finished film.

Overall it was a good few days that will payoff long term.

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