Author: Ted Hope

Categories
Issues and Actions

Are you joining me tomorrow?

I am speaking at the Tribeca Film Festival.  I promise to say some lively things, even some things controversial.  I know it should be fun and informative — there’s a lot of good people on the panel.

This is the panel description:
Is The Sky Falling? A Closer Look at the Future of Film Distribution
Depending on whom you ask, the landscape of film distribution is changing either for the better or worse. So which is it? Is the sky really falling on the film industry? Join filmmakers, sales agents, and distributors in a discussion about enabling independent film and filmmakers to reach audiences and make money in this digital landscape. Panelists include Eamonn Bowles, president of Magnolia Pictures, Ted Hope, producer/partner of This Is That Productions, Efe Cakarel, founder and CEO of The Auteurs, Arvind Ethan David, CEO of Slingshot Studios and producer of The Infidel, Paul Cohen, president of Red Hills Releasing, and Marc Simon, partner at Cowan, DeBaets, Abrahams & Sheppard LLP. Moderated by Geoff Gilmore, Chief Creative Officer of Tribeca Enterprises. Friday, April 23, 2:00 PM, SVA Theater 2

If you haven’t already: buy tickets here.

If you missed it here is Tribeca’s wrap up of it.

Categories
Truly Free Film

Discovery Tools: Better Internet Interfaces & Playlists

Finding what you want to watch when you want to watch SHOULD be the easiest thing in the world.  It still will always be hard to know what you want to watch, mind you — but if you do, you should be able to find it.

In terms of the knowing part of the equation, playlists are a start.  Every social media site should have an easy to use playlist function that allows you to post what you are going to watch, and for others watching those films to find you.  The film watching experience is only partially about content. It is also about social and we need to have easier tools to connect with if we are going to make it all work again,

And combining playlists with easy searches of what is available online is the start of something truly great.  Clicker helps a great deal in this regard. The ability to share playlists is a key thing when it comes to discovery and it doesn’t look like that is a possibility with Clicker unfortunately.  We want to be able to build playlists, post them, embed them, share them.

Continue reading “Discovery Tools: Better Internet Interfaces & Playlists”
Categories
Truly Free Film

Filmmakers vs. Aggregators: Distribber speaks of Win, Win!

Today’s guest post is from Distribber founder Adam Chapnick responding to the question of just what IS Distribber and how can it make the world safer for filmmakers.

Distribber was recently acquired by IndieGoGo, and in the wake of the publicity surrounding the announcement, we received a tremendous outpouring of enthusiasm and interest in Distribber’s service.  As is inevitable, there’s been some confusion around what Distribber does and doesn’t do.  

Distribber was created to help rights holders maximize the payback from their work and investment.

More specifically, Distribber was conceived as a solution to several persistent complaints from filmmakers and other creative rights holders about distributors in general and aggregators in particular.  (“Aggregator” is the term used for a company that acts as a gatekeeper between a rights holder and a retail platform, such as iTunes, Netflix, Hulu or Cable VOD operators like Comcast, Time Warner, etc.)  

The complaints surrounded 3 specific pain points: 

Complaint #1.  Eternal revenue-share for finite service

Continue reading “Filmmakers vs. Aggregators: Distribber speaks of Win, Win!”
Categories
Issues and Actions

Talk Back To “The Take-Back”

Although there is certainly a lot of “truth in the jest”, HammerToNail’s Tully’s plea to end all the blah-blah-blah of film panels on how-to-social-media-ize-your-film-to-glory and Stop-the-sky-from-falling-by-old-white-guys (I am on one this week!) is still written as humor: no one really needs another manifesto (and I live to write a manifesto each week). Yet…

The Take-Back has gotten a good deal of Talk Back. I think many of us fall on both side of the fence: tired of the same old, same old, and desiring to figure out some way to get the conversation started. Let’s face it: we need to figure out how to get people to talk about culture in a more meaningful way. Still though, Tully’s started a lot of good dialogue on film panels and their relevance. Now Brian Geldin of The Film Panel Notetaker has chimed in. Check out his post and lend your voice to the discussion.

Categories
Truly Free Film

More Thoughts On The New Film Festival Model

“Blood Simple” was the first film I bought a ticket for at a film festival.  It was screening at the NYFF and I soon came to recognize that the films accepted to that fest were of a exceedingly high quality.  The curatorial taste behind that festival choices was something I had confidence in.  They gained my trust precisely because they have never tried to be all things for all people, and for that I have always been willing to pay a premium for. The NYFF was, and is, a trusted filter.

Too many festivals these days program too many films without revealing, or reveling in, their curatorial hands, diminishing the power of their brand in the process.  If festivals are going to become the new curators, that will have to change.  Festivals must emphasize their unique taste, if not overall, then within sidebars at the festival.

Continue reading “More Thoughts On The New Film Festival Model”
Categories
Truly Free Film

Understanding Other Audiences: An Australian In America

Today’s guest post is from Louise Smith, the producer of Nash Edgerton’s THE SQUARE (out now in theaters in the US and highly recommended).

I’ve just returned from a trip to New York & LA for the release of my film THE SQUARE.

In the lead up to the opening weekend, I was part of some Q & A sessions with Nash Edgerton (the director), and we were asked a couple of questions that I thought I’d share with you:

Had we ever thought to subtitle our movie (the lady who asked the question said she couldn’t understand our accents)
Does everyone in Australia have a mullet
Hmmm… no and… um, no.

The Square -Anthony Hayes (Smithy)-(p)MatthewNettheim_2

The cultural gap between Australia & America is always bigger than we Aussies anticipate – especially from the eyes of an American looking toward Australia. We however, consume American movies and TV all the time, so there’s no language or cultural things for us to learn about your characters when we watch them… we know them already because we’ve grown up on them.

Continue reading “Understanding Other Audiences: An Australian In America”
Categories
Truly Free Film

Make It Tasty: Part 3 of 3

Today’s guest post from producer Cotty Chubb concludes his post on recognizing audiences.

“Joltin’ Joe has left and gone away.”

But here’s what we do have to do. We have to know who needs what we make. The days of a generalized appetite are likely past. The great magazines of my childhood are gone: The Saturday Evening Post, Life, Look.

In their place a multiplicity of niches… Bass-fishing, trout-fishing, salt-water-flat fishing, each with its own devotees, each with its own audience and its own media that satisfies with fact and fantasy.

When Beverly Hills was awash with money in 2006 I was talking to a successful independent producer friend who’d amassed a stash of cash, hedge fund money looking for a non-correlated asset paired with a compliant bank selling leverage. [No disrespect to my friend, none; I couldn’t have raised that money.] About a picture he was intending I asked, “Who’s the audience?” With the calm that comes from a full wallet, he said “If it’s a good movie, people will come to it.” Except that he’s since entirely lost his equity, tapped out. And he made some good movies.

Really, it’s only sensible. If your job is gratifying the unspoken needs of a group of people, shouldn’t you have some idea who those people are?

Continue reading “Make It Tasty: Part 3 of 3”