Tag: IFP

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Truly Free Film

I Don’t Do Panels. I Do Do Panels. I Am Doing A Lot Of Panels! What Am I Doing?

I don’t like panels. They can never be conversations. They are usually five people pushing separate agendas that have no relation to what the audience is looking to learn.

I like discussions. Two, maybe three participants is best. It was just me & Anthony Kaufman in Toronto. I happily moderate panels though, when it is an issue, film, or organization I care about. And sometimes I break my own rules. This weekend I am doing one panel and one conversation. I hope you will come. I may start enforcing my rules after this.

Tomorrow I am participating in ” Co-Production Strategies: Identifying and Negotiating US and International Partnerships” at the Film Finance Forum / East. Get tickets here.
“This session will address how to identify the right partners and locations for enhanced incentives, work out financial structuring, distribution territories, agreements, and accounting practices, among many other issues when working on co-productions in the current environment.”

Moderator: Jeff Begun, Production Executive, The Incentives Office
Panelists: Ted Hope, Producer, Double Hope Films
Randall Emmett, Co-Chair, Emmett/Furla Films
Harris Tulchin, Owner, Harris Tulchin & Associates
Pat Swinney Kaufman, Executive Director, New York State Governor’s Office for Motion Picture and Television Development
Lloyd Kaufman, President, Troma Entertainment

On Sunday, I am participating in IFP’s Independent Film Week in “The Hot Button: Is Indie Filmmaking A Career Or A Hobby?” My fellow participants are Scott Macauley and Mynette Louie. The blurb explains: “As production budgets contract and sales struggle to rebound, is it possible to make a career of independent filmmaking? Join the debate on the sustainability of the industry.” Get tickets here.

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Truly Free Film

Wake Up Early & Join Me Tomorrow…and maybe I will give you a free gift (seriously)…

I know told you before, but why say something once when you can say it two or three or more times? I am here to help. I am here to share what I have learned. I am here to offer some hope. At least for the moment…

So tomorrow I am participating in two public events. One is free. The other you have to pay, but the money goes to support a great organization (IFP). And to someone who knows the secret word and meets me at either of the events, I have a gift to give you. So if you come to either….

x

And by either I mean:

tomorrow’s IFP ScriptToScreen conference where I will be moderating a case study of MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE with Borderline films, including writer/director Sean Durkin, and producers Antonio Campos and Josh Mond.

DIY DAYS NYC where I will be conducting a conversation with indie film producing legend Christine Vachon.

Come find me and stand on one foot while you tell me the actual name of the Lou tune that Mike Connel in the movie I did with Greg Mottola butchers the title of, and I will give you a couple of DVDs and other swag, and of course thank you for coming. I might as well as start clearing out those closets, right?

Sometimes I feel like I am an infomercial, so why not give out the indie equivalent of a knife set?

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Issues and Actions

The Audience Award Of Audience Awards

VOTE BEFORE SUNDAY AT 11:59PM FOR THE NOMINEES OF THE 1st EVER FESTIVAL GENIUS AUDIENCE AWARD AS A PART OF THE GOTHAM AWARDS

This weekend, voting is well underway for IFP and Slated’s Festival Genius Audience Award for the 20th Anniversary Gotham Independent Film Awards. This first-ever award gives audiences from all across the country the chance to pick five of their favorite films that took home an audience award at one of the Top 50 US and Canadian film festivals in the past year. After you, the people, have spoken, your voices will be heard on November 10th when the five finalists, the first-ever Festival Genius Audience Award nominees, will be announced on both IFP’s and Slated’s websites. This award is a fantastic, unique opportunity for you to give your favorites of this past year one last round of applause, whether you’re just a casual festival-goer or die-hard movie buff. And also, when you vote, you’re also automatically entered to win a one night’s stay at the Andaz Wall Street in New York City and two tickets to the 20th Anniversary Gotham Independent Film Awards on November 29th at Wall Street Cipriani. So go vote THIS WEEKEND at http://gothamawards.slated.com … and then run to tell your friends to vote, too. Awards season starts here…and it starts with you.

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Truly Free Film

Younger Audience & Creators Tell Old Fogies To Wake The F Up!

Guest post by Audrey Ewell

Ted Hope invited me to do a guest column about attracting a younger audience to indie film, after I commented on a column by Robert McLellan at Globalshift.org.  That column was a recap of the debate between Hope and Jeff Lipsky during a Cagematch at IFP Week.  You can read it here: http://www.globalshift.org/2010/09/19/indie-film-can-art-house-theaters-attract-a-young-audience/.)

The column’s final statement, attributed to Hope was this: “It all comes back to having a relevant and compelling story and telling it well.”  That is an oft-repeated statement, and I noted in the comments that what mattered more to this crowd was plot, subject and genre.   So who am I, and why should my opinion matter?

I’m the director and producer (along with my partner, Aaron Aites) of the documentary film, Until The Light Takes Us.  I am 34 years old, white, female, I love Antonioni, Fellini, Marker, and science fiction.  I have Gizmodo, The Huffington Post and The Economist on my Twitter stream.  I own three video games consoles and I’m currently on level 7 of Halo: Reach.  I listen to indie rock, stoner/doom, experimental, dubstep; and I am often on my boyfriend’s and friends’ guest lists when their bands play shows.  I am the audience you’re (they’re, we’re) trying to reach, + four years. But I’m immature enough to let those four years slide.

Continue reading “Younger Audience & Creators Tell Old Fogies To Wake The F Up!”
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Truly Free Film

How Can Indie Film Appeal To Alternative Youth Culture?

Sunday September 19th, as part of Independent Film Week, the IFP invited me to a “Cage Match” with Jeff Lipsky on Indie Film’s relationship with youth culture.  The discussion was spurred on by a post of mine “Can Truly Free Film Appeal To Youth Culture “, and the robust discussion everyone had in our comments section to that post, and then still further by discussions on Filmmaker Mag Blog and Anthony Kaufman’s column.  It was a good discussion before IFP even proposed the CageMatch, but I appreciated the opportunity to give it more thought.

You might have missed it but it’s been summed up pretty well by Robert McLellan on GlobalShift.org (thanks to Shari Candler for tipping me to that), Ingrid Koop on the FilmmakerMag Blog, and Eugene Hernandez at Indiewire (although I don’t agree, or believe I said, that Indie Film is aimed at white women over the age of 45 — although they are the dominant audience — but that we have to prevent Indie Film from being the province of the privileged, old, and white (i.e. me!)). Jeff and I could have blabbed for hours. I have plenty more to say on the issue.

As both a community and an industry, it is critical we look at both the creative, infrastructure, and societal factors for answers of why we have so failed to develop the alternative and youth sectors.  Every other cultural form has a robust young adult sector that is defined both by it’s innovation and opposition — yet in film that is the exception and not the rule.

To me the issue comes down to the fact that unless Indie Film appeals to the under 30’s, Indie Film will continue to marginalize itself into the realm of elitist culture like Chamber Orchestras and Ballet.

Continue reading “How Can Indie Film Appeal To Alternative Youth Culture?”
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Truly Free Film

Support Your Family! Give To Indie/Art Film Infrastructure

I have always supported the idea that you need to vote for the world you want with your dollars. I am the odd bird that believes in both optional and mandatory contributions to a better world; what’s all the beef about taxes? If our tax dollars really went to things I cared about, I would be all for more of them (as long as there was REALLY HEAVY penalties for corruption too that is). Hey, I’d even vote for mandatory conscription if it had more options than just military and if they provided some real training to the participants. But that’s a different subject, better suited for rants elsewhere. Let’s get back to the world of cinema…

Here on TrulyFreeFilm the goal is to find a way to build an infrastructure that can support diverse work (and promote it — the work, the participants, & the infrastucture). To that end, I think everybody that partakes in and benefits from the infrastructure, should give back to it. Sometimes this giveback comes in the form of labor and participation, and sometimes it depends on $$money$$. It costs to build the world that we want and being responsible means accepting that fact, and recognizing that it is our place to contribute.
By that standard, how much show one give to build the infrastructure for the culture we want? Should it be 5% of your income like they encourage in some churches? Perhaps even more is mandated when it also is your livelihood that needs support, right? If we don’t support our industry’s infrastructure, how can we expect it to be around to support us?

Beyond money though, we must fight for what we want with our actions. The phrase “stand up for what you believe” always felt off to me. Shouldn’t it be more “Step forward for what you believe“. Even if you are broke (it is indie film afterall) then hopefully you still have some time you could you give weekly to move the culture a bit closer to the one you want. Why don’t more people use their labor in this way?

So… what should we all be doing? Well, I have made that list before.
Maybe it’s time to air our laundry. Show our true colors. Perhaps we should discuss what we each really do, and figure out what more we can do. I am pretty public with my thoughts already, and with most of my actions too. But is it enough?
So… this is that list of mine as to what I have done this year to support indie film in terms of donations. I am showing you mine, not so much in hoping you show yours too, but to motivate you & others to do likewise). I recognize this list is just a start. I want to get more on the ball. I hope this list doubles next year — particularly in the artist support category (this is the dawn of crowdfunding). We all have to do a whole lot more. I know I have to give more money for a more diverse and vibrant cinema. I need to do more to support the existing apparatus. So this is that list in hopes that maybe you will be motivated to give a little more.
$ DONATIONS FOR A NEW MODEL:
$ DONATIONS FOR ARTISTS I SUPPORT:
$ TO SUPPORT EXHIBITION & CURATION:
Exhibition Membership: Film Forum
TIME DONATION: MENTORSHIP:
Sundance Creative Producer Lab Mentor
Made In NY Mentor
This is that Internship Program
WHAT I AM NOT YET DOING:
Active Membership In Organizations
The thing that I have been wrestling with is that I do not participate in any organization. I have previously been on the board of the IFP and have been on various advisory boards, but as of now I am not on any other than the Adrienne Shelly Foundation. I have thought hard about becoming more involved in the PGA, the IFP, & FIlm Independent but for various reasons of my own, haven’t thought my time is best spent there, as much as I admire each organization. I think this is a failing on my part but am not sure how to best to resolve it. I like to work where I am most needed and those organizations have a lot going for them already — although personally speaking I still think it is a lame excuse.

Supporting More Artists
Hopefully this will become easier to both identify and give in the new year with the rise of crowdfunding models.

Supporting More New Model Exploration
Hopefully this too will become more widespread and easier with crowdfunding in the new year.
Note to self: resolve to do better in 2010.
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Truly Free Film

I Will Be Speaking Publicly…

Instead of typing publicly that is.  I will be one of many panelists at IFP’s upcoming SCRIPT TO SCREEN Conference March 7 & 8.  My session “Working With Producers and Production Companies” will be Sunday at 230PM.  There’s a whole bunch of folks who will be there, and many even more interesting and knowledgeable than me!  C’mon down!  I hope to see you there.

For more information, visit IFP’s Script To Screen website.