Zeitgeist 20th Anniversary Salute at MoMA Presents Two Films From Todd Haynes

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York began a celebration this week of the distributor Zeitgeist Films 20th anniversary with a retrospective of some of their best releases from over the years. Friday night, Todd Haynes presented two of his earlier films from the Zeitgeist collection, the short Dottie Gets Spanked and the controversial feature Poison , both shot by the great indie cinematographer Maryse Alberti, who most recently lensed Alex Gibney's documentary Taxi to the Darkside and whom I've had the personal privilege to work with on two short films in my own early days of independent film, a mere eight years ago compared to Zeitgeist's, Haynes' and Alberti's longevity. As an aside, Dottie Gets Spanked stars two former One Life to Live castmates, J. Evan Bonifant (ex-Al Holden) and Barbara Garrick (Alison Perkins). I state this because a few weeks ago, I posted notes from from the OLTL 40th anniversary panel discussion (speaking of anniversaries) at the Paley Center. Haynes also cast Garrick in his 2002 film Far From Heaven. She is a great character actress and I hope to see her in more of Haynes' films. Where is this aside going, you might ask? I suppose it just shows the point I addressed in my intro to the OLTL notes where I said "both genres (that being soaps and independent film) when done right, are often bold, risky, and deal with thought-provoking socially relevant issues." Nuff said. For more reading on Haynes, check out The Film Panel Notetaker's notes (here and here) from last year's New York Film Festival. And here are my notes from Friday night's discussion featuring highlights from the opening remarks and audience Q&A:

Zeitgeist: The Films of Our Time

Todd Haynes' Dottie Gets Spanked and Poison

MoMA

New York, NY

June 27, 2008

Haynes opened by thanking MoMA for bringing him to New York from Portland, Oregon. "This was a once in a lifetime opportunity to pay tribute to these two unbelievably talented, brilliant, smart and innovative distributors." Haynes is speaking of course of Zeitgeist co-founders Emily Russo and Nancy Gerstman, who were also present. "They are without a doubt the best distributors and best people I've ever worked with in distributing any of my films," Haynes said. On his films, Haynes said Poison was conceived, financed and approached at the time as an art project, outside the realm of traditional film financing and production. Russo and Gerstman were so committed to what Haynes was doing (along with Apparatus Productions partners Christine Vachon, producer of many of Haynes' films, and Barry Ellsworth, who shot the black and white scenes in Poison) that they wanted to distribute Poison even before it was completed."We had distribution of this art film at a time when that isn't something that filmmakers in their right mind should ever expect," he said. The film became the subject of great discourse and debate. It was one of the early films that sort of "branded with the new queer cinema mantle" that fell into a lot of controversy from the far right. On Dottie, which Haynes said was sort of the most autobiographical film he ever made, came three years after Poison and was made for ITVS , then was picked up for distribution by Zeitgeist. Haynes also dedicated the screening of Poison to Jim Lyons who both stars in and edited the film, and passed away last year.

Immediately following the screenings of Dottie and Poison, Haynes took some questions from the audience. Here are some of the highlights:

Q: Which of the Jean Genet stories (in Poison) were related to which of the stories you wrote?

Haynes: The clearest source for the film was Miracle of the Rose. It's sort of encapsulated in the prison story. I felt in a more general sense that I was interpreting aspects of Genet in all of the stories and I was very clearly interpreting the two more American genres...the horror film and the tabloid documentary story...into a vernacular that I felt I could speak in which is an American one. A lot of the same kinds of questions about transgression, about issues of the outsider, about issues of disease and the monster and so forth were things that I had encountered in Genet's writing. I felt this interest in bringing to a discussion that related to what was happening at the time, which is very much in the height of the AIDS scare. I was living in New York. It was sort of the center for a lot of political activity and activism and a lot of struggling that went on around those issues. I was also very much aware as we all were of how the media was beginning to depict AIDS and creating this sort of comfortable us versus them boundary. Those were the kinds of things I wanted to challenge, but I think even more than that, I felt that the gay community, which at that point was in a state of shock, where it wasn't being expressed through activism and through political activity. There was a retreat. There was an almost sense of culpability following the experimentation of the 70s and sexual experimentation that characterized that decade that people sort of felt that they had brought this on themselves. Genet had only recently died around that time and I felt like he was somebody that I could try in my own humble way to apply to some of these questions and embolden some of the issues that I felt might have been getting lost in the public assault around HIV.

Q: Genet did a film (Un Chant D'Amour) in the late 1940s or early 1950s which had a prison sequence in it. Was that an inspiration?

Haynes: I knew the film well when I made Poison and I love that film. Un Chant D'Amour is an exquisite work on film by this playwright and fiction writer and poet Jean Genet. I didn't want to literally re-produce those scenes. They're too specific to that film. There are some proverbially erotic scenes in that film that were shocking for it's time. Maybe the most provocative is the one you described where one inmate sticks a little piece of straw through a hole in the granite wall and smokes a cigarette and exhales the smoke into his neighboring inmates cell who inhales it and blows it back out. So simple and so minimalist...so powerful.


Q: What was it about the early 1990s that allowed you to push the envelope and make the kind of films you wanted to make? Why did you decide to make a feature after making so many shorts?

Haynes: I don't know if anyone would do that today. I bet it would have even been easier in the 60s and 70s to conceive of and get support for and get interest behind a film like this possibly. For me, and I think this is true for many ways Christine Vachon and Barry Ellsworth, were interested in aspects of experimental filmmaking...had all gone to Brown University where there was this very interesting theoretical program where any film classes were taughtwhich was called at the time semiotics. It has since expanded in a full-fledged department called Modern Culture & Media. We've seen these kind of departments of critical theory expand at universities throughout the country and the world. We were being exposed to critical theory, post-Freud and feminist, that looked at Hollywood classical cinema from the critical perspective. We were also witnesses the end of that purist era of American experimental film...the Stan Brakhage era, let's say, which was amazing work, but very anti-narrative. That period was beginning to be re-examined by some experimental filmmakers like Sally Potter whose film Thriller we had all seen in college. It was these filmmakers who were beginning to take genre and references to Hollywood film and references to narrative formulas and formats and applying them to experimental strategy. I think that excited all three of us in different ways. For me, in a weird way, my education was even more in Hollywood traditions and classic genre traditions than even experimental traditions. This melding of the two opened up our eyes. At the same time, Blue Velvet came out in theaters. You sort of saw in a sort commercial venue or parallel platform, something very similar where in a narrative film, experimental strategies...and playing around the idea of artifice and pushing the boundaries was being played out in commercial cinemas with great critical response and great potential for a lot of filmmakers. Probably gave birth to a whole generation of filmmakers. With all of that in mind, I think we sort of informed what Apparatus was about, a non-profit organization aimed at what we call the experimental narrative where narrative was being accepted from a critical perspective. It was something that was very much a part of that time and a real sense of necessity...some political response to the climate of HIV. And yet all of those films approached their narrative strategies with a sense of innovation and different from one to next.

ND/NF - "My Olympic Summer" - March 30, 2008

New Directors/New Films
My Olympic Summer
Walter Reade Theater – New York, NY
March 30, 2008

Daniel Robin’s My Olympic Summer, winner of the Short Filmmaking Award at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival, played last Sunday at the Walter Reade Theater during New Directors/New Films, a joint program between the Department of Film at MoMA and the Film Society of Lincoln Center. My Olympic Summer preceded the feature film Jellyfish. Below is my review of My Olympic Summer along with some notes I took during the audience Q&A. I also had the chance to correspond with Daniel for further insights on his film a few days later for a One-on-One Q&A, which you will find directly beneath that.

Film Review & Audience Q&A Notes:

My Olympic Summer is a fictional re-telling of the events of the 1972 Munich Olympics where Israeli athletes were killed by terrorists, told through home movies of Daniel’s mother and father who seemingly go through a rocky relationship, to which Daniel parallels with his own divorce. These are real home movies, however the events are manipulated into what I feel to be an artitistic and compelling story. If this were completely fiction, it would still have an impact, but the fact that Daniel creatively took movies and elements from his real life and turned into in a fictional account of a historical event, doesn’t make it any more or less artistic. Filmmakers have been fictionalizing historical events since the beginning of filmmaking, so why not mix two genres together to create a new artistic expression? Unfortunately, some audience members reacted negatively. The Film Society’s Joanna Ney opened the Q&A by asking Daniel to elaborate on his quote that photos conceal a certain mark of living. Daniel responded that most of the film is fiction and on one level, the film works on how we read images. Several audience members said they were offended that they didn’t know in advance that this was not all a true story and that they felt it was making light of an historical tragedy. Daniel said he wasn’t trying to dupe anyone and the most important thing is how you view the film emotionally. Another audience member asked him where he came up with the idea for his film. He said he was really interested in crossing narrative filmmaking over into documentary with an historical backdrop.

One-on-One Q&A with Daniel Robin:

TFPN: How do you feel the screening and Q&A at ND/NF went? What inspired you to make My Olympic Summer?

Daniel: When the audience member asked where I came up with the idea for the film I answered that the idea came from me wanting to find the best way to (cinematically) talk about my own, somewhat mundane, experiences going through a failed marriage, and still engage the audience. I feel for this particular film, combining narrative and documentary forms was the more interesting path to follow to get at the heart of the emotions I wanted to talk about.

TFPN: What has been the reaction from audiences at festivals where the film previously screened?

Daniel: In Amsterdam at IDFA, many audience members were outspokenly upset, saying they felt betrayed. However, their frustration came from the emotional attachment they had developed from the film rather then being upset about me re-orchestrating historical events. The funny thing was that with each of the five screenings at IDFA, other audience members would get up from their seats and tell those who were upset that it didn't matter if it's real or not, but that it's how you feel emotionally. And I couldn't agree more. My barometer for the success of my film, or for that matter any film I watch, is what I am left with emotionally, that's the truth of the film. So when I'm not present at screenings, which is a whole lot because the film is playing at many festivals, I'm not concerned whether or not the audience knows of my formal manipulations. And when I am present, and able to have a Q&A, which certain festivals won't even allow, then it's a bonus to be able to provoke discussions about how we read the surface of images and text in a film. What are our expectations of a documentary?

ND/NF- "Ballast" - March 30, 2008

New Directors/New Films
Ballast
Walter Reade Theater – New York, NY
March 30, 2008

On Sunday during New Directors/New Films, a joint program between the Department of Film at MoMA and the Film Society of Lincoln Center, Lance Hammer took questions from the audience following his narrative feature film Ballast, about the effects of a suicide on a family in the Mississippi Delta. The Film Society’s Marian Masone started with the first question.

Masone: You used no music as the soundtrack. That’s a really ballsy move. So many times, music is used so badly. Why did you choose not to have any music?

Hammer: From the get go, I realized there would be no music. I played with it for a while. My intuition was to capture the experience of the Delta. To fully communicate the Delta, nothing could construe against the sound.

Q: What inspired you to make your film in the Delta?

Hammer: I was from Los Angeles and visited the Delta 10 years ago. It was an experience of being overwhelmed emotionally. I let the film articulate what I was feeling. The history of racism is a sadness that’s literally a part of the landscape. I’m an outsider. I was interested in capturing the sorrow and grieving. I had to figure out a narrative element to base it on. My girlfriend told me about a story of identical twins brothers, one who killed himself. I thought that would be an interesting place to start. Over two years ago, I wrote the script. The more time I spent there and people I met, I realized how little I knew of the racial relationships there. It was important for me to cast people from the region. There’s a ratio of 9:1 blacks to whites. The people we cast would bring their own experience with them. We improvised a lot. The emotions in the scenes come from the actors. I hope it was communicated. All were non-professionals except for the white neighbor. I did the most work with him.

Q: Did the improvisations change the script?

Hammer: I never showed the script to the actors. I gave them a contrived scenario and they filtered it themselves.

Q: Did you always plan to have the story reveal itself slowly?

Hammer: I did in the writing process by structuring the cadence and pacing. The films I enjoy are the ones where I’m confused. You piece together the clues of someone’s life slowly. I’m offended by films that properly tell the back story. That’s not the way it works in reality.

Q: Did you choose the climate to shoot in?

Hammer: It took 45 days to shoot. I wanted rain and cloud cover. The film was shot with a handheld camera for two reasons. First for aesthetics and second because it was important that the actors could do whatever they wanted. The camera had to follow them. Setting up lights doesn’t give you 360° capability. I wanted to make something as beautiful as possible without the limitation of film.

ND/NF- HBO Films Roundtable: New Directors and Beyond - March 30, 2008

New Directors/New Films
HBO Films Roundtable

New Directors and Beyond
Walter Reade Theater – New York, NY
March 30, 2008

New Directors & Beyond Panel at ND/NF

Sunday during New Directors/New Films (ND/NF), an HBO Films Roundtable entitled New Directors and Beyond took place with ND/NF veteran filmmakers who talked about the beginning of their careers, where they are now, and new technologies that are changing the way they make films. Overall the discussion was nice, though I kind of wish moderator Joanna Ney would allow the panelists to further answer one particular audience member's question about how the panelists connect to their audiences via online social networks and grassroots promotion versus traditional marketing. Ney said that this wasn't a marketing panel. True, but this was still a relevant question because many filmmakers are now utilizing these resources to their advantage, and it would have been interesting to hear more thoughts on how the panelists may or may not be using them, being that they come from a previous generation where these tools weren't necessarily available to them when they were starting out. Speaking of audience questions, there was another really good one: To what extent do you feel the choices you made in your career were your own vs. external factors, to which Lodge Kerrigan answered, "That's a fascinating question."

Moderator:
Joanna Ney, ND/NF Selection Committee Member & Producer, Arts Programming, Film Society of Lincoln Center

Panelists:
Lodge Kerrigan (Clean Shaven, ND/NF 1994)
Philip Haas (A Day on the Grand Canal with the Emperor of China, ND/NF 1988; Music of Chance, ND/NF 1993)
Tom Kalin (Swoon, ND/NF 1992)
Jim McKay (Our Song, ND/NF 2000; Everyday People, ND/NF 2004)
Michael Almereyda (Another Girl, Another Planet, ND/NF 1993)
Tamara Jenkins (Family Remains, ND/NF 1994)
Su Friedrich (The Ties that Bind, ND/NF 1985; Rules of the Road, ND/NF 1993)

Ney: After your initial films, was it easier or more difficult to make your second film?

Kerrigan: Clean Shaven was an amateur film. It took two to three years to make and cost about $60K just to correct it. If I started shooting, then I’d be so much farther than just talking about making a film. At the end of the day, it was a good experience. When it ended, it was such a strange experience. I thought I had to make something else. I sent it to Telluride where Roger Ebert saw it, and then it was selected by ND/NF. I went to a writer’s workshop in France and got my second project produced. People look for a blueprint on how this happens, but in my experience, there is no blueprint.

Haas: My third documentary about Hockney was the film that got me attention. ND/NF positioned me. I then got another film, Music of Chance. I thought that would get into Sundance, but the festival committee didn’t like it. The financiers were in a panic. The only thing we could do was change the music. The along came ND/NF to show the film. Music of Chance was more successful for its esteem than as a commercial success.

Kalin: I started as an experimental filmmaker. My first film grew into a feature. I got involved with Christine Vachon and Todd Haynes in an AIDS activist group. I continued to make experimental shorts. I fell in love with the book Savage Grace, a light-hearted story about Irish-Catholic women, a sweeping epic story that ends in tragedy. We never made the musical version of it, because Andrew Lloyd Webber had the rights at the time. I still wanted to do Savage Grace and re-optioned it. It came about because I never fell out of love with the project.
McKay: I thought my second film would be easier to make. I financed my first film, Girls Town, myself with credit cards. It got a distributor, but I kind of got cocky and thought I knew how to do it. Then I wrote Our Song. It’s about the project itself, not about what you did before. I remember Steven Sodergbergh did Sex, Lies & Videotape, and then he did a lot of smaller films after. For my second film, I cobbled $100K. That got into ND/NF, probably my best filmic experience for me. I was asked to get involved with HBO’s Everyday People. For my next script, Angel Rodriguez, they wanted to make that, too. It was a much smaller film. That time has changed just because of corporate changes at that place. I think they decided to stop making smaller films. I never cast someone because they would bring in money, and that’s sad. I like to watch films with people who don’t have a lot of baggage so you can get to know their character.

Almereyda: I had a rough time on my first movie, Twister (not the blockbuster Twister from 1996). No one was paid except for an elephant from New Jersey. It’s a very eccentric film under one hour long shot in pixelvision. It’s kind of magical. It had an odd history on the festival circuit, but was never released. It’s not even on DVD. I was lucky that some people saw it and liked it such as David Lynch and his wife. They were excited about getting involved with my movies, but couldn’t get the money. I then made Nadja, which is about vampires and also kind of eccentric. It’s easy to underestimate how difficult it is to make films, but things are shifting.

Jenkins: My first film was a half-hour film that played at ND/NF and was financed by ITVS. I finished film school and applied for a grant called TV Families. I got to make a weird black and white movie and got paid to do it. It was my first semi-pro film. Probably one of the purist experiences I ever had. Prior to making films, I was a performance artist. Theater companies encouraged me to make my own material. I realized when you get frustrated; you can make your own thing. I went onto film school eventually, then got my lucky break by getting this grant. At Sundance, it won the prize for best short. It led to me making Slums of Beverly Hills as a broke emerging artist in a post-grad stupor living very frugally. At Sundance, I met Michelle Satter who asked if I had a feature. She had a great new timing quality. I sent her this unfinished screenplay and got it into the Sundance Screenwriter’s Lab. I’ve been saved many times in my life by institutions. Those have been like my mother. I developed the script at Sundance. American Playhouse was going to make it, but Federal funding went away. Eventually, I made it with Fox Searchlight. I never had to negotiate with executives before that. I think they should teach that at film school.

Friedrich: My film The Ties that Bind from 1984 was a stunning moment for me because I had only been making films for a couple of years. It was only 54 minutes long and it was selected for ND/NF. There was a full-page review in the Village Voice for it. I am really grateful for ND/NF for choosing my film. I’m different than these other panelists because I don’t work with commercial films. I didn’t get investors to give me money to make my films. I did get a stipend to go to Germany. It gave me time to think about what to do next. I proceeded to get grants and made Rules of the Road, a 30-minute film, in 1993 about a woman I know. At that ND/NF screening, I was sitting near a couple I didn’t know who said they didn’t know lesbians live their life like that. I thought that was a great moment. It’s not all an easy road.

Ney: How has technology affected your filmmaking? Is it evolving? Does it have an impact?

Friedrich: I always shot on film until 2002. I wish I could still afford it, but I can’t. My new short is on video. It’s a great boom to have this medium, but you have to deal with lousy projection, except here at the Walter Reade Theater.

Almereyda: I’ve shot in about every medium. Shooting in film is cumbersome and expensive. William Gibson said the future of film is not evenly distributed.

Kalin: I work only in film. Started with 8mm and eventually graduated to 16mm. Savage Grace was shot on 35mm. Julianne Moore means something financially, but she was also the right person for the role. Technology will continue to move forward. People tend to choose what the economy dictates and what stories dictate. It depends on aesthetics. I’m mostly drawn to lyricism and romanticism. You also have to embrace the limitations.

Kerrigan: It’s important to couple technology with the discovery of distribution. How will you get people to see your film? It’s based largely on advertising.

McKay: When digital cameras came into being, everyone could make a movie, but I don’t know where they all are. Sherman Alexie was quoted as challenging directors to make something for less than $1,000. A personal story is possible, but where are they? We have 100 million people making videos of exploding Coke bottles on YouTube. It’s still an elitist group of people who are telling you what to see. The next film I’m producing that’s directed by Josh Fox is shot with a handheld camera and mixes fiction and documentary. My company invested in it and one year later the director came back with something completely different. It’s hard getting it into festivals. It’s all video and looks like crap at times intentionally, but it works when you’re in a small room of people or watching it online.

Friedrich: I’d like to respond to Jim’s remark. We’ve all heard that all this great work will happen. The problem with things on YouTube is because of distribution. I teach and all my students think they’ll be filmmakers. Odds are it won’t happen. How do you support yourself? Me for example, because I came from a time where there was a circuit to show work. There’s a limited amount of space to show this work. There’s a lot of talented filmmakers who are justifiably desperate. It’s just a bad scene.

Kalin: The Rodney King beating was kind of a watershed moment in video. It’s kind of awful this idea turned into YouTube.

Kerrigan: The music industry is under increasing pressure to offer music for free and make up revenue through concerts. This will be applied to the film industry, too.

Friedrich: Theaters in America can show a short before a feature. IFC Center is the only place I know that does that.

Audience Q&A:

Q: To what extent do you feel the choices you have made in your career have really been your choices verse external voices?

Kerrigan: That’s a fascinating question. Your environment determines what you really want. When I was younger, I was determined to take my time. As I got older, I had to support myself and family. I’m now attached to direct a studio film. I want to do it, but question where this comes from. So much of people’s really interesting vibrant work happens early in their career. When you get too relaxed, you somehow lose certain focus.

McKay: Bingham Ray once said that indie film is the realm of the young and irresponsible, which to I add people who also want to live in New York City and don’t want to have a family. I lived on people’s couches. After that, I had a family. Comfort is a part of it. Is it my dream choice to direct an episode of Law & Order? No. I’d rather make my own films, but this allowed me to make my films. My wife wrote a script which I’ll now direct. I never did anything I wasn’t crazy about.

Kalin: I made my second feature 15 years after the first one. I was barely paid to make it. I’ve chosen not to pursue other offers except my own work. I also teach. It’s been completely rewarding. I still want to make opinionated films.

Q: Do you continue to work with the same talent and crew from your first films?

Kalin: On Swoon, I worked with Ellen Kuras and then worked on several shorts with her after. There’s also a great reward working with new people.

Haas: I’ve worked with different people over the years. I started working with my wife, but not anymore. It’s good to have continuity, but also to be open to new situations.

Jenkins: I worked with an entirely different group of people on The Savages. It always feels the same making movies. The problems always feel the same, like where to put the camera. I feel the same anxieties.

Friedrich: I’d like to make a remark. There’s something to do with age. I think there’s a problem in this country regarding mania for youth. It used to be as you go along, you get better, ie. Kurosawa. We need to remember if there isn’t going to be any support, you have to be 24.

Kerrigan: This is tied to economics. When you’re young and have potential, people see it, but that can’t define it. Studios think perhaps they’ll evolve into a great talent, but potential can diminish.

Haas: It’s also a question of perception. More commercially successful films get pigeonholed. It’s reassuring and depressing to hear this.

Q: How easy is it to connect to your audience? Have you experimented with social networks or grassroots promotion versus traditional marketing?

Kerrigan: It’s usually best if you already have a brand. It could be very effective, but how much of your time can you devote to setting up this mechanism.

Haas: It works best when it goes hand in hand with traditional marketing.

Q: Is it important to live in New York City to do creative things or has technology made it easier to live anywhere and do it?

Kerrigan: Filmmaking is like any other industry. It’s centered on relationships. You can write a screenplay anywhere, but you have to develop relationships.

New Directors/New Films - "Frozen River" - March 26, 2008

New Directors/New Films
Frozen River
MoMA – New York, NY
March 26, 2008

Frozen River Director/Writer Courtney Hunt and Actress Melissa Leo

At the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City Wednesday night, the Sundance Dramatic Grand Jury Prize-Winning Frozen River opened the New Directors/New Films series, a joint program between the Department of Film at MoMA and the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Frozen River is the feature directorial debut of filmmaker Courtney Hunt. The film stars the sure-to-be remembered at Academy-voting time actress Melissa Leo (21 Grams) who portrays the ultimate desperate housewife who after her gambling addicted husband leaves her and her two children, goes to desperate measures to pay the bills for her family by helping a Mohawk Native American woman smuggle illegal immigrants from Canada into the U.S. via a frozen river on the border of an upstate New York town.

Hunt and Leo were on hand after the screening for a Q&A with the audience. The Film Society’s Rich Peña kicked off the discussion.

Peña: How did you make the transition from the film starting off as a short into a feature?

Hunt: I had an idea a long time ago of women smugglers. I knew this went on at the border. Back then it was cigarette smuggling, but no one was interested in that for a film. I put the idea aside and had a baby. I later made the short. It was accepted into the New York Film Festival, which was shocking. I took that lift and developed it into a feature.

Q: How long did it take to complete the feature?

Hunt: Since making the short, it probably took about three years just to get financed.

Peña: How did you get involved with the film?

Leo: At a 21 Grams after party, I met Courtney who came up to me and asked if I wanted to do a short. I’d say it was about three years after making the short that I asked Courtney, when are we making the feature? The experience of making the short was a vital tool to making the feature by learning what the conditions would be to work in. We were very well prepared for it.

Q: Did you have a relationship with the Mohawk Nation?

Hunt: I found Misty Upham (who plays Lila) through a Native American actors website. She is not Mohawk. The short was shot on a reservation. We had a lot of support there. The feature was shot in Plattsburgh, NY. My producer Heather Rae also made contact with a reservation and cast actors there.

Q: Is there any underlying message in the film that crime pays?

Leo: What she (my character) wants is more than she can bare and has to step down a notch to get it.

IFP - Alternative Models of Distribution - March 14, 2008

On Friday, IFP organized an event in conjunction with the Consulate General of Canada in New York for Canadian producers and directors whose work is screening at MoMA as part of their Canadian Front series. I attended a panel discussion on Alternative Models of Distribution during this event. Below are my notes. Once again, Jason Guerrasio proved to be a stalwart moderator asking very on-topic questions, and getting some pretty meaty answers from the panelists. This was a very well programmed panel.

IFP’s US Industry Immersion
Consulate General of Canada in New York
Alternative Models of Distribution
March 14, 2008

(L to R: Jason Guerrasio, Arianna Bocco, Tom Quinn, Slava Rubin and Lance Weiler)

Moderator:
Jason Guerrasio, Managing Editor, Filmmaker Magazine

Panelists:
Arianna Bocco – Vice President, Acquisitions and Productions, IFC Entertainment
Tom Quinn – Senior Vice President, Magnolia Pictures & Magnet Releasing
Slava Rubin – Founder & Chief of Strategy and Marketing, IndieGoGo.com
Lance Weiler – Partner, Seize the Media & Co-Founder, From Here to Awesome

Opening Remarks

John McNab (Deputy Consul General, Consulate General of Canada in New York):
This was the first occasion I had to participate in this, the fifth anniversary of coming together of the Canadian film community. It’s maturing into quite an event. Last night at MoMA, I saw Poor Boy’s Game. It was an edgy film. There was a discussion after with Canadians and Americans talking about distribution and financing.

Michelle Byrd (Executive Director, IFP):
The program is based on the relationship and success of the International Alliance, a new IFP program. Last week, we did a program with Unifrance. In November, we’ll do one with the Indo-American Arts Council Film Festival. We feel New York City is the capital of independent film. Today’s event was inspired by four years of working with the Consulate General of Canada.

Susan Boehm (Managing Director, International Programs, IFP):
Poor Boys Game participated in IFP’s No Borders program in 2004. Those participating in today’s event will become digital members of IFP.

The Discussion

Before asking questions to the panel, Guerrasio said that the film The Lilliput, which is featured on IndieGoGo.com (founded by panelist Slava Rubin) has raised approximately $10,000 through IndieGoGo.

Guerrasio: Are traditional models of distribution going to the wayside?

Bocco: I look at it on a sliding scale. I don’t think it’s dead, but crippled severely. I don’t think distribution can survive on just traditional models. There’s more films out there, more competition for screens and rising costs.

Quinn: I feel crippled, handicapped and screwed. For the last eight years of theatrical distribution, there are at least twice as many prints. Ticket prices have raised approximately 30%. The price to produce a movie has raised approx. 40%. The million dollar theatrical gross was attainable three to four years ago, and now is only attainable to about $300K-$400K.

Rubin: When does distribution really start? Do you think about strategy from the start of making your film? Is online distribution an option? The challenge is the capacity of distribution and the cost to make film is still a hurdle. The risk is slowly coming out of that process. What medium do you want to have your film distributed? Folks coming to IndieGoGo.com are not taking for granted their film has to get theatrical distribution.

Guerrasio: How do you get your films out there?

Weiler: The Democratization of tools has created a surplus of films. When I released my film on DVD, it performed well at retail stores like Best Buy, but there is shrinking retail space. The excitement is with the direct connection to your audience. I start early in the process. I got my audience to help me to amplify my message. You see this mostly in the music industry, ie. artists trying to get control of their work such as Radiohead.

Guerrasio: Magnolia Pictures and IFC Films are successfully using the day-and-date model. How has the model worked for you?

Quinn: It always comes back to the content. Unless it’s tailored for a particular release, it doesn’t make much of a difference. Look at the figures and numbers of what day-and-date are doing. Magnolia is pushing 40 million households on VOD. The benefit is we also own Landmark Theatres, a chain dedicated to specialized film in the top 21 markets. This enables us to flex our muscles in the day-and-date model. Our showing of the Oscar short films was very successful surpassing $500K. It was simultaneously released on iTunes. Theatrical money always jumps from there.

Bocco: The key is prints & advertising (P&A). The whole notion of the amount of money spent on traditional distribution has really changed. IFC releases about two films per month or 24 films per year. You have to be conscious of P&A spent. Our day-and-date model (IFC FirstTake) has worked incredibly well. It has evolved. We release films theatrically and on VOD simultaneously, ie. Paranoid Park. There’s certain reciprocity with theatrical releases and VOD. It actually helps your box office. Word of mouth really spreads. With 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, we projected low VOD numbers, but probably quadrupled our expectations. It’s also about to go to $1M at the box office.

Quinn: It’s an ever evolving thing as far as content goes.

Guerrasio: Is the FirstTake model being used for every IFC film now?

Bocco: Yes. We’re now in 50 million homes for VOD. We just made a deal with Blockbuster. It’s been really successful. Why go backwards to a traditional model? We have a lot of these ‘Mumblecore’ movies. They embrace this model. I see a generational difference in filmmakers. Even someone like Gus Van Sant is all for it.

Rubin: Robert Greenwald’s Iraq for Sale was a successful and controversial film. My point is that he needed to raise approximate $750K, but could only get about $350K. He sent an email to people who saw his other films and raised around $250K from them. He already had an embedded audience. Instead of Do-It-Yourself (DIY), we call it Do It With Others. How do you create a multi-platform universe where your project can exist?

Weiler: For Head Trauma, I had a VOD release through Warner Bros. I knew they wouldn’t promote the movie, so I created an alternative reality game (ARG). The storyline ran in tandem with Head Trauma called Hope is Missing. I released it through a variety of outlets. I saw 2.5 million people play the game spending many hours with it. I also did guerilla drive-in screenings. People found out about them through the game. I also used this to promote the DVD release. Day-and-date sees consumers driving the way the market is going. The game experience created this whole world. A perfect example is World Without Oil where uses created content. It’s a form that’s emerging and has a lot of possibilities. If it’s compelling, people will engage in it. They’re interested in something that’s easily accessible.

Guerrasio: Do filmmaker realize that their films may not play theatrically?

Rubin: The challenge is that there is an emotional tie being in a theater. The data proves that theatrical distribution may not be as successful on its own. The concept of not getting theatrical distribution is okay. There’s more of a mind shift of what is acceptable.

Guerrasio: Where are we with watching films online? Is this the next step?

Weiler: There are a number of issues starting with the ease for the audience to be able to view films online. There’s also politics and policy, ie. bandwidth allocation. Another is traditional windows of release and SAG-related contracts that go with that. But there are a lot of people stepping into this space to aggregate it. BestBuy and iTunes don’t want thousands of filmmakers knocking on their doors. There’s not a lot of foot traffic outside of something like iTunes. Jaman, for example, only gives creators 30% of the profits, while they take 70%. Then there are some aggregators that make a service deal taking only 20% and giving the filmmaker 80%. Also issues with piracy. Day-and-date allows you to get it anyway you want it.

Guerrasio: Will there be web-based divisions in your companies?

Bocco: Not in the near future. There are so many platforms. I agree with everything Lance said. It all comes down to technology and the ease of consumers. The ability to expand in all these other platforms is great. Day-and-date gives films an opportunity to have lives they wouldn’t have had before.

Quinn: Everyone said TV was going to kill film and that video was going to kill TV. Essentially, it created content. I started meeting people in the past two years that don’t watch movies anymore. There’s still a business that’s based on theatrical models. Embrace the Democratization of distribution. My background is live theater. It’s better than anything else out there. There’s no better way to see a movie than at the Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, Texas. I do not think there are certain things that will go away completely.

Bocco: As a business, my company is part of a larger corporation. The challenge is to find ways to buy these films. We stopped producing films. Our goal is to continue to bring these movies to life, but we have to make money.

Quinn: I’m wrestling with the question, has the Democratization of film production and equity dramatically improved the quality of content? No. The percentage of films I’m excited about is less and less.

Bocco: I don’t think it’s changed. Perceptions and tastes have changed, but not the quality.

Audience Q&A:

Q: What’s the main demographic for customers at Alamo Drafthouse?

Quinn: College students under 30. I feel that consumers are very lazy. Familiarity of use is the key. I know exactly what I want to order and what’s going to be in the pre-show. IFC is another example that has a built-in audience that wants a certain kind of movie. I want there to be an Alamo Drafthouse in New York City, but not sure you’d get the same kind of service here that you’d get in Austin. The Alamo owner has gone way out of his way to trump mall movie theaters. They’ve figured out a way to serve food without interrupting the movie.

Q: Do you think producers will now be also producing games and events or will they look for people to produce these for them?

Weiler: It will become a natural extension of the production and distribution. Right now, everything is so fragmented and new. Distributors will always have some role, but more people are realizing they can go directly to their own audience. I think it starts at the beginning.