Durand Alexander
New member
I just wanted to share my experiences trying to secure a deal for my narrative short Grandpa's House over the past couple of years to find out if they are typical or exclusive to me.
In short, everything has gone terribly wrong since the film was completed or has been much harder (dare I say, impossible) than any worst-case scenario I ever imagined.
It all started with the first film festival I entered.
They told me being selected wasn't necessarily based on the merits of the film but also had to do with how well the film fit with the rest of their program and the other films they selected. I took that to mean the film was good enough to be in the festival but didn't fit with the rest of their films as well as they would like.
Other festivals entries followed with the same type of rejection letters, saying how many people had entered and how tough the competition was and how everyone can't make it and yada yada yada.
We then moved on to pressing up DVDs, but the company we paid to do it printed out covers at least five shades darker than the spec we approved. They ended up brightening it but never got it right, only acceptable to the point that it was no longer worth the hassle of shipping back and forth and to the point that I didn't think they were capable of doing any better.
And this was a major company too, one that you've all heard of, not some fly by night.
I tried calling agents to help me sell the movie. But they all told me I need a referral.
I tried sending material to production companies (Willl Smith's, Steven Spielberg's, HBO, etc.), but all I got was a returned movie or script with a letter from an attorney basically saying it has to come from an agent or someone they know.
Catch-22. I feel like the hero in an action movie: Mission Impossible: Making It As A Filmmaker.
The calls and e-mails to big store and movie and online retailers were never returned. And it took me weeks of deep internet research just to find the right person to contact.
Finally, I was able to get the movie on Amazon. And I was calling around (more days of research to find the right person to call) to television stations to get the pricing for my tv spot to run.
To this day, not one of them has returned my call. That was six months ago. I ended up not going that route because of budget concerns but still.
I shot a music video and paid to have it appear on a certain website, only they spelled the title of the song wrong (how will anyone find it to buy it with the wrong title?) and put it in 4:3 instead of widescreen.
How they messed that up will never be known.
I e-mailed them to correct the title, and they finally got it in widescreen within the past two weeks, five months after the fact. I didn't bother contacting them earlier about the widescreen because I didn't have faith in them that they would be able to fix it.
And on and on and on.
So I would like to know, is this typical? Is this what everyone goes through? Or is it just me? Because I'm finding making it as a filmmaker a riddle, wrapped inside a mystery, inside an enigma, buried in a Dan Brown novel.
All comments are welcome.
Thanks
In short, everything has gone terribly wrong since the film was completed or has been much harder (dare I say, impossible) than any worst-case scenario I ever imagined.
It all started with the first film festival I entered.
They told me being selected wasn't necessarily based on the merits of the film but also had to do with how well the film fit with the rest of their program and the other films they selected. I took that to mean the film was good enough to be in the festival but didn't fit with the rest of their films as well as they would like.
Other festivals entries followed with the same type of rejection letters, saying how many people had entered and how tough the competition was and how everyone can't make it and yada yada yada.
We then moved on to pressing up DVDs, but the company we paid to do it printed out covers at least five shades darker than the spec we approved. They ended up brightening it but never got it right, only acceptable to the point that it was no longer worth the hassle of shipping back and forth and to the point that I didn't think they were capable of doing any better.
And this was a major company too, one that you've all heard of, not some fly by night.
I tried calling agents to help me sell the movie. But they all told me I need a referral.
I tried sending material to production companies (Willl Smith's, Steven Spielberg's, HBO, etc.), but all I got was a returned movie or script with a letter from an attorney basically saying it has to come from an agent or someone they know.
Catch-22. I feel like the hero in an action movie: Mission Impossible: Making It As A Filmmaker.
The calls and e-mails to big store and movie and online retailers were never returned. And it took me weeks of deep internet research just to find the right person to contact.
Finally, I was able to get the movie on Amazon. And I was calling around (more days of research to find the right person to call) to television stations to get the pricing for my tv spot to run.
To this day, not one of them has returned my call. That was six months ago. I ended up not going that route because of budget concerns but still.
I shot a music video and paid to have it appear on a certain website, only they spelled the title of the song wrong (how will anyone find it to buy it with the wrong title?) and put it in 4:3 instead of widescreen.
How they messed that up will never be known.
I e-mailed them to correct the title, and they finally got it in widescreen within the past two weeks, five months after the fact. I didn't bother contacting them earlier about the widescreen because I didn't have faith in them that they would be able to fix it.
And on and on and on.
So I would like to know, is this typical? Is this what everyone goes through? Or is it just me? Because I'm finding making it as a filmmaker a riddle, wrapped inside a mystery, inside an enigma, buried in a Dan Brown novel.
All comments are welcome.
Thanks
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