To festival or not to festival.. that is the question

Azmyth

Azmyth

Veteran
Ultimately, I want to get my film out on DVD by some distributor.

Its a campy low budget horror flick with some unique characteristics.

Do we bother with film festivals or do we take a different approach?
 
There are a lot of horror flicks showing at festivals - then again there are many more being made. The lower end festivals don't really have any distribution success. You'd probably get more success from another alternative, sorry, can't really suggest one - I'm sure someone else can.
 
If you want to use the film to get your name out there, take the festival route. If you want the film to actually be available and try to bring in some money, I'd go a different direction.

Have you at least looked into getting it available on one of the rental streaming sites? iTunes/Amazon/Netflix? These days I wonder how much the financial difference is to have a physical copy vs. simply available to rent.
 
I put little credit in the idea of "getting your name out there" via festivals. I think festivals are for the most part a big waste of time for anything other than maybe a "paid" premiere. Well, I guess some have great parties and swag.. but other than that, mostly a waste of time.

Once in a while something happens that helps a filmmaker, but not most of the time.
 
Snazzy Flapper said:
I put little credit in the idea of "getting your name out there" via festivals. I think festivals are for the most part a big waste of time for anything other than maybe a "paid" premiere. Well, I guess some have great parties and swag.. but other than that, mostly a waste of time.

Once in a while something happens that helps a filmmaker, but not most of the time.
Click to expand...

We actually had a major discussion about the point of film festivals recently: http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthrea...-how-the-game-is-played-these-days&highlight=

Yeah, I wouldn't use festivals to get my name out there. Many consider it to only be good for networking.
 
Yeah, I'm not sure what route to go in.

We premiered it Saturday night for a whopping 500 local folks. We cleared several grand in profits, that will all come to us..

Now this is only a fraction of what we actually spent..

Now I've looked at our options, and I'm wanting to do a combination of a few things..

1. get my name as a film maker out there, to get attention from investors to be able to make higher budget films in the future.
2. To have my film available for just about anyone to be able to purchase, whether that be physical or streaming.
3. (and I know this one is a toughy) Get enough funds from this to at least pay off what was spent.

For me... I'm looking at this route..

- submit it to a handful of "key" genre specific film festivals just to get the word out about my film in other places.
- submit it to several Horror specific distributors and see who bites or doesn't bite.

or

- self distribute it, and take it to horror conventions.


I don't want to be having to spend all my time still trying to market and distribute my first film, all while trying to shoot my 2nd. I need a solution that will allow me to work on another film while this is being marketed and sold.. so obviously a distributor would make the most sense. But, I don't want to "Give my movie away" which is what I've been told is the norm these days.


BTW... I read that other thread.. and its seemed more pointed towards shorts.. This is a feature length film.
 
Get your name out there to whom? Other festival goers? OK, that's nice, but not likely to ever land you a paid gig. To distributors and production execs? Then you need to get your film into Cannes or the other dozen or so top tier festivals, none of the other couple of thousand festivals in the US are really going to attract anyone you really want to see your film (excepting your mother, of course!).

If you want to distribute your film, call distributors, send them screeners. Buy a table at a decent film market. Try to get your film onto Netflix, iTunes, Amazon, Hulu, Vudu, etc. Book it into theaters yourself. You could stand on a busy street corner and sell your movie off a blanket on the sidewalk and you will sell more copies and earn more money than you ever would from putting it on the festival circuit.
 
What if we were to submit to a handful of genre specific festivals or even better go to horror conventions with it.

and either self distribute it via one of the many self contained methods (createspace) or get distribution via a smaller distributor and go to horror conventions with it.
 
Azmyth said:
What if we were to submit to a handful of genre specific festivals or even better go to horror conventions with it.

and either self distribute it via one of the many self contained methods (createspace) or get distribution via a smaller distributor and go to horror conventions with it.
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That's going to be a lot of work. Plus traveling.

Are you prepared to do that?
 
I think the most productive way to use the film as a calling card is to use it as a sample when you approach potential partners/investors for your next project.
 
I think we are going to submit to distributors first, and go ahead and screen at a handful of film festivals just for the experience and then if we haven't gotten a bite from a distributor.. we'll self distribute.
 
Do what feels right for you and then report back what happened!
Several grand in profits! You are making more than most film makers trust me!
I sleep on the street face down in piss my friend!
 
Yeah the total I counted this morning was 3200.. and thats in ONE night.
We still have a few more screenings to do as well.

I'm getting DVD screeners made now.. is MP4 good enough quality for that, or should it be higher?
 
Azmyth said:
Yeah the total I counted this morning was 3200.. and thats in ONE night.
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That's not several grand, just to be a semantic-Nazi. That's "over a couple grand." And, remember, if you got any crew on deferred payment, money needs to go to them.

But you've probably run through your friends/family crowd after the first screening. Would be interesting to hear what kind of drop-off there is for subsequent ones.

I'm getting DVD screeners made now.. is MP4 good enough quality for that, or should it be higher?
Click to expand...

I don't know what your film's current existence looks like, but no. Either render out a straight MPEG-2 from the timeline or in some lossless or HQ codec (Lagarith, AVID DNxHD, ProRes) in a good high quality setting that matches your film's technical specs, and provide to whoever is making that screener.

MP4 is a final delivery codec, not useful for something being re-rendered into yet another codec.
 
Yeah, just export straight to MPEG-2 in a DVD specification from your timeline. If you need more specific advice, I can provide if I know what NLE it exists in.
 
Is the movie we're talking about Exit 101? I just watched the trailer, and I'm not sure where exactly the bar is for low budget horror distributors and what kind of money you can expect to see from it, but I wouldnt be suprised to see it pop up on netflix or something. If I were you, I would only submit to genre film festivals, a decent horror fest would probably love to play it, but I don't really see any non-genre festivals that have attendees worth meeting being interested.
 
Yeah its EXIT 101. Its a low budget horror flick. I've got a friend who has movies out with Tempe Ent, and he told me about a newer company called Chemical Burn that distributes this kind of stuff. My plan was to submit to ONLY genre specific fests.. unless they were local...

for example.. we are in GA.. so we'd do..

Macon Film Fest
Atlanta Horror fest
and any other genre specific fest in this region.

I'm also going to send a screener to chemical burn, brain damage, and a few select other genre specific distributors.

But I'm thinking sending off some review screeners to some horror sites/magazines might help us first.
 
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