what grant recipients get wrong

Patryk_Rebisz

Patryk_Rebisz

Veteran
So my wife was asked to be on a panel giving away a grant to filmmakers who deal with arts and disability. The grand is $10k and i got a chance to look over some of the submitting proposal films that were being judged. We get so close to our films that as filmmakers we forget how things are being seen by the "other side." This was my chance to see the world without the rosy glasses. So to simplify things for the prospective grant recipients, here is a little guide.

1. Say who, what, and if not "what" then what else (stakes). It seems a majority of people (again based on the sample of candidates) know how to establish the "who" but the "what" and "what not" is somehow beyond their grasp. Listen, it's fantastic that you found your "interesting" subject but that was the easy part now the difficult part kicks in. What are they going after and if they don't get it what can be the negative consequences?

2. Don't stand in the way of your story. On at least a few occasions the filmmaker's choices destroyed otherwise fascinating set-up. In one video proposal mediocre reality-show style setup of the conflict was followed by fascinating images. We kept staring at those wonderful visuals knowing very well that the filmmaker doesn't know what to do with this material and is only capable of delivering the reality show banality.

3. Similarly good production values of documentary gets only passing marks with fiction. Images that would be seen as high end in a doc are nothing spectacular with narratives. It's as if we subconsciously understood the technical differences between the two genres and thus rewarded one over another for certain qualities. That said, production value still does the distance and is the "easy" mark: out of 5 questions to rate the projects on, one was related to production value so the filmmakers who spend money up front and got a skilled cameraman and good audio automatically had 20% chance of moving up.
 
Interesting.

This is great information from "inside".

I'd love to hear more if you feel like expanding on any of this.
 
Thanks for the great information. This isn't just useful for learning how to receive a grant, but useful for every instance of making and marketing a film.

Do you think it's worthwhile for filmmakers to apply for grants? Is there a catch?
Out of curiosity, do you know if many of these grant societies use sufficient "checks and balances" to try to remove bias and favoritism when awarding grants?
 
Thanks Patryk for your observations , Drew being in Austin you should absolutely apply for some of the grants thru the film society afs. I've known many many filmmakers who received grants over the years. Usually a different group of filmakers decides every year so don't give up, keep trying.
 
Drew Ott said:
Thanks for the great information. This isn't just useful for learning how to receive a grant, but useful for every instance of making and marketing a film.

Do you think it's worthwhile for filmmakers to apply for grants? Is there a catch?
Out of curiosity, do you know if many of these grant societies use sufficient "checks and balances" to try to remove bias and favoritism when awarding grants?
Click to expand...

Definitely still apply - they had 30 applications so based on statistics alone you have 1 in 30 chance. "Checks and balances" is a bit though question because it's related to the system used to evaluate. For instance here each application is being rated on 1-5 scale: story & structure; production value; relevance to disability; how artistic the project will turn out; minorities involved in making the film. All but last category is self explanatory as it's hard to judge the "minorities involved" when many projects don't even have credits attached to them. Definitely still apply, as with every institution there are ALWAYS politics but they are nothing in comparison to major film festivals.
 
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