Archives for bnewman

Surviving Sundance Notification Time

Short newsletter this week due to the US Holiday. It’s that time of year again – when filmmakers and their colleagues pretend to enjoy Turkey over Thanksgiving while waiting for the notification from Sundance on whether they are accepted or rejected. Literally every film person I know is waiting to hear. Some heard already – mainly no’s but a few yes’s, but most people tend to hear over Thanksgiving weekend if they were accepted, and just after if not. 

This year, I am somehow attached to about ten projects stuck in this limbo – from a mix of clients to personal projects, both indie films and branded content, and let me tell you – the wait sucks. There’s no getting around it. Even filmmakers who won’t truly have a good cut until February, 2020 (after Sundance) or later usually submitted anyway just in case (I don’t like this strategy, but it’s common). And while they’ve called everyone they know and tried to position their films with sales agents or whoever, it basically comes down to the taste of a small group of programmers, and you don’t have much control over that process.

Read More

It’s time for Branded Content to Break the Rules

I wrote another guest post this week for BrandStorytelling – check out the full article there, but here’s a teaser:

As more brands move into long form branded content – meaning feature length documentary or narrative films around 90 minutes – brands increasingly have the same plan – to premiere at Sundance or another top festival and then “get onto Netflix”. These are worthy goals to be sure, and I’ve sold multiple brand client films to Netflix and other distributors. But this is just one strategy for distribution, and I keep hoping more brands will wake up to the reality that maybe they don’t need to follow “the rules” and go down this path to distribute their films. Perhaps it could be better to break the rules of the old-school film world and forge their own paths.

This might seem counterintuitive, but if part of the goal of premiering at Sundance/SXSW and then landing on Netflix is to show prestige and break through the noise, you might be picking the most crowded path of all.

Read the Full Post here. And in case you’re wondering – yes, this applies to indie filmmakers as well, but brands are better capitalized to take control of their distribution. And no, I’m not saying you shouldn’t keep in mind the realities of the marketplace, or best practices, but I am saying that a lot of those aren’t working anymore, and we can explore new models, especially if you are a brand with a loyal following and marketing know-how.

Read More

The Film Fest Database is Live

Michael Forstein’s Film Fest Database

The 2020 Film Festival Database is live! Thanks to Michael Forstein for creating it. It’s a super handy resource for filmmakers, production companies, brands making films – anyone who needs to submit projects to film festivals. 

Michael is an independent filmmaker who made the first version of this database on his own because he needed it, and then he made it somewhat open-source for anyone to use for free. It’s a labor of love, and while he now has a small group of sponsors paying him for some of his time (kudos to them), you can and should donate to the project if it’s something you are going to use. My staff and I use this almost daily as we help our clients submit to festivals. For now, it’s US centric – Michael hasn’t had time to go in and list all of the international festivals, which would be a great addition, but hey, it’s a volunteer effort from one guy!

Read More

“It’s a Disgrace” or Netflix vs. Theaters, again.

The Irishman Newspaper at the Belsasco, photo: me.

The Irishman opened this past Friday, and I finally saw it this week at the Belasco Theater. This is not a review, but it was great, and not just because it’s a Scorsese film with a great cast (Joe Pesci in particular), but because I saw it on Broadway, in a storied theater, that was a much more pleasant experience than seeing it at AMC, Regal or any other big chain theater. I mean, heck, there were only 2 pre-show trailers, no ads and it cost less than most movies in NYC. And Netflix added great touches, like phone booths in the lower lobby that played clips from the film, actual print newspapers with Hoffa headlines and funny fake ads, and some gag props on the bar that referenced key scenes in the movie (no spoilers here). A great experience all around.

Read More

Getting Real about Brands and Impact Films

This week, I wrote an Op-Ed article for the BrandStorytelling website and newsletter on the topic – Getting Real about Brands and Impact Films. This is the first of a series of articles I’ll be writing for them, and I wanted to start with a topic I think is super important for brands, but that also applies to filmmakers – that you can’t just make a social impact film, you have to do the impact work (or hire someone to help). Here’s the intro paragraph, and a link to the full article:

As more brands move into making content, especially long and short form film, many are starting to make films intended to have social impact. While films and media made for impact aren’t right for every brand, they increasingly make sense for brands wanting to share their values with consumers who consistently say they want brands to take a stand. But while many brands are making impact entertainment, too few are actually doing what it takes to have an impact, and need to start thinking harder about what impact means – before audiences (consumers) begin to see this as more cynical “purpose-washing” and brands meaning to truly have an impact have difficulty rising above all of this noise.

Read the Full Article over at BrandStorytelling

What I’m Reading: Film

Read More

The Upcoming Crisis in Arthouse/Indie Film

From Vulture – a classic that Disney isn’t removing

More from the best of times, worst of times files. Three articles hit this week that obliquely touch on what I think is a big crisis facing the indie film sector – in the middle of a golden age for content – and the need for us to build more mechanisms to support indie and arthouse narrative films.

Read More

Why were you rejected?

Why were you rejected? will you be accepted ?- fest service needed

Free idea to anyone who wants to launch it. We need a festival advisory service that helps filmmakers (and brands) figure out whether their film is good enough for film festivals (and which ones), and what would make it stronger – and it needs to be made up of festival programmers.

Read More

Get While the Gettin’s: Or the Vicissitudes of this Market

Frothy Waters

A short one this week, as I’ve been on deadline for another article running soon elsewhere. It is a plumb crazy time in the film business – not unlike the financial markets, or our daily news.

On the one hand, this moment in the film business reminds me of a quote I read from Ray McKinnon in Garden & Gun: “ I always said that if you couldn’t get a role in In the Heat of the Night in those days, if you were an Atlanta actor, you should strongly reconsider your career choice. I actually played a crack dealer one year and got killed, and came back as the town newspaper editor.” Point is, the gettin’ was good for actors back then (and now).

Read More

Netflix vs. Theaters…again

via Variety

Owen Gleiberman penned an “upper decker” of a review/slam of Scorsese’s The Irishman and Netflix’s release strategy this week in Variety when he wrote “Netflix, You Have a Problem: ‘The Irishman’ Is Too Good,” arguing that the film demanded a longer theatrical release before it hits streaming.

His entire argument can be summed up by his last paragraph:

Read More

Perception vs. Reality & Other Sub-Genre news for Sept.26.2019

This week, the NYT reported that Female Artists made little progress in Museums, based on research from ArtNet. The study showed that while the perception is one of growing gender equity in the art world, the reality is that just 11% of museum acquisitions were of female artists in the last decade. And women artists make up just 2% of the global auction market.

Read More

Dove sells Dads to Apple at TIFF; WeWork killing Real Work; Netflix wars and more Sub-Genre news for Sept 12.

Unilever’s Dove Mens+ Care funded film, DADs, lands at Apple during TIFF –  

Dads at TIFF via TIFF

Big news in the branded film space – and worth covering up front, I think. One of the big sales announcements at the Toronto International Film Fest (TIFF) was Dads, by Bryce Dallas Howard, which was picked up by Apple for its new Apple TV+ subscription service. The film was produced by (her father) Ron Howard, but most interestingly, it was funded by Dove Men+Care, a Unilever company (full disclosure, I’m working with Unilever on another project). In fact, they announced the partnership from the stage of the premiere.

Read More

Fall Fests, Laemmle closing, Brands and hard news, and other musings post Labor Day

I’m back from my social media and all-things-electronic-vacation, and back to writing this newsletter. Can’t say I missed the social media, but I did miss the feedback from readers, so I’m glad to be back.

image via WikiMedia

Fall Festival Thoughts:

Read More

Unplugging; Brands; impact and film and more news.

Well folks, “below the fold” is the news for this week – and for awhile. As my longer-term readers know, I take every August off for a writing and social media vacation. Every year since 2010, which means for ten years now (!!!), I’ve unplugged from the web – except for work – for the entire month. I don’t check blogs, read any online news, f-around with Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media. I am not lucky enough to be able to completely unplug – I do take emails from clients and other general work for the first two weeks of August, but then I actually stop checking emails for the latter half of the month and am completely off-line through Labor Day.

Read More

Netflix’s “Ad-Free” Experience and the Future of Branded Content?

Erick Opeka got a few laughs on LinkedIn when he posted this comment recently:

I’ve long argued that Netflix is going about brands and content in the wrong way- product placement like this, or these gigantic ads for Lavazza Coffee on Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee are actually more intrusive and gross than regular advertising. Heck, on the new season of Comedians… Seinfeld takes us on a five minute gushing tribute to Porsche that is longer than any commercial.

Aside from the few times when it makes legitimate sense to show a product for nostalgic reasons (and some of the Stranger Things tie-ins fall into this category), Netflix should move away from product placement and embrace smarter branded content. With nearly every brand you can think of making films these days, and all of them needing distribution, it’s a great opportunity for Netflix to get good content, lower its bills and bring in a new revenue stream without ruining the consumer experience.

Read More

Diversifying the Cultural Conversation

NYT Op-Ed Page

Elizabeth Méndez Berry (a director at the Nathan Cummings Foundation) and Chi-hui Yang (a program officer at the Ford Foundation) wrote a great Op-Ed for the NYT on July 5th about the need for more diversity among critics, cultural writers, editors (and assigning editors) in the arts and cultural sphere. The entire piece is required reading, but these two paragraphs sum it up for me:

This matters because culture is a battleground where some narratives win and others lose. Whether we believe someone should be locked in a cage or not is shaped by the stories we absorb about one another, and whether they’re disrupted or not. At a time when inequality and white supremacy are soaring, collective opinion is born at monuments, museums, screens and stages — well before it’s confirmed at the ballot box.

Read More

What does it mean when NYC loses Kanopy?

Big news in the educational streaming market this week – I may be the first person to ever type those words!- as the New York City Public Libraries Drop Kanopy’s “Free” Movie-Streaming Service. The NYPL, Queens and Brooklyn Public libraries all dropped the service (they are actually distinct library systems) citing costs. Now while many readers may not even know what the heck the educational streaming market is, I think this is bigger news – and worse news – than it seems.

Up until now, if you had a library card from these or many other public libraries, you could watch movies for “free” by just using your library card to access Kanopy, which has become one of the biggest streaming libraries for film in the educational marketplace. I scare quote the “free” part because Kanopy reportedly charges libraries about $2 per view (with a view being at least 30 seconds of watching), which adds up. In fact, these three libraries said the cost got too high for them to renew their contracts and would invest more into ebooks and audio books. Mind you, that’s what public libraries pay. Educational libraries, like a University or College, pay even more, with some quoting $150-300 once more than 3 people watch the film. For a good run-down of the educational market, Kanopy and how this all works, read this Film Quarterly article.

Read More

Missing the Boat on Curation

Every brand is now a studio. Every day, a new brand enters the fray of content creation. They all want to be filmmakers. And I obviously think that’s a good idea in general, or I wouldn’t advise brands on how to do it, smarter. But at a time of superabundance, when the last thing the world needs is another movie, smart brands should be thinking more about curation than creation.

Mind you, I didn’t say every brand. People trust certain brands and not others, and curation only works when there’s trust involved.  But for those brands that have built such trust and have the following to prove it – there’s a unique opportunity, and a glaring gap in the market for smart curation.

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, Joe Marchese wrote about curation and the attention economy for Redef recently, and pointed out: “…The brands, retailers, and media companies that understand how to operate in the current Attention Economy will become trusted curators and shape the future of culture and commerce.” (emphasis mine). 

Read More

Surviving the Trifecta Dash, Fake film fests, brain machine interfaces, new branded content and more

Read More

Getting inspiration from a teen filmmaker, and more news you can use for June

Read More

The End of the ‘Net as We Know It, and other cheery news for May 21st

Read More

Arts/Film Ethics, the State of AI & Film, the Doc Market and more news

Read More

Entrepreneurial Producing, in memory of Steve Golin; Facebook & Blockchain & Film and More

Read More

Ten Trends to Embrace in Branded Content and other Sub-Genre news for April 25

Read More

Cleveland Rocks – or how to Run a Film Fest; and news on streaming, Branded Content and more

Read More

Towards a New Public Media, and more Sub-Genre news for April 3

Read More

Saving the Indie Film “Middle Class,” what Hollywood gets wrong on YouTube and more news you can use

Read More

The Skoll Report on Impact Entertainment and other Sub-Genre News for March 7

Read More

Academy Thoughts – North Face Tuxedos and Acceptance Speeches, and other Sub-Genre news

Read More

Buzzfeed and Canaries in Coal-Mines, Happy Valentines Day Edition of Sub-Genre News

Read More

Five Sundance Takeaways, the death of Media and More Sub-Genre news

Read More