Having attended the Austin Film Festival as well as a variety of other film fests, I thought I was prepared for SXSW, but when confronted with the reality of this ginormous event. I was… well, not.
I’m an independent filmmaker, living and working in the film mecca known as San Antonio, Texas, or at least I like to dream. Thanks to clanofthefanboys.com I was able to attend the festival – panels, films, parties, live the indie dream for 4 days and ideally come out the other end a much wiser, more prepared, more connected filmmaker.
DAY 1
Driving from San Antonio, I got to the Austin Convention Center late, of course. I had to plow through a sea of badged scenesters to make it to the fourth floor, just in time to check in for my first meeting of the day, a “mentoring” session with TNT executive, Oppenheim. Let me explain. To get these much sought after mentoring sessions with top tier execs, you have to sign up on the SXSW website approximately a week before the event. Fortunately, I was online when the email came in and immediately signed up. Only one a day per person. You get EXACTLY 10 minutes with these golden eggs, not a second more. How useful these mentoring sessions are, for me, is yet to be seen. Everyone expects to pitch their idea to one of these guys to be ‘discovered.’ Whether that happens, I haven’t heard. For myself, with several projects in the works, but not completed, I made some possibly valuable contacts, but little immediate progress. The reality for filmmakers is you pretty much almost have to have a completed project before anyone’s going to look at you twice. Getting a project funded based on an idea or even a finished script is a pipe dream for no-names in this economic climate. But I’m told and I like to believe that cream rises to the top, and so I do my best to meet the people that can help me… someday.
Phillip Oppenheim – TNT Acquisitions
I liked this guy. He was excited I was representing a geek site and claimed to be a nerd – interested in sci-fi. In fact, he passionately told me about a new series coming out, “Falling Skies” – which is, as he told me, for the nerds. But what I got out of this session is that when pitching your projects to anyone, go in prepared. Do your research, find out what content they’re looking for, what their audience is. You have to know why your project is a match. He suggested I check out tvbythenumber.com. He suggested I understand the network, talk about them, prove you know what they’re looking for.
Director Workshop – presented by Catherine Hardwicke
For those of you who loathe Twilight as much as I do, you’re not going to be excited about this, but truth is the problem with Twilight was the script, the story itself, not the director. Hardwicke knows her shit and as Red Riding Hood actor Shiloh Fernandez proclaims, she’s like no other director he’s ever worked with, and he means this in a good way. She throws herself into it with the actors, she knows what it takes to excavate emotions on cue, she is sensitive to their needs and a very organized director. I was impressed. If you’ve seen some of her other films – Thirteen or Lords of Dogtown – you might find she knows how to tell a story. For anyone interested in directing, there’s a lot of research, a lot of preparation that goes in to it. She recommends developing shot lists, diagrams of locations (for entrance/exits for actors and camera positions), storyboards, and concept sketches. She talked about getting a moving master – which means literally the master shot of your film – you’re “A” camera is following the actors around, moving with them, getting all the action. She never re-lit for camera “B” – they just picked up close-ups or details as they could. She talked about using color/contrast to match the emotion in a film; she talked about production designing (which is where she got her start) and how simple things like lines of sight need to be considered when scouting locations. However, the key thing I got out of this was to get a performance out of an actor, you need to really be there with them in the moment and be willing to share yourself and your emotions with them. If this is not something you do naturally, then it’s something to be explored. She recommends all directors take an acting class, so you know what it’s like. She also takes actors through improv games, which I have done myself and have found very effective in helping the actors relax and get in character. So all said and done, Catherine Hardwicke gets my vote.
Pee-Wee’s Big Broadway Adventure
So Gavin and I went to the screening for Pee-Wee’s Broadway show film. I adore Paul Rubeuns, but I’d be lying if I said I loved Pee-Wee. I don’t, never have and probably never will. I was bored to tears and left about half-way through the film, but that was primarily because I had to get back to San Antonio for a gig. Gavin promised it got better after I left, and I hope he’s right. All I can say is if you love Pee-Wee, you’ll probably enjoy this romp back through Pee-Wee’s World.
Day 2
It wasn’t until the second day I discovered the Press Lounge, much to my chagrin. It was nirvana… with an array of treats, drinks, even hot chai tea, which made me very happy. They had boxes of necessities such as Imodium A-D and Visine, for those who partied too hard the night before; they had free notebooks and press materials for every film showing at the event, along with buttons, etc. The lounge was covered in press reps, all attached to some form of electronic device, most of them laptops, click-clacking away their reports on the event for some well-known website like Fandango or magazines, like Entrepreneur – I met both of these reporters. My technique was to ask for a business card from everyone I even bumped in to. I bummed a smoke out on the balcony just to strike up a conversation with two interesting-looking Brits. I got a DVD for some comedian named Bill Hicks out of that one.
First up was my mentoring session with Indiegogo.com’s distribution channel, Distribber.com dude, Adam Chapnick. This guy was more interested in talking about himself and what they do, rather than really mentoring anybody. I had to cut him off to ask questions, since I knew I had very limited time. I’m actually using Indiegogo right now for our crowd-funding campaign for a new web series comedy JiveTown (here’s the link if you want to check it out: www.indiegogo.com/JiveTown), so I had high-hopes this guy would offer me some valuable info. I was wrong. I still think the website itself can be quite beneficial even though Mr. Chapnick was a dud.
Paul Reubens Panel
The sheerly delightful story of Paul Reubens career, told by the man-boy himself, was one of the highlights of the festival for me. He’s a wonderful story-teller, very humble and clearly able to laugh at himself. Maybe you do, but I did not know that Paul started out his career on the Gong Show, trying out characters. He was on about 15 episodes – and won the best and the worst act at some point. It was here he first played at being Pee-Wee and immediately delighted the audience. He knew, just knew, he’d stumbled onto something good. He threw away the rest of his characters and just focused on Pee-Wee, even appearing as the character for production meetings, until that fateful day. His mug shot popped the Pee-Wee bubble. His first project after the debacle was Buffy the Vampire Slayer and included in his contract the right to appear as close to his mug shot likeness as possible. He knew he had to get back on the horse, and he did, digging in his spurs and yelling a rowdy “Yee-Ha!” in the process. This is something to be admired, I think, something not done too often. Instead of shying away from his mistakes, he faced them head-on, and I think, became a better man and actor because of it. Paul claims to have no regrets, well, expect for turning down the Easter Egg Hunt at the White House under old Ronnie, since, he’s never been invited back. His most recent dilemma is grappling with an aging Pee-Wee. Paul joked, “I think you’ll be seeing Pee-Wee in a turtle neck soon.” He advised any actors in the audience to learn to write, as he did, out of necessity. If you go back and watch Pee-Wee’s Big Adventures you’ll see it follows the screenplay guidelines to the letter. One of the funniest moments was when Paul admitted how badly he had wanted to play Pollyanna, just so he could say the line, “I hate everyone, leave me alone.” But we won’t, Mr. Reubens, because we love you.
It was while waiting for this panel to begin that I met a man, a blogger for Time Warner, that I got some of the best advice of the entire festival, and he didn’t even get paid for it. When I told him about JiveTown and asked his suggestions on getting the word out, he said, “Don’t only talk about what you’re doing but other things that sort of relate.” Basically, don’t be a self-centered asshole just talking about yourself. You want to engage people on that other level, give them something to think about or laugh about, a reason to read what you write. JiveTown involves a vintage shop and a lot of gayness, so he said to send out links on vintage stuff or gay issues, again, something related but not exactly about what I’m doing. It seems so simple I should have thought of it myself, but sometimes when you’re close to a project, you really do lose that perspective. Thanks Mr. No-Name Blogger dude!
Panel: Branded Documentaries
What this panel boils down to is that if you do your research, you may just be able to come up with a documentary idea you can pitch to a Brand who can use the film to raise brand awareness. For example, the panel was there talking about a film they made about these quilts funded by Downy and given to people who had lost their homes. The trick is to make sure your idea is geared toward the audience the Brand you’re pitching to is trying to reach. They suggested you take these ideas to the PR agency that handles the brand and not the advertising agency. You go in there and you say, “Here’s a story we think you could tell and we can tell it.”
Panel: Person2Person Filmmaking
This panel was put on by Bit Torrent. They use Vodo.com to distribute original content and have done so very successfully in a few instances. They were there with one of their successes called Zenith – which is some sort of conspiracy story. The fun aspect of this panel was a very evident personality conflict with the Director of Zenith and one of the Bit Torrent guys. The Director got miffed when Bit made some comparison of these indiefilms to the big movie giant production houses. The Director took the off-handed comment as a personal affront. They discussed how genre fiction works, but the reality is anything can work, if it’s good enough and finds an audience. They also discussed how their films often use crowd-funding sites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter to produce their projects, but what Bit Torrent offers is a distribution channel, something not all projects crowd-funding have. They only want projects over 20 minutes or so. I, for example, do not yet have a distribution channel, although the network LOGO is currently considering JiveTown. Keep your fingers crossed!
Unfortunately by the end of day 2 I was so fu**ing exhausted I had to go back to my hotel for a little nap, so I missed the screening of Paul, in theatres now. Had I known that one of my absolutely most favorite people, Simon Pegg, was in the house, I would have gladly suffered. Gavin got to go though, so I’m sure he’s got some cool stuff to share.
After my nap, I ambled down to 6th street, where all the festivities were taking place. I had to park quite far away, so as I made my way to where I was going, it was only myself and one other person on the sidewalk. We both looked up at the same time and made eye contact, striking, bold eyes. I did a double-take. And then another. And then I almost ran after him. I can’t be 100% certain but I’m pretty sure it was Jake Gyllenhaal. He had been in town that day promoting Source Code and after the premiere, some lame-ass fan took a pic of his willy while he was peeing in the bathroom. Arrested, camera confiscated, the perpetrator defended himself by saying he wasn’t planning on posting the pic online, it was just for himself. Well you should have just said so then, eh? I’m sure Jake wouldn’t have minded at all.
Day 3
I drug ass, late again, to my press nirvana for some hot tea before going to my first panel and zombie-like took notes. Nothing of import to report from this one.
During a break, I wandered around, investigating what other delights I might discover and for some of you geeks, you may agree that, delight I did find, in the form of Felicia Day, star and creator of The Guild. Now, let me explain. I only know of her from my partner, a huge fan. I’ve been told I would be left, if in some alternate reality, Felicia decided she wanted him. So… I thought I should see what I’m up against. Imagine my chagrin, when I discover this red-headed, self-proclaimed geek ends up being charming, witty, intelligent, nice and well, adorable really.
She spoke of high-minded ideals such as leading by example and fighting against regulations attempting to control the internet. She encouraged geeks from around the world to tell stories they’re not telling in Hollywood. That with the internet, the more specific your content, the better, as you identify and engage your niche audience. Felicia Day is here to let us know that girls don’t game in their bikinis. She has been a serious gamer from the beginning and from the looks of it intends to go out that way too. So what’s next for Felicia? She’s started her own production company, Knights of Good, whose focus will be other web series. The Guild may qualify as what is now being coined “transmedia” (media that transcends its own platform), but as far as Felicia Day is concerned, the web is where it’s at and where she intends to stay.
Embarrassingly, it was at this panel that I discovered that as the gilded “Press” I was allowed to actually go to the back to snap shots and ask final questions of these celebrities. I wish I would have realized that the day before with Paul Reubens, dammit! So I got a few photos and asked Felicia how I can get in touch with her… hahaha and I’m not sharing that info with you, sorry!
MicroBudget/Crowd-funding Panel:
On this panel were creators from the top crowd-funding sites, except Kickstarter, interestingly enough. So for those of you looking to fund absolutely anything this way – could be a book, a music CD, a cause, a film, whatever, here’s what I learned. Just like any other fundraising, you need a plan. You need to offer updates on the site and through emails. However, you can’t just stop there. You might need to make calls, do some old-fashioned networking. Reach out to groups who might be interested in what you’re doing, not just your friends and family. One suggestion is to find someone/organization who will match all funds raised on a given day. Put limits on things you’re offering and be creative with those offerings. For ideas, check out other campaigns. Again, do your research. Ask friends (aka Ambassadors) with lots of “fans” to help you get the word out.
Super – the movie
I drove to the Arbor – a theatre quite far from downtown Austin to see the second screening of RainnWilson’s new film, Super. An hour in line, uncertain whether I was even going to get in, I waited. Was it worth it? I think so. I enjoyed it. Not the best film I’ve ever seen. A dark comedy, as the director called it, but entertaining nonetheless, especially if you love Rainn (of The Office) like I do. The director, James Gunn, is a whirlwind, full of kinetic energy. He talked about how all the actors – a lot of big names like Kevin Bacon and Liv Tyler, did this for SAG wages and not their usual millions of dollars, they so loved the project. At times I wondered if he couldn’t pick a story-telling style, at times I think that was his style. Funny, maybe, weird, yes. Seeing Ellen Page practically rape Rainn was a little uncomfortable, but I get that’s what he was going for. I guess my only real complaint is the storyline needed some meat, some complexity. The ending at least, was unpredictable.
Day 4
Grant-Funding Panel:
What I got out of this was that all states have a humanities council, so check with them about grant opportunities. The National Endowment for the Humanities offers matching funds opportunities. I intend to look into this myself. There are plenty of organizations looking to fund projects, but they’re usually organizations interested in raising awareness about social issues.
Financing Panel:
This panel with rife with lawyers. Honestly, I didn’t get a whole lot out of this. The crux of it is traditional funding sources for filmmakers have dried up. Even films making it at Sundance aren’t finding distribution deals these days, so what can you do? Look into foundations, non-profits, as mentioned earlier. Find someone to act as a fiscal sponsor for you so you can go after funds only awarded to non-profits. Seek out corporate sponsors/support, also mentioned earlier. Put on your own crowd-funding campaign – this you know of! One thing they noted was that if you are doing a crowd-funding campaign, be sure to follow through on what you’ve promised, or you could be held liable. This means if you’ve promised donators a DVD, make sure they get it, and make sure you calculate these costs, printing, mailing, etc., into your overall budget. Also beware of using language that might lead your donators to believe they’ll be getting something on the back-end if it’s a huge hit. They are not investors.
So… that pretty much sums up what I got out of SXSW. I have a bag full of business cards that I hope might one day prove useful. I met an executive from Paramount’s Insurge who loved the JiveTown idea. Even big production houses are now wanting to tap into these online sensations that may not just be a flash in the pan. I also met one of Canada’s largest distributors, Mongrel Media, and learned that filmmakers get funding through the government in Canada. Oye! What is wrong with the US? We have so much $ but we’re just spending it on bombs and bank accounts, not on the arts. Wake-up America!
Here’s the reality – if you’re interested in making a film, what I’ve gotten from my whole experience of late and what I’m doing, is do what you can do now, what’s financially feasible for you to do. Use the resources at your disposal. You’ve got to show people what you can do. Don’t just wait around to be discovered, get out there and make it happen for yourself because unless you’re blessed with the luck of the Irish, there’s really no other way. A lot of people will take a look at your work once it’s completed, but complete it, you must!
The Trade Show
According to what I heard at the ACC, the interactive portion of the event doubled this year from last. The Trade Show was pretty cool and packed with everything you could imagine. I got to play air-hockey, so I was stoked. For the interactive portion, you had video games galore and then afterwards, all sorts of new and amazing start-up and established companies slinging the latest gadgets and whoha’s. Overwhelmed, I was. One of my favorites was GameSalad.com, a website which allows you to create sophisticated games for the Mac and iPhone without any programming or scripting. It’s drag and drop, kids. Welcome to the new millennia! One of my trade show treats was I got to play around with a Super 8 camera and shoot some footage that Kodak will be using to put a little film together with. Pretty frakin’ cool, I tell you. Yeah, Super 8’s prices are on the rise now that everything’s digital, with refurbs costing $800, but I still want one.
SXSW Wrap-Up
SWSW... for all the insanity, rude wannabe’s and lack of hot water for my tea, I commend you. It was an experience worth remembering and, hopefully, returning to next year… make sure to let Jake know I’ll be there!
