David Lowery with Ain’t Them Bodies Saints cast

I was sixteen then. I was about to turn 32 when I began reading it again over the holidays, for what was probably the third or fourth time. It was glib and entertaining and insightful, as always, but it also seemed deeper and richer – a natural side effect to my own evolving understanding of the filmmaking process. There’s not a lot of technical jargon in the book, and each journal entry is often comprised of a span of days or weeks, but I didn’t notice that the first time I read it. It all seemed breezy and exciting and fun. Soderbergh made filmmaking – serious filmmaking, great filmmaking – seem like something efficient and doable. When you’re sixteen and don’t even know what the word coverage means, you’re drawn towards the broad strokes. You need the broad strokes. And then, as you grow as a filmmaker, you start to read between the lines.

What I found between Soderbergh’s lines – and sometimes not between them at all but right smack dab on the page in clear and simple text – was a marvelous reflection of what I’d just been through, and a projection of what we were about to embark upon. How had I not previously picked up on the fact that there were days that didn’t go well for him, too? How had I missed the bit of his production journal in which he mentions his AD pulling him aside and telling him he should have serious conversations with his actors in their trailers during the set-ups and not on set when the cameras were ready to roll?  The days where they ran out of time? Where the Louisiana heat wore everyone down? There on the page is a description of conversations I felt like I had been having on a regular basis. There at the outset of the book is mentioned a financing meeting with Cassian Elwes that came out of the blue but didn’t quite pan out, which felt alarmingly similar to the sudden financing meeting we had with Cassian Elwes, which did in fact work out and lead to our film getting made.

David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints

I don’t mean to say that I was reducing his experience – and mine  – to a checklist of corresponding points. But the parallels were unavoidable, and also amusing, interesting and gratifying. All of this information deepened my understanding of his humbly triumphant first-person narrative, and it also helped me contextualize what I’d just been through. And indeed, to see it in broad strokes.  I realized that my own shoot was breezy, exciting and fun in its own way. And, too, that I was unquantifiably lucky and quantifiably persistent (and that hopefully the talent quotient of that equation wasn’t running at a deficit).

So then there was Sundance. Back when sex, lies was invited to screen there, it was still called the U.S. Film Festival, but it was up there on the same Main Street, at mostly the same venues, with lots of the same people. Soderbergh describes in nonplussed terms (or maybe he was dazed) his first screening, and then the second, and then the point at which Todd McCarthy hints at the positive review he’s going to give the film in Variety. He also describes having enough free time to join the festival volunteers in shuttling other directors and actors to and from the airport.

Since then, Sundance has become Sundance, and while I imagine the intrepid filmmaker might still find time to volunteer services here and there, I don’t think it would be possible (if it ever truly was in the first place) to be nonplussed about showing a film you’ve finished only days before to an audience of 1200 people. I anticipated a quickening of my pulse, but not my transformation into jelly when John Cooper called me out onto the stage at the Eccles. I have no idea what I said up there, other than thank you. When in doubt, those are always good words to fall back in, especially if you mean them, which I did.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints at Sundance 2013

This is not the sum of my experience there, but a small part of it, and here is where I leave my parallels with Soderbergh’s narrative behind (aside from the fact that Todd McCarthy, now writing for Hollywood Reporter, gave us a really great review after our own first screening) and dovetail fully into my perception of the experience. When one’s been aspiring towards premiering a feature at Sundance since the age of sixteen, it would be natural to assume that a sense of culmination would accompany that moment. But the thing about persistence is that it renders success in varying shades of gray. Accomplishment is not divided into the setting of a goal and its achievement, nor is that achievement a plateau which one rests upon. Everything is a step. Some steps are bigger than others. Sometimes they lead you right back to the bottom. Sometimes they provide an opportunity to step back and survey the view. As you look back, all the little footholds and switchbacks blend with distance into one singular path, one broad stroak, but you don’t forget that each one came with its own encompassing sense of triumph, of disappointment, of accomplishment, of knowing you can do better.  In the moment, each one was everything you were working for – and then you achieved it, and you moved on. You may have done well. You’ll do even better.

At some point you might find yourself referring to the process in vaguely distended metaphors, which is a good time to turn back to that script you were writing or that book you were reading. We left Sundance two weeks ago. It was spectacular. It was overwhelming. It was equivocal to running a marathon, except that marathons end. Time now to keep persisting, and hoping the luck holds out.

Footnote: I went to see Steven Soderbergh’s Side Effects last night. I have a feeling he won’t be publishing a journal about this one, and I am OK with that. But if he were to write it, I’d definitely read it, and read it again in 16 years.

Sundance is a festival where you’re constantly checking your watch; stressing as one movie’s credits roll about how you’re going to get to the next one. At parties, it seems as if everyone is not so much socializing as jockeying to find out from everyone else which films are on the edge of a sale. It’s the kind of festival where when my colleague and friend Nick Dawson woke up one morning in intense pain, and called a taxi to take him to the ER, the Park City dispatcher responded, “I’m not familiar with that venue.”

Indeed, there’s an urgency and an intensity to the festival that’s all too easy to get sucked into. So perhaps the most valuable thing I figured out early on was to savor the small moments, and to just kind of zen out. Once I adopted this philosophy, I was able to settle down and really enjoy myself. Here are just a few of my favorite moments from the festival:

Films Coming to Fruition

At IFP, we support hundreds of work-in-progress films and young filmmakers each year. At Sundance this year, we were lucky enough to have twelve alumni projects premiering. Professionally, it’s always invigorating to see so many works that you’ve supported start their journey on the festival circuit and beyond. And on a personal level, it’s sincerely moving to see filmmakers who I know have been toiling away on projects for years finally introducing them to the world.

My first film of the festival was Shaka King’s Newlyweeds, a comedy about an aimless young couple in love with each other and with marijuana, but not necessarily in that order. IFP first supported the project back in 2011 when King attended our annual Independent Film Week as one of our Emerging Narrative screenwriting fellows. Back then, the script was still an early draft, but King’s charming and unique voice was already shining through. During Film Week, IFP put together a reading of a section of the Newlyweeds script in partnership with SAG Indie and casting agent Paul Schnee. I still have a very vivid memory of seeing King’s words come to life in front of an audience for the first time. And now, two years later, it was great to see that happen again on the big screen, with much of the same cast as first appeared in that screenplay reading two years ago.

Amari Cheatom and Trae Harris as Lyle and Nina in Newlyweeds

Similarly moving was Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, the sophomore feature from David Lowery, a wonderful young filmmaker who has been a friend of the IFP family for some time now (his micro-budget debut St. Nick came through our Filmmaker Labs all the way back in 2008). The script for Ain’t Them Bodies Saints was a part of our No Borders International Co-Production Market two years ago, but the screenplay only hinted at the majestic, ambitious, and wonderfully visual work that Lowery has concocted. Working to great effect with established actors such as Casey Affleck, Rooney Mara, and Keith Carradine, Lowery has put together a meditative, haunting, and beautiful ode to the dying myth of the American outlaw. It’s a film that pays off years of hard work on Lowery’s part, one that should skyrocket him towards the top of the list of crucial American auteurs.

Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck in Ain’t Them Bodies Saints

Beyond these two films, there were so many other projects that IFP has been working with for years that were the talk of the festival: Stacie Passon’s complex character study Concussion (Narrative Labs 2012), which sold to Weinstein’s Radius for seven figures, Alexandre Moors’ Blue Caprice (Narrative Labs 2012), a dark meditation on the DC Sniper attacks, which received nearly unanimous rave reviews, After Tiller (Documentary Labs 2012), a controversial documentary about third-trimester abortion doctors that seemed to be the talk of the festival everywhere I went, and many, many more.

Making Time for Slamdance

Up the hill from the frenzied party hopping of Main Street, Park City’s Treasure Mountain Inn plays host each year to Slamdance. An indisputably smaller operation compared to the festival that most people descend on Park City for, Slamdance is still a vital facet of the independent scene. Showcasing work from emerging filmmakers, the festival has a bootstrappy, DIY feel to it that’s quite charming indeed.

This year I served on the Slamdance Documentary Jury, an opportunity that not only helped me to familiarize myself with the workd of many talented emerging storytellers, but also helped me to escape the constant insanity that is the Sundance Film Festival. There’s a sincerity and integrity to Slamdance – whether illustrated by the daring and unorthodox programming choices, the awesome parties (the opening night event featured a pop-up barber shop smack in the middle of the party), or just the fact that everyone at the festival – filmmakers, programmers, press, industry – seemed to be on a first-name basis with one another.

Still from Nicole Teeny’s Bible Quiz

As my co-jurors and I deliberated in the Slamdance main office, I couldn’t help but notice a wall of cubbies stuffed with backpacks and coats, as if everyone at the festival was part of one big grade school class. I dare you to find anywhere else in Park City that replicates such a vibe.

Festival Forum Progress

The programming team at IFP spends much of its time supporting storytellers, but we feel that it’s equally important to help those people who are dedicating themselves to helping storytellers. That’s been the mission of the IFP Festival Forum, an association and alliance of festival professionals that launched three years back at Independent Film Week. Since then, I’ve watched the group grow in scope, membership, and mission, as our very dedicated Executive Committee has put a plan in place to transform the group into an independent 501c3 run by and advocating for festival professionals.

It’s a lofty goal, and one that will take a lot of work to put into effect, but at the group’s annual brunch for festival leadership at Sundance, a resounding majority officially ratified a proposed set of bylaws and strategic plan for this evolution. Not only that, but the group also announced a set of exciting new recruits to the Executive Committee – including the San Francisco Film Society’s Ted Hope, the Hampton Film Festival’s Anne Chaisson, and Sundance’s Sarah Pearce.

Following the brunch, we all set to work with four hours of subcommittee sessions, where members of the Festival Forum convened to continue brainstorming and implementing next steps for the organization. Over these sessions, I watched representatives from festivals all across the world take time off from their packed Sundance screening schedules to convene and work together on strengthening their industry. Time will tell exactly when the Festival Forum completes its transformation into the organization that the Executive Committee has envisioned it becoming, but it was inspiring to see progress being made.

Santa Maria Della Salute Church, Venice

Filmmaker and fellow IFP Lab leader Jon Reiss and I entered the exhibition. In Praise of Doubt was based upon the curatorial notion of “questioning the idea of uncertainty and our convictions about identity,” It too displayed modern art masters like Jeff Koons and Donald Judd alongside a wide-range of younger, lesser-known artists, many of whom have never been included in previous exhibitions of the Pinault Collection before. For many of them, like our filmmakers, this was their first time engaging audiences with their work on the international stage.

These themes and ideas closely mirrored what would soon be consuming the teams of emerging filmmakers on the island of San Servalo, where FILMMAKER Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief Scott Macaulay & I were privileged to work with a group of five teams at the Biennale developing feature films in Egypt, Lebanon, The Philippines, Italy and England.

In concert with other experienced mentors and their fellow artists from around the world, they were pushed again and again for two weeks to communicate their vision: to fine tune their story worlds, enrich their characters and dig deep into their own personal narratives to create something totally fresh and engaging.  Above all, they were forced to revel in and embrace the uncertainty of what was to come and what they might uncover.

I have to admit, I really felt for these artists. Although it seems like yesterday, I couldn’t help but remember my own transformation in Venice eighteen years prior when I arrived on the island with little more than a pair of unfashionable overalls and the pack on my back. As an art student from a small, southern university, I was certainly wasn’t equipped with the language needed to express myself. I too was there living amongst strangers.  And I was terrified of how I would survive when seemingly my only skill-set was a proclivity for welding complex structures.  It was a time in my life where there was a lot to doubt on a daily basis.

All to say, my world was small before Venice.

But the art, the people, and the copious espressos fueled me. I went out and explored. I tried new things, and sometimes failed spectacularly. For every night that I reveled in the experience and appreciated the opportunities given, there were plenty where I felt like this horse sculpture by Maurizio Cattelan which aptly confronts viewers at the entrance of the Dogana.

Untitled, Maurizio Cattelan

Luckily, the many teachers, artists and friends I met eventually got me talking about my work. It all became real – not just the art I was making and the stories I was telling, but the idea that this could be my life.  And while I eventually exchanged my acetylene torch for a cheap digital camera, my experiences in Venice gave me above all the courage of conviction to keep pushing forward and become comfortable with the unknown.

Thus, the most emotional and meaningful part of the Biennale College- Film for me was watching these personal transformations unfold anew, some slowly and others adapting at a shockingly quick pace.  Seeing these filmmakers find their own courage to change, – in this case, overcome  fears of public speaking or letting go of cherished, deeply personal storylines – was a reminder that inspiration and collaboration in Venice can truly do wonders for the creative mind.

In particular, it was a beautiful sight indeed to watch Shireen Seno’s Nervous Translation and Vatche Boulghourjain’s Tramontane develop. Quiet and evocative directors whose projects told stories of self and country, they were adept at creating unbelievable story worlds with rich characters and detailed elements that left you slackjawed and wanting, These stories seem like a distant relative of Edward Kienholz, whose large-scale installation ROXY was appropriately tucked away in a secret corner the Dogana.

ROXY, Edward Kienholz

More still were the types of projects that took cues from old dramatic structures and spun them in fresh directions.   Deeply personal narratives Roland Jobson’s Into the Light & Kasem Kharsa’s I Dream of Empire and their dark, nuanced visuals have scenes that continue to play out in my mind. They mingle in my memory along with Paul McCarthy’s mutilated mask series, She/Man, all playing with time, gender and form in a way that feel simultaneously original and ancient.

Paul McCarthy’s “She/Man”

The ultimate winners of the Biennale – the three projects which will receive $150,000 Euro prizes and the opportunity to premiere at the 2013 Venice Film Festival – were all shockingly strong, conceptual pieces. Each provoked an almost visceral audience response as their stories and visuals unfolded in their pitches.  Thai artist Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit’s A Year of June and IFP Alum New York-based Tim Sutton’s Memphis both wowed, and I look forward to seeing them come to life in the coming months.

Memphis’ John Baker and Tim Sutton at the Biennale di Venezia Pitch

And then there was Alessio Fava’s Yuri Esposito, a meditative and beautiful project Scott & I worked with chronicling the slowest man in the world. The project won as well and will go into production this spring. The filmmakers assure me that their protagonist may be “lentamente,” but the project will be delivered on time!

Director Alessio Fava, Producer Max Chicco and Yuri Esposito

To see it all in motion was a true joy and there’s not enough gelato or Chinotto in the world to thank  Gucci, the Biennale’s Paola Baratta, Venice Film Festival head Alberto Barbera, and the amazing team of Savina Neirotti, Jane Williams, and Michel Reilhac for all they’ve done for these filmmakers. And as their sole U.S. partner, it was an honor for all of us here at IFP to have worked with everyone on this program from idea to inception.  To see it all become real right before our eyes, watching these young filmmakers make work amongst the backdrop of one of Italy’s most achingly beautiful and ancient cities, was truly a sight to behold.  I have no doubt we’ll be hearing quite a lot from these artists in the coming years and encourage you to discover them for yourselves at http://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/collegecinema/.

The College’s Jane Williams, Michel Reilhac, Amy Dotson and Savina Neirotti

Still from “Brave New Wild”

And no sooner do you get used to the fact that people will watch your private work and have their public opinions about it, good or bad, than you begin the proverbial dog-and-pony show: distribution.  Despite all this internal dialogue, the IFP Distribution session left me hopeful about the process because it empowered us with smart, creative, satisfying options.  If you are about to get to distribution on a film, here are a few things that I thought were worth thinking about:

• No seriously, what is your film festival strategy?

Sure, it’s gotta be really useful if you can premiere your film at a top-tier festival because maybe this will put you on the radar of industry who might make your dreams come true.  But the honest truth is that every year, really wonderful films don’t make it in to the top tier festivals.  Some become wildly successful regardless.  Some films premiere at a top tier festival and disappear without nary a buzz.  So ‘get in to a top tier festival’ should not be the extent of your strategy.  Start considering your film festival run as a bonafide theatrical run where you get to show your film in theaters to audiences across the country (or world).  For many films, it will be the extent of your theatrical distribution, and you might want to harness the press and connections with audiences at festivals to launch your film.  Are you going to sell festival DVDs?  What’s going to be on your website during the fest that people can look at from their smartphones?  Are you going to ask for screening fees? When and how and why?

• You gotta fight for your (Split) Rights.

When you’re making your first film, the hazy distribution ‘plan’ sorta starts out as two imaginary steps: 1) get into the Film Festival of your dreams 2) next thing you know, a deus-ex-machina distributor swoops in and your film is screening nationwide at Big Shot Megaplex 2000.  But in this [rare] traditional model, one distributor gets all your rights for a long, long time.  And because it costs a lot of money for a theatrical run, cross-collateralization means unless you get money upfront, you’re not going to see any.  Not to mention, you don’t have any say in how your film is put out there.

If there’s anything that Jon Reiss (Think Outside the Box Office) won me over on during the Labs, it’s that forgetting about the traditional model and splitting up rights may be the best thing for your film.  When you split your rights up, for example, you can sell your broadcast rights to whatever TV channel you can book, sell your digital rights to a digital aggregator who can get you on iTunes, and then sell DVDs and merch off your website/ via a fulfillment company, etc.  You can tailor strategies that you think will work for your particular film and audience.  A few things to keep in mind when you actually get down to parceling these off:  don’t give rights to an entity that doesn’t have a history of making money off those rights, don’t give exclusivity unless you’re getting paid extra for it, and think about a clawback clause – where you get your rights back if a certain amount of time (6 months, 1 year) has elapsed and a minimum amount hasn’t been earned on those rights. It sounds a little daunting as a filmmaker to go in and negotiate these things, so if you don’t know if you’ll have the chops, hire a lawyer to negotiate for you.

• Consider your own damn theatrical run. 

Creating a month or two tour of one-off special event screenings can turn your film into an amazing theater-going experience.  Use the network you’ve been growing while making your film to get a full house where the audience is engaged, excited, asks questions, talks to people in the film, maybe even dances and drinks a beer with you, and thinks about it all week afterwards.  All the while, spread the word of your film, sell some DVDs, special merch, and promote for your digital release.

Map of future screenings

As Dylan Marchetti from Variance Films pointed out, if you call a theater and let them know that you sold out your last screening, and want to book their theater for a Tuesday night for your next one, odds are they will be interested.    The world is your oyster, as long as you are willing to put in the time and effort.  If you’re trying to move on to your next film as part of your goals or have a rigid work schedule, this probably won’t sound as desirable, but as for my Producer Alex and I, we’re looking forward to packing the ’76 VW van we filmed our doc in, and living the er, dream for a month with the film.  Of course, you often barely break even on a theatrical run like this – but independent film has always been a pretty lousy get-rich-quick scheme to say the least.  At least this way, you can make a film, build an audience, work on the ancillary market, and have some bargaining power when you start on your next film.

Some of the meetings for SCARLET POPPY were with the same  individuals and companies I had met in previous co-production markets – Asian Project Market (Busan, Korea), Film Bazaar (Goa, India) and IFP “No Borders”.  I have noticed that relationships are developing over time and people  wanted to see what progress has been made since the last encounter.  But there were also many meetings with new producers, sales agents, and film financing companies that were interested in the project.  I learned a lot by talking to all of these people, who were very generous with their time, about where to direct our efforts in terms of attachments and where the market is for this film. Since this is my first feature as Writer/Director/Producer  and none of the other members of our producing team (Executive Producer  Siddiq Barmak, Producer Thomas D. Adelman) were able to join, I was on my own.

The best thing about the Partnership section of the Market as well as DIFF in general, were the compelling filmmakers and stories that are coming out of this tumultuous region at the moment – all with with strong Middle Eastern or South Asian elements.  Ironically, DIFF, with many stories of war and political and social upheaval, took place in one of Dubai’s glitziest hotels (and there is no glitz like Dubai glitz) – the Mina-A -Salam Hotel.  The realness of the stories could not have been in stronger contrast to the fantasyland setting.  The best meetings I had were not on the schedule at all and happened by chance.  Where else can you be wandering in the hotel garden, lost and looking for a restaurant and make a random acquaintance with a billionaire Emirati media mogul who is building an entire media city in Kurdistan and invites you to have a meeting about your project?

Evenings were spent having drinks and talking films at the Koubba bar in the Al Qasr hotel – the best networking place at DIFF.  When I finally did meet my Emirati media mogul on the veranda of the Al Qasr, he showed up with his Iraqi Airlines pilot friend – a man in his sixties and for some reason dressed entirely in leather, including the pants – I should have gotten a picture but I was too busy telling him about my project.

Another random encounter at the Koubba bar led to my instant friendship with an Iranian filmmaker from Australia who runs a festival there and must be one of the few people to have seen Opium War, an Afghan movie I acted in a few years ago.  He was quoting me lines from the movie all night – lines I didn’t necessarily want to remember.

As usual, I did not have time to go see most of the great movies at DIFF but hopefully I will see many of them soon.  The ones I did see were largely in the screening room when I had a spare couple of hours.

I am now in Mumbai where I have come for some meetings.  Reflecting on DIFF, this is the fourth co-production market I have participated in for SCARLET POPPY and  I feel people had more substantive interest in my project there – and this probably comes down to the organic connection the project has to the region.  In some of the other markets, people said they were interested in the project – and I am sure they were, but it was a bit off their radar screen. I had to do a lot of talking to explain the context of the film.  Not so here.  Some People were looking for exactly this type of film.  Some projects fit more naturally in certain festivals and mine fit here.  What this results in – who knows?  But it was certainly a worthwhile experience and a place not to be missed for stories such as mine with Middle Eastern and to a lesser extent South Asian stories – whether from the region or involving the diaspora around the world.

I am very grateful to IFP NY for selecting our project to go to DIFF as well as to Jane Williams and her team at DIFF, who did such a great job in making the experience a rewarding one.

Uptown/Detroit Independent Film Festival — Winner, Best Michigan Documentary

Detroit was undoubtedly ground-zero for the film, as the story focused on the auto industry and its workforce.  My team and I spent countless hours at the Wayne State University labor library and other historical archives around the state of Michigan. Relationships with local researchers led to an introduction to one of the directors of the MotorCities National Heritage Area, an affiliate of the National Park Service dedicated to preserving the automotive and labor heritage of the state. The mutual benefits were obvious, as the film was unearthing a vast amount of Michigan history keen to MotorCities and we were certainly excited to link up with any statewide network. But, I’d never heard of a “national heritage area” before so, it warranted further investigating.  A National Heritage Area is “a region that has been recognized by the U.S. Congress for its combination of natural, cultural, historic, and recreational resources that have shaped a cohesive, nationally distinctive landscape.”

There are 49 such areas across the country and many have established grant programs to support local interpretive projects (including films!)  Outside of my Detroit legacy, the family has roots in West Virginia, leading me to approach the Wheeling National Heritage Area as well.  Since the documentary at least briefly covers those early years, we were at first eligible for a modest Mini-Grant ($1K), which soon grew to a larger Partnership Grant ($6K) after the Board screened our rough cut.  For those producing a film on any aspect of American history or culture, I highly recommend exploring an applicable Heritage Area.  There’s no guarantee of funding availability but, making contact could lead to benefits in other areas. When we reached completion of Brothers On The Line and the film was accepted into the Uptown/Detroit Independent Film Festival as our World Premiere, The MotorCities National Heritage Area launched a campaign of blogs and Facebook messages in advance of our screening dates. TV and radio interviews followed, boosting attendance at this up-and-coming festival and prompting organizers to add a second showing of the film. The free and far-reaching promotion proved to be just as valuable as the earlier grant awards.

Tales From Planet Earth Film Festival – Madison, WI

Aside from historical societies, a number of advocacy groups also played a role in my film’s progression. The Reuther brothers were not just workers’ rights activists; their commitment spanned a broad range of social movements: civil rights, community organizing, voter registration, national healthcare, anti-war, the environment, etc. Unable to cover all of these issues in the eventual 80-minute film, I nonetheless made the effort to reach out to any group who might have a special connection to the material, no matter how slim. During the process, I began an email exchange with The Nelson Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  I was researching the UAW’s environmental activism and The Nelson Institute has one of the leading programs in that field, named after the late Senator Gaylord Nelson, founder of Earth Day. (The UAW was a financial contributor to the first Earth Day in 1970.)  While my communication did not result in funding, the staff at the institute were particularly intrigued by my film for its progressive message and offered to consider it for their annual Tales From Planet Earth Film Festival.  Acceptance into that festival was providential, not just because they provide a screening fee AND honorarium (very rare these days) but, primarily for its location.  If Detroit is the root of our story, then Madison, WI represents the current heartbeat of labor activism.  It was the home of last year’s Madison Uprising in which embattled public sector union members took to the streets after Governor Scott Walker slashed their pensions and benefits.  I couldn’t have asked for a better stage from which to link current affairs to our historical documentary. Brothers On The Line drew a full-house crowd at the festival and was immediately embraced by the South Central Federation of Labor, which set-up their own special screening the following night.  In stretching the boundaries of my “cause” film and throwing the fundraising net a little wider, I was fortunate to catch an ally that paid off with patience. What at first appeared to be a disappointing dead-end in regard to financial support, transformed into the ultimate contact list for today’s frontline activists, all eagerly anticipating our home video release.

Washington DC International Film Festival – Nominee, Justice Matters Award

The final resource worth mentioning here did not come from earlier legwork but, actually arose directly from a festival acceptance. If given the opportunity, I knew the documentary would play well in the DC area, as there are a plethora of activist groups to attract and it happens to be my hometown. American Rights at Work and The International Labor Rights Forum, two Capitol Hill based advocacy organizations whose missions support workers’ rights, were great partners in our completion efforts.  However, upon selection into the Washington DC International Film Festival (a.k.a. FilmFestDC), one of the most promising associations was with Teaching For Change, a non-profit organization promoting social and economic justice in the classroom.  In coordination with FilmFestDC programmers, Teaching For Change selects one documentary from the annual festival slate that has potential in the educational market and invites the filmmaker to participate in preview screenings at area high-schools.  Brothers On The Line was chosen and two classroom visits scheduled.  The junior and senior-year students watched the full film prior to my arrival and I came in for a follow-up discussion.  We had an in-depth chat on U.S. history and film technique in both settings; each class with their own unique commentary.  One of my goals for the film is that it would have a long educational shelf-life and this “test-screening” was priceless. The students’ honest observations caused me to view the film in a new light and will aide in the preparation to promote to a younger audience. In discussing their favorite scenes, we also touched on what they might cut out, which could be helpful if I ever need to bring the film under an hour for TV. (Note: be prepared when asking that, as the answers could be brutal!)  Even if not initiated by FilmFestDC, introducing yourself to Teaching for Change is a must when it comes to social justice meets educational filmmaking.

Brothers On The Line was produced before crowd-sourcing really took off so, we relied heavily on nurturing personal relationships. Some offered a modest yet immediate boost; while others revealed their worth in the final hour. But, what I didn’t realize at the time is that all alliances made during production were actually shaping our film festival run.  From New York (Workers Unite Film Festival – Best Documentary Feature) to California (Mendocino Film Festival – Audience Choice Award), our non-traditional circuit has been deeply gratifying as the enthusiasm of our supporters is the driving force behind our success.

From the 2011 Independent Filmmaker Conference.

From the 2011 Independent Filmmaker Conference.

Additional IFP alumni screening at the festival: Spotlight on Documentaries alumni Annie Eastman’s Bay of All Saints, Jay Bulger’s Beware of Mr. Baker, and Caveh Zahedi’s The Sheikh and I in Documentary Competition; Katie Dellamaggiore’s Brooklyn Castle, Rebecca Richman Cohen’s Code of the West, Ashley Sabin and David Redmon’s Girl Model, Ben Shapiro’s Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters, and Kristy Guevara-Flanagan’s Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroes in Documentary Spotlight; and Mark Kendall’s La Camioneta: The Journey of One American School Bus (also fiscally sponsored by IFP) and Kahlil Hudson and Tyler Hughen’s Low & Clear in Emerging Visions. Also screening at the festival are Todd Rohal’s Nature Calls (No Borders) in Narrative Spotlight and Adam Leon’s Gimme the Loot (IFP/Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Emerging Visions) in Narrative Competition.

Also at SXSW, IFP’s Rose Vincelli is a part of the “Mentors: Artist Development” session at 11am on Saturday, March 10. She is also moderating IFP’s panel, “Tough Love: Why You’re Still Not Festival Ready” with hybrid distribution guru Jon Reiss and IFP Labs alumnus Tim Sutton, director of Pavilion. “Tough Love” is at 3:30p March 10. If you’re at SXSW, come say hi & glean from our knowledge! Follow IFP on Twitter @ifpfilm for updates from some of the 17 IFP alumni fest premieres and other news from the fest.

Congratulations to everyone – we’ll see you in Austin!

From the 2011 Independent Filmmaker Conference.

Better than my own scattered memories, for my Sundance diary, I wanted to round up some good writing that might help to establish a lateral picture of this year from many different critical points of view.

The shadow outline of Quvenzhané Wallis on the front page of the arts section of The New York Times was almost a shock to see—BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD felt too intense, too personally magical, for it to be real that anyone outside of the Eccles at its morning premiere would know that this film even existed. It took me a second to digest that BEASTS was the central title in Manohla Dargis’ Sundance wrap-up, and also in her opinion, “the best film to play at Sundance in two decades.”

Manohla’s take on the film summarizes the visceral glory and excitement of experiencing BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD for the first time at Sundance. It is so rare that a film seems to be introducing a new language onto the screen, so fresh and inspiring that it leaves most at a loss for description. BEASTS dominated the atmosphere of the festival, leaving little room for the same level of excitement elsewhere.

Similar to Manohla’s Sundance wrap-up, James Rocchi’s brief history of Sundance-past gets at what felt special in 2012. Rocchi documents the ennui of mini-majors in the mid-2000s followed by an ambivalent and uneven climate post-financial crisis, and believes that this is the year that the festival’s relevance in handling the cultural zeitgeist through independent film reasserted itself.

However, for many festival attendees, last year’s festival was the one that seemed like a return to form, when the festival presented many low-budget outside-the-box gems like TAKE SHELTER, THE CATECHISM CATACLYSM, TERRI and THE OREGONIAN. Mike S. Ryan at Hammer To Nail champions the independent spirit of the 2011 lineup to cast a critical eye at this year’s festival, but still found some shining talent in the new independent auteurs of 2012, particularly COMPLIANCE and THE COMEDY (which he produced).

Tom Hall’s reports for Filmmaker are insightful Sundance diaries. His “Sex, Drugs And Falling Apart” alludes to the festival’s external influences: the mountains, the feeling of remoteness and insularity of snow and ice, offer a backdrop for movie watching that can intensify our experiences as movie goers—as Tom says, “the perfect weather for introspection.”

One oft-overlooked element of festival coverage is the mood of the festival environment, so heavily influenced by off-screen factors such as the Saturday blizzard, which effectively stopped traffic and destroyed well-laid plans on what is typically the festival’s busiest day. Also in the air was the fact that some of the most highly buzzed about films were also those dealing with sobering realities: rape in the military (THE INVISIBLE WAR) and rapidly melting glaciers (CHASING ICE). There are always many difficult films in the documentary competitions, but somehow this year the brokenness of our society and culture really burned.  Surrounding all this was the independent film industry’s own tragic loss, the untimely death of veteran distributor, Bingham Ray, in the middle of the festival.

I don’t know if it was the overriding solemnity, but this year’s Sundance had a sense of palpable earnestness. I heard more conversations dealing with the films than about budgets and sales numbers. It felt grounding—like the industry was there because they believed in all of this, in spite of everything.

And yet Karina Longworth, who always does bring really worthwhile thoughts to elucidate the big picture of Sundance, noticed a continued upsetting festival trend in a conversation published on Indiewire.  Says Karina: “It’s shocking how little debate actually happens about the merits of any individual film at the festival, because too many attendees with a “voice” approach the festival as though it’s a place of right and wrong answers.”

This, to me, is an essential point about major festivals in general: ‘What did you like?’ and ‘What is your favorite?’ are the dominant questions. In our fear not to miss a film, we ask everyone we encounter what they thought of what they just watched. A curious colleague who asks, ‘What did you think?’ usually doesn’t care to stick around to dig in and try to read the film with you. And this atmosphere of heavy consumption defines every Sundance—for many of us, our job is to see as much as possible, and often that means we’re not digesting as well as we should be. Sometimes the less assuming yet very thoughtful film is lost in the mix. (For me, the overlooked victims this year were the weighty and complex THE ATOMIC STATES OF AMERICA and the intensely cinematic FOR ELLEN.)

There was almost too much work to love at this year’s Sundance. I can’t believe how much excellence and artistic ability I experienced at the festival this year, and I missed seeing many films that were highly praised by others. Speaking of earmarks, it will be very difficult for next year’s festival to compete with this year’s anomalous crop of exceptional films.