Written by Loren MarshI'm an American independent filmmaker living in Berlin whose previous films have been showcased at prestigious festivals such as the Berlinale, Sundance, and AFI Los Angeles. My latest feature film Night to be Gone had a limited theatrical release earlier this year in Germany where it received some excellent reviews, and was then released on the Sooner streaming platform in Europe and on Amazon Prime in the USA. For a micro-budget film made by a group of friends with just a few thousand dollars, that's a pretty nice result.But before that, the film was turned down by all the major film festivals. That left me wondering what had gone wrong. If it worked for audiences and critics in the release, what had held it back with programmers? Like many of us, I believe that making a film to get into a festival is the wrong approach. But still, filmmakers can benefit from being aware of certain pitfalls with festivals. That's particularly true today when programmers have to think about social advocacy as well as cinematic quality when they consider a film. There's a major emphasis on what kind of stories we should be telling, and who is permitted to tell them. Here I'd like to share with you the lessons I learned about the current festival environment through my experience of applying to festivals with our film. Know your characterNight to be Gone stars a non-actor, Omer Cissé, a Black African refugee playing himself in a dramatization...
Published By: NoFilmSchool - Friday, 1 November