Filmmakers attending Sundance next week may hear the line above as they stand outside the Cinetic or William Morris parties, but for, oh, a couple of thousand feature directors, those words came a bit early – when they got their Sundance rejection letters.
As
Filmmaker’s editor, I go through several phases when I review Sundance’s annual list. There’s my first, “Oh, great, that got in” reaction when I see that films I’ve been looking forward to screening have made the cut. And then there’s the “Wow, how did they get that finished in time?” take on movies that entered production in August, September and even October but have managed to still slip into the fest. Next are my “They selected
that!” exclamations when I see that films I think are going to suck are debuting in Park City. (Last year, one of these films --
A Guide to Recognizing your Saints, which I read the script of and didn’t like, turned out to be one of my favorites, so go figure.) Then there are the films and filmmakers I’ve never heard of, the ones that send me to the search engines for more info.
A few days later, though, another list forms in my mind: the films I expected to see but for whatever reason aren’t in the fest. Some weren’t finished in time, are in need of reshoots, are planning to premiere in Berlin or Cannes, ran out of money… but most, simply, just didn’t get in.
In a rational marketplace, this wouldn’t be such a terrible thing. But given that so many indie-film investor business plans end with the words “and then we premiere at Sundance,” it’s painful to talk with producers and directors who have not a clue as to what to do with their movies now that the Sundance programmers have given them the axe. Especially sad are the rejections received by films that the industry dubs as “Sundance films.” Sometimes said as praise, sometimes said pejoratively, the terms refer to American independent films that are often human-scale and character based… “ethnographic fictions,” Amy Taubin has called them. But it also refers, subtly, to films from emerging talent that are perceived to need the programming imprimatur and early critical exposure of the festival to convince a distributor to buy them.
There are Sundance films that never went to Sundance and were acquired elsewhere (
George Washington and
Sling Blade are just two examples), and there are other festivals and venues where Sundance films films can be screened and acquired (although their collective sales record last year was poor). But for a Sundance film without a smart “Plan B” in place, a Sundance rejection can be fatal.
If you’ve got a film that didn’t get in, what are you doing now? Post anonymously if you want.
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 1/07/2007 07:38:00 PM
Comments (8)
We have a film that didn't get into Sundance. Then again, we weren't exactly counting on it. But, we did get the news that we were accepted to the Durango Independent Film Festival. Which is good. A world of different from Sundance, but we're excited.
Heard anything good about Durango? Who attends? Who buys? Parties?
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posted by ajfprod @ 1/08/2007 3:27 PM
ajf - have a link to your movie?
we're just finishing up our short film and we plan to submit to sundance for next year's festival, but there's plenty of other festivals to go to (for short films the palm springs short film festival is considered the 'sundance' for short films).
plenty of films have gone on to success without traveling through sundance. and some end up at sundance later even after being rejected, if they do well elsewhere.
there are as many paths to successes as there are filmmakers and films. if you don't get into sundance (and the majority don't), you shouldn't feel lost. move on to the next one. that's what we'll do. though we'll have already been rejected or received by quite a few others before we even get around to sundance.
our short film:
an exercise in vigilance
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posted by deepstructure @ 1/08/2007 4:14 PM
Deepstructure's got the best advice:
"there are as many paths to successes as there are filmmakers and films. if you don't get into sundance (and the majority don't), you shouldn't feel lost. move on to the next one. that's what we'll do. though we'll have already been rejected or received by quite a few others before we even get around to sundance."
Don't know a lot about the Durango fest -- hopefully others will reply here. But please pass along some info on your film so we can help get the word out.
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posted by Scott Macaulay @ 1/08/2007 6:08 PM
Two years ago, aroung Thanksgiving, my collaborators and I started getting calls from agents at William Morris and UTA regarding our omnibus feature Deadroom. We weren't sure of the cause for the sudden interest - we'd been written up in Filmmaker that past summer, but that had been months ago, and we didn't know why they would have waited until November to call us. Since they all were expressing great interest in repping us if we got to Sundance, we figured we must have been on some sort of short list.
So that last week of November came and went, with much wringing-of-hands and checking-for-missed-calls and hoping-against-hope. Come early December we received the official rejection e-mail we already were resigned to receiving. The agents who had until then been so quick to return our calls wished us luck and turned their attention to those who'd actually been accepted. And we hung our heads and wondered what to do until, two weeks later, we got a call from Matt Dentler at SXSW letting us know that we'd been accepted. We were one of the opening night films that year, and while our ensuing festival run was small (commensurate, I retrospectively realize, with the appeal of the film), I think we came out of it about as well (if not better) than we would have had we gone to Sundance. Some of the films that played there that year haven't fared any better than ours, and the experience of premiering at SXSW was -- well, it was nurturing, in a way. We felt respected, and taken care of, and it was a great way to get broken into the festival circuit.
I still submit all my projects to Sundance - who doesn't? - but it's almost sort of a ritual now, rather than some great white hope. You send out the application because That's What You Do if you make independent film, and then you forget about it and start noticing all the other, equally bright horizons.
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posted by David Lowery @ 1/08/2007 9:23 PM
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posted by Andy @ 1/09/2007 7:28 PM
Our film is a graffiti doc.
I know. You've seen them. They're all the same.
Except we take it from a youthful perspective. Not the guys who are doing it into their 30's and 40's, but the actual kids who are risking their lives, jail time, etc. Not the kids who are in gangs, but the kids from Beverly Hills hanging out with the kids from Compton. Doing it for the 'art'. But is it 'art'?
We tell a story of 4 graffiti artists. How they got started. How some went to jail, some went to art school, and where they are ending up.
It's really quite a cool narrative to a documentary that you think you know what to expect.
Check it out on MySpace:
www.myspace.com/pieceofmindthemovie
...off to Durango!
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posted by @ 1/09/2007 7:28 PM
kids. learn how to link! ;)
myspace - piece of mind
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posted by deepstructure @ 1/09/2007 7:35 PM
We decided that our short wasnt really a short and should be made into a feature. We will spend this coming year finishing off the project and resubmit next year.
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posted by @ 11/30/2007 12:45 PM
