MANAGING EXPECTATIONS AT INDEPENDENT FILM WEEK

Hello from New York. Tara Wray here blogging the start of Independent Film Week. This morning Cartoon College producer/my soon-to-be-husband Josh Melrod and I picked up our badges and registered so now it’s off to the races. I ran into some familiar faces right off the bat: editor Andrew Blackwell (who is at IFW with The Graves of Putumayo; he also teaches at The Edit Center) and Juna Skenderi, director of this year’s industry video library who worked with me in the library in 2006.

I haven’t been back to New York (where we lived for almost seven years) since I left for Vermont in April 2007 to begin production on Cartoon College. This city is mad! Literally. Josh and I are staying two blocks from Bellevue, just in case.

Anyway, this afternoon I went to the Doc Spot orientation, hosted by Milton Tabbot. It was part orientation, part panel discussion. Ryan Harrington, head of IndiePix provided the industry point of view and the crew from the doc 21 Below were there to share their experience at last year’s market. The focus was on being prepared for our upcoming meetings (which I’ll talk more about in my next post), and also managing expectations—something I’m working on. Both Ryan and Milton reminded us filmmakers to keep it simple, stupid. Actually, they just said keep it simple; the stupid was mine.

Ryan spoke about what industry people want from those of us who will be pitching docs-in-progress: character, story, and commercial viability, especially commercial viability. IFW, Ryan said, is one of the only times when industry people are a captive audience to filmmakers—it’s his busiest week of the year; it’s at IFW that he’ll get a first peek at docs that’ll be in front of audiences for the next two years. He also stressed the importance of being able to pitch your movie in a single sentence. Industry people and festival coordinators hear between fifty and a hundred thousand pitches at IFW, so if you can’t get their attention right away they’re likely to zone out or take that incoming call. Tonight I’m going to work on boiling my pitch down to something so concise it’ll be like a slap in the face! The team from 21 Below talked about cramming as much as you possibly can into your IFW experience. Last year they successfully obtained finishing funds after making some important connections at peripheral events: lunches, cocktail parties, speed-dating sessions.

Also mentioned: bring a laptop (and headphones) with you to your doc meetings, so you can show your trailer. Ryan seconded. He said the industry people we’re meeting might not remember having seen it (or they might not have watched it at all – OMG!!), and besides, it’s best to let the work speak for itself.

Tonight we’ll be going to bed early in preparation for a busy day tomorrow. In my next post I’ll report on the start of industry meetings, which are like the bacon in the IFW BLT.

(Portions of this post ghost-written by Josh Melrod)