IFP NO BORDERS CO-PRODUCTION MARKET DAYS 1 & 2 – FOCUSED ON FILM FINANCING – PHANG BLOGS
Hi. Jennifer Phang here, back again to report on the IFP No Borders Co-Production Market 2009. Quick notes: I’m twitterable at HalfLifeJen, here’s our Half-Life website, and Half-Life facebook page. Friends, fans, indie/arthouse sympathizers, and all generally good-hearted people, please join up and help us spread the news of our approaching December release.
Pictured on the right: filmmaker Tze Chun and I in silent agreement that blue/blue-gray with a black lanyard accent was the power ensemble of the day. No, we are not related.
I have to get some sleep for Day 3, so I’ll keep it to the important info and save the full gushing and wit for my third post next week.
No Borders Day One saw our team (writer Dominic Mah, producer Reuben Lim, and me, director Jennifer Phang) meeting with Alain de la Mata from the Wild Bunch, Amal ElWardi of IM Global, and Daniel Bauer of K5, based out of Munich, who all turned out to be really pleasant people. The reception of our project felt genuinely strong, with a convincing show of interest for potential financial assistance and recommendations toward overall packaging. We’ve found that our best meetings tend to be when potential production partners know what they’re looking for. There was a sharp contrast between the general passions and preferences of IM Global vs. K5. K5 seemed not have much interest in straight genre pictures, but rather genre-bending pictures. This was appropriate to our project and kind of unusual for me to hear. They also weren’t too concerned about a heavy-hitting cast, but rather the interesting storytelling and the exploration of ideas. This felt like a strong set of meetings because these were people who seemed ready and able to do business. Participants were selecting our project out of interest in our project dossier, which we know to be enticing due to its unique concept. These were not assigned meetings.
Day Two felt similarly positive. We met with reps from The Weinstein Company, E1 Entertainment International, Worldview Entertainment, and Astrakan. All of the people we met with seemed to connect easily with the story’s appeal, and that increased when we shared our look book. There was one meeting in which some concern was voiced as to how I might capture some of the internet communication/social networking scenes in the film. This was the first time someone had asked this in a meeting, but it’s something I had considered deeply. Pointing at look book photographs, waving my arms, and drawing shapes in the air, I explained how I would make these seemingly non-cinematic scenes visually dynamic. In other meetings, our story was not only compared to the The Wizard of Oz, it was pitched back to us as The Virgin Suicides meets The Wizard of Oz.
At the party Sunday night, I got to say hello again to the Sundance Institute’s Michelle Satter and Rachel Chanoff , who expressed interest in putting up another Half-Life screening in New York. Outside of formal meetings, I also took the opportunity to compare notes with James Ponsoldt and Todd Rohal about our past Sundance Labs experiences. Tomorrow I finally get to make contact with the folks from Cinemart (Rotterdam), which I think may be an appropriate additional market for this project. We expect our project to have international appeal because of its romance, adventure, social networking, and escapist themes.
Closing suggestion/tip: To avoid loss of focus in your meetings, get a lot of sleep the night before. Don’t stay up till 3 a.m., blogging irresponsibly like me.
