After posting my last blog about all our festival rejections, I got a nice response from another documentary director who's in the same boat.  I ended up having a really good conversation with Tray White (The Impaler) about being a small-time filmmaker and how to work within those confines. He's had a bit more experience than I with the festival circuit; confirming a couple of my suspicions and sharing couple of good tips.

Basically the only way to get into the big festivals is with name stars or filmmakers and/or connections to somebody within the festival.  That all the schmoes aka me, who blindly send in entries have a lottery chance in hell of getting in.  Unpaid volunteers, who may or may not know a good film if it kicked them in the face, are the first round to get through; your film has to receive extremely high scores from them to get into somebody's hands who might have the slightest bit of power in getting your film into the festival.  Smaller festivals have similar systems in place, but don't get the landslide of entries, so you have a slightly better chance of getting through. 

Withoutabox, the do-all website for film festivals, has created a win-win situation for festivals and win-lose one for filmmakers.  The festivals win because they get more exposure to filmmakers equaling more entries and more money, while doing less of the leg work.  The filmmakers win because all these festivals are a click away, it's easy to research what festivals fit your film; and you only have to fill out your entry form once, making it incredibly easy to enter ten festivals in a blink, something that used to take hours of paperwork; but because it is so easy to find and enter multiple festivals there are exponentially more entries.  Making it that much harder for quality films to rise to the top. I've even heard stories about people starting film festivals just to cash in on the entry fees. Withoutabox has changed the landscape of film festivals forever. 

But I'm done with the blind entry, it's a worthless process.  Instead I'm going with an idea that Tray gave me, in that you call the festival first, talk to the festival director; make sure that your film will be seen by somebody that has some power in getting your film into the festival.  And if the director won't talk to you and won't give into those terms, fuck 'em, move on to the next festival, there's thousands of them out there.

It's tough going from a filmmaker to a salesman.  I hate talking on the phone, hate it, and avoid it with every opportunity; cold calling is even worse.  But if I want my film to be seen, it's something I'm going to have to tackle.  Before entering any more festivals, I am going to call the festivals I have already entered; push those investments that are already out there.  In the little time I used today I called two west coast festivals and got through fairly easily to both directors.  After a brief explanation of who I was and why I was calling; both promised to watch the film once it got around to them, regardless if it got good scores from those who had seen it before or not.  That's already a big step in the right direction.  The top guy at each festival will watch my film and by talking to them it gave them somebody to identify with behind the film.  At the least I know I have somebody's attention, and if the film doesn't get in, it's not because "nobody" saw it. 

I plan on calling the rest of the festivals I have entered and doing the same thing.  I may not get the same promises, but I'll at least know I've tried.  The next step is getting some distribution people to see it.  I know that there's a fairly large potential audience for the film, in anybody that is thinking about or is having a baby for the first time. That may lead the film to being on the Discovery Channel in some chopped down version, which I'm not opposed to, any way the film finds an audience is a good one. But I'd take some satisfaction in being able to walk into a Blockbuster and seeing a few copies of my film on the shelf next to the latest Hollywood release.

I'm pretty much winging this as I go along.  I know I could be doing it all in a more efficient fashion.  I've read some books on the subject, taken a few ideas, but this is the way I learn things; trial and error. And the next time I'm trying to get a film out into the world, I'll have some sort of clue of how to do so and hopefully some friends in the business to lend a helping hand.  For now I'll keep plugging along in my meager way, keeping the moral about the tortoise in mind; and eventually I'll find the finish line, wherever that may be.