FILM FESTIVAL IN VEGAS CATASTROPHE - Why smaller film festivals are just not worth it скачать в хорошем качестве

FILM FESTIVAL IN VEGAS CATASTROPHE - Why smaller film festivals are just not worth it

Join us on our Las Vegas film festival vlog. This video follows us through a catastrophic festival that we attended in Las Vegas. On paper film festivals look like a great idea but are they actually worth it? I was recently invited to showcase three short films that I produced and acting in. Well, I acted in two out of the three films that I produced, and thought to myself great. I am invited to Vegas to showcase some of my work. What could go wrong? I won’t mention the film festival out of respect to the people who created it but it was a total mess. So myself, and two other friends headed out to Vegas to go to this film festival and I thought I’d film a couple of things. Registration done, we go into the screening room and literally there are a handful of people. For a medium sized festival that is supposed to be part of a much larger festival we were expecting a full house. Of course projector problems arise and they notify us 30-40 minutes later that because of technical issues they will only project the films. We have to note that they basically have a computer connected to a legit cinema projector and they are simply hitting play on the video files. You’d think that they could figure that out. Not complaining about it, but it’s not that difficult. I got my movie into the festival for free but most other people had to pay to get their film submitted so the least they could do is screen their film. Well, they did eventually film our movie but at this point, I kind of gave up on the whole filming process. So, this goes back to my initial topic of Are film festivals worth it? I really don’t want to put this particular disorganized mess of a festival on a pedestal, but this has been my experience at a ton of festivals. I’m not saying that they all had technical issues or that they were disorganized. Actually a lot of them had smooth screenings and were timely on their showings, but film festivals can pretty much be organized by anyone. If you have access to a screen be it at a bar, movie theatre, regular theatre, backyard…You name it, you can actually create your film festival. Each festival usually has a submission fee that can range from as low as free (which is rare) to $25, to even up to $100. I even had a couple of shorts screening at the Cannes film festival in the short film corner section. I’ll praise Cannes because I did submit one year and got denied and they actually refunded me the submission fee. The other two times I submitted the films were screened and it was all rosy. But either Cannes, which is huge or smaller festivals it has always been extremely underwhelming. In order to really benefit from film festivals you have to be in the official selections of festivals such as Sundance, South By Southwest and even The Cannes film festival but as an official selected short and not the short film corner where there’s 1000s of movies that are accepted. You’re very unlikely to get any sort of distribution or recognition from being in small stuff. The whole thing with festivals is that submitting your films to a handful of festivals will most likely result in close to $1000 of submissions. If you don’t get it 99% of the time forget getting that money back. And even if you do get your film screened, unless it’s a big film festival get ready for disorganization, crappy projection quality and most probably nobody that can actually distribute your film. I’m really not trying to be negative, and on the other hand am simply sharing my experience. I really think that the best thing for indie film makers to do is to produce short films that can actually get into the bigger festivals. Better quality in visuals, script, acting, VFX will give you more of a chance of getting into bigger places. In the beginning it’s always hard and everyone has to start from the pretty much 0 budget film, but the more quality work you do, the bigger your team can get and eventually you will be able to create something amazing. Don’t forget that movie making is a collaborative effort. Do try to experience 1-2 really small film festivals so that you can get your bad experience. I feel all film makers should see the less than optimal state of film making at least once in their life. This’ll make you appreciate the bigger and better places to screen your future films. Lastly, don’t forget social media platforms such as YouTube. Just create a ton of work and the more you create the more of a resume you have. The bigger the resume the more chance someone can see your work. It really won’t be at smaller film festivals. Try to focus on getting to the level where you can show stuff in the big leagues. #filmfestival #lasvegasfilmfestival #catastrophicfestival