strange frame: Love & Sax

I’ve been wary about film festivals. In 1999, I did the production on a feature film called Ka’ililauokekoa. It was a low budget film, but never the less did very well at the film festivals. When I did the math on the ticket sales at these festivals I found that these festivals grossed 2 times the budget of the film. This was very unsettling for me since the film never got a theatrical deal.

There are definitely festivals to go to where the exposure is worth giving the festival free content, but that is the conscious decision every filmmaker must make: Who am I willing to give free content to? What is the non-fiscal payback?

Tribeca recently announced they are following Sundance into the VOD distribution model. David Poland sums up this idea better than I can: Festivals Raping Filmmakers… Or Just A Friendly Reach Around?

strange frame is featured on Hawaii’s Reel Stories
Premieres Thursday, June 25 at 8:30 PM on OC 16
Also playing 12 more times this week:
Friday at 2:30 AM
Saturday at 3:30 PM
Sunday at 10 AM & 11:30 PM
Monday at 5:30 AM & 6:30 PM
Tuesday at 12:30 AM, 10:30 AM & 10 PM
Wednesday at 4 AM & 4 PM
Thursday, July 2 at 9:30 AM

If you are reading this weeks from now, it might not be the top film. Only last week it was number 2. Still impressive for the type of film. When I checked State of Play was 26th.

Not biggest grossing film, but the feature film with the total number of positive critical reviews. Don’t click on the link yet.

It is not some clip on YouTube. We are talking about feature films made within the last year. 

Can you guess? I’ll give you a hint:

It is an eclectic animated music driven feature in a unique style about love in the face of adversity. It is an independent film done with a very low budget by a handful of passionate filmmakers. Its audience is mostly teens and adults. Sound familiar? 

The film is here and it is free to download in high resolution

Notice another eclectic animated film not targeted at kids is in the top 20 as well. Why am I interested in this? Because from the start of this project studio execs have told me that we have a fantastic idea, but no audience. ‘Animated films we mostly for kids and the adults that bring them.’ Honestly,I can’t imagine a huge audience for our film, but a dedicated one…and in the current market of media piracy and changing distribution models, I’d rather have a smaller group of intense fans than a wide release.

Enjoy the film.