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Kinyarwanda dramatizes the 1994 genocide in Rwanda that saw one million lives lost in one hundred days. As it interweaves six tales into one narrative, its characters confront the realities of forgiveness in the face of vengeance. Kinyarwanda is the feature-length debut of writer/director Alrick Brown; produced by Darren Dean, Tommy Oliver and Executive Producer Ishmael Ntihabose. The film was supported by a Cinereach grant in summer 2010 (towards post-production), and premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, where it received the World Dramatic Competition Audience Award. Kinyarwanda begins its theatrical run December 2nd in multiple cities across the US, being distributed by the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM).
Kinyarwanda’s theatrical release happens to coincide with the announcement of the 2012 Sundance Film Festival lineup. This exciting time finds producer Tommy Oliver reminiscing about an unexpectedly rewarding bond forged at Sundance, that is even stronger one year later. Infused with admirable generosity, his post offers an uplifting example of the social capital that can sustain films through their festival and distribution journeys.
A Rising Tide Raises All Ships
a guest post by Producer Tommy Oliver
On a freezing cold day last January in Salt Lake City, something special happened.
Before I tell you what that special something was, let me offer a bit of context:
1) Salt Lake City is 45-60 min drive from the main Sundance hub of Park City.
2) By cold, I mean less than 20 degrees.
3) When you have a film (especially your first film) at Sundance, you barely have time to breathe between multiple screenings, events, press junkets and so forth.
4) Before every screening we had, I made a point to engage with each and every waitlist line (if they were willing to wait in line for the chance to get tickets, they absolutely deserved attention and gratitude).
While engagingd with the waitlist line for our Salt Lake City screening, I happened upon three faces I knew. They were those of Dee Rees, Nekisa Cooper and Adepero Oduye, the writer/director, producer and star, respectively, of the phenomenal film Pariah, which was also playing at the festival.
The fact that they would attend our screening isn’t a particularly big deal – Alrick and Dee were contemporaries at NYU and we all went through the IFP labs together. But when you take into account that they had their own screening that day, drove 45 minutes in the snow, waited outside in the cold with little chance of securing tickets and not once picked up the phone to call Alrick, Darren or myself for tickets before heading down, it paints a very different picture. They wanted to support us and not in a fleeting or ephemeral manner, and I loved them for that. It was so gracious, humble and incredibly beautiful.
It was the sort of thing that affirms your faith in people and collaboration in an industry typically known for its narcissism.
Fast-forward eleven months as both films are set to open theatrically (Kinyarwanda on December 2nd and Pariah on December 28th), and our bond is even tighter. We’ve supported and cross-promoted them at every turn and they’ve done the same for us. If you go to Nekisa’s Facebook page, you’d see that her profile picture is the Kinyarwanda poster. If you check my twitter feed, you’d see that I’ve mentioned Pariah almost as much as I’ve mentioned Kinyarwanda.
We’ve fallen into a sort of symbiosis (ironic for a film named Pariah) that illustrates how working together can result in something greater than the sum of the parts. It also shows that treating collaboration and not competition as the default, is a healthy and viable option. The best part of all of this is that it was completely organic. We’ve never once had a conversation about how we’d cross promote, what the parameters were or who was doing what. Ever.
In the end, Pariah is a good film done by good folks and spreading the word about it is something we did happily and will continue to do.
A rising tide raises all ships.
Follow @KinyarwandaMov @ProducerTommy and @NorthstarPics on Twitter for more good vibes related to Kinyarwanda and Pariah.
Kinyarawanda theater and ticket information can be found at affrm.com.
Tommy Oliver, a strong believer in the transformative power of film, is trying to make the world a better place, one film at a time. Growing up in inner city Philadelphia, he quickly learned that “preaching at” his peers was not the way to go and film was a much better medium to reach them. Over the next fifteen years, he has honed his craft through practice, training, education and experimentation. As a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University, where he double majored in Economics and Digital Media, and as a Microsoft alum, he developed a keen understanding for business as a whole. As a cinematographer and certified techie, he developed the technical skills to fill in any crew position and to be able to better communicate with team leaders and vendors. As a producer and writer, he’s faced innumerable challenges from crafting a coherent and marketable story to tackling the logistics of shooting in a foreign country and beyond. This combination of skills allows for outside the box thinking, creative problem solving and better communication. In addition to dozens of short films and commercials, Tommy has produced three feature films including Kinyarwanda and Plastic Jesus starring Mackenzie Foy and Hilarie Burton.
11/16/2011
» Cinereach Supported Projects at IDFA
Cinereach is proud to announce that six films supported through the Cinereach grants program will be showcased at this year’s IDFA in both the festival and the forum, running Nov 16 – 27.
IDFA SCREENINGS
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IDFA FORUM
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10/27/2011
» Dragonslayer Opens in Theaters
Dragonslayer, a Cinereach 2010 grantee and winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at SXSW, begins its theatrical release on Friday, November 4th.
Executive Produced by Christine Vachon, Tristan Patterson’s directorial debut draws a vivid portrait of a new generation of kids growing up in the rotting suburbs of inland California by following one of them, a skater named Skreech, over the course of a typically turbulent year.
Skreech’s skating may be framed by the sloped walls of an empty swimming pool, but his story fits into a larger scope of dimished dreams. As described in a New York Times profile of the film, “Existing on the fringes, pool skating has always thrived during times of crisis.”
With acclaimed cinematography by Eric Koretz, textured score by T. Griffin, and a galloping soundtrack populated by musicians from rock labels Mexican Summer and Kemado Records, Dragonslayer’s energy is best experienced big and loud in a theater.
The film opens in New York at the Cinema Village and travels around the country in the weeks that follow. This is the second feature film to be released theatrically by Drag City Records. Check out their website for more information about where Dragonslayer will play next.
In advance of its opening weekend, New Yorkers can get into the Dragonslayer mood at a free concert on Tuesday, November 1st. The bands Psychic Ills and Endless Boogie, and DJ Steve Lowenthal, will provide the night’s soundtrack at Public Assembly in Brooklyn. See details in the flyer below.
10/14/2011
» Summer 2011 Grantees Announced
Dear Friends of Cinereach,
We’re excited to announce $350,000 in grants to 17 feature-length film projects, completing our second grant cycle of 2011. Over 1000 applications were submitted this cycle, from filmmakers based in more than 70 countries. 10 of the selected films will receive Cinereach support for the first time, while 7 are past grantees being awarded additional support.
This grant cycle includes our 100th supported film and continues our five-year tradition of funding films that confound expectations and resonate with audiences around the world. We remain committed to our belief in film as a significant force in shaping global culture, and to creating space for manifold aesthetics, stories and voices.
For the latest information on upcoming Cinereach program deadlines, visit Cinereach.org, and keep an eye out via this email list. We also invite you to explore our revamped Grant Recipients page, where you can navigate through Cinereach films by type, phase of production, or theme. You can also read our blog to keep track of what’s happening throughout the Cinereach community.
Our Summer 2011 Grantees are:
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Cinereach is proud to announce that five films supported through various Cinereach initiatives will be showcased at this year’s BFI London International Film Festival, running October 12 – 27.
Dragonslayer
Director: Tristan Patterson
Nonfiction | Winter 2010 & Summer 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information
Drag City in association with Killer Films presents the transmissions of a lost kid, falling in love, in the suburbs of Fullerton, California. Featuring skateboarding, the usual drugs, and stray glimpses of unusual beauty.
Here
Director: Braden King
Fiction | Supported through The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute
Festival Screening Information
Measurement and orientation break down in an intensely visual, landscape-obsessed road movie that chronicles the relationship between an American mapmaker and a foreign art photographer who impulsively decide to travel together into deeply uncharted territory.
On the Ice
Director: Andrew Okpeaha MacLean
Fiction | Winter 2010 Grantee & Supported through The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute
Festival Screening Information
On the snow-covered Arctic tundra, at the top of the world in Barrow, Alaska, two Inuit teenagers try to get away with murder.
Pariah
Director:Dee Rees
Fiction | Winter 2009 & Winter 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information
When forced to choose between the fragile cohesion of her middle-class family and loyalty to her best friend, a Brooklyn teenager juggles conflicting identities and risks friendship, heartbreak, and family in a desperate search for sexual expression.
Return
Director: Liza Johnson
Fiction | Winter 2010 Grantee & Supported through The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute
Festival Screening Information
Back from a tour of duty, Kelli slowly realizes that her everyday life doesn’t resemble the one she left. Can she regain her place in the kind of life she’s been fighting to protect?
The Forgiveness of Blood
Director: Joshua Marston
Fiction | Supported through Cinereach Productions & Winter 2009 Grantee
Festival Screening Information
In The Forgiveness of Blood, the lives of a teenage boy and his younger sister are thrown into turmoil after a killing in a dispute over land draws their northern Albanian family into a blood feud.
Cinereach is proud to announce that five films supported through various Cinereach initiatives will be showcased at this year’s Hamptons International Film Festival, running October 13 – 17.
Laura
Director: Fellipe Barbosa
Nonfiction | Winter 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information | World Premiere – Golden Starfish Award Documentary Competition
Imagine if Grey Gardens’ Little Edie had actually realized her dream of moving into a studio apartment on 10th Avenue: her life might have resembled that of Laura’s, a Brazilian expat in New York City who lives two contradictory lives. (synopsis by the Hamptons Intl. Film Festival)
Ok, Enough, Goodbye
Director: Rania Attieh & Daniel Garcia
Nonfiction | Summer 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information | US Premiere – World Cinema: Narrative
A 40-year-old man still living with his elderly mother has given up on the idea of becoming independent – until she suddenly leaves him.
The Bully Project
Director: Lee Hirsch
Nonfiction | Winter 2009 Grantee
Festival Screening Information | Films of Conflict & Resolution
A year in the life of America’s bullying crisis that offers an intimate look at how bullying has touched the lives of five kids and their families.
The Forgiveness of Blood
Director: Joshua Marston
Fiction | Supported through Cinereach Productions & Winter 2009 Grantee
Festival Screening Information | Films of Conflict & Resolution
In The Forgiveness of Blood, the lives of a teenage boy and his younger sister are thrown into turmoil after a killing in a dispute over land draws their northern Albanian family into a blood feud.
You Have the Right to an Attorney
Director: Matt Bockelman
Nonfiction | Supported through the Reach Film Fellowship 2011
Festival Screening Information | Short Films
You Have the Right to an Attorney enters the daily grind of two young public defenders in the South Bronx.
10/11/2011
» Crowd-funding a Short Doc: How Reach Film Fellow Nancy Schwartzman raised $8,538 for xoxosms
a post by Nancy Schwartzman
Back in September 2010, I was selected to participate in Cinereach’s Reach Film Fellowship, a program for emerging filmmakers making short films. I wanted to explore technology and its impact on our intimate relationships, so I developed xoxosms, a documentary about two awkward, introverted teenagers from two different worlds. The subjects of the film, Gus and Jiyun, found each other and fell in love on the Internet (see prior Cinereach guest post for how I navigated my delicate access to their love life). The film is about to premiere at the New Orleans Film Festival this coming weekend, but as I reflect back on the early days of the project, I think one of the most valuable things I can share is what I learned from my experience crowd-funding to raise a significant portion of my film’s budget.
The Reach Film Fellowship provided mentorship and a grant towards making the film, but we needed more money for post-production because we shot in multiple formats and needed motion graphics sequences to illustrate Skype and chat scenes. I chose to do a crowd-funding campaign to bridge the financial gap for a few reasons. First, I wanted to try online fundraising, which requires a new kind of trailer and telling the story of my film outside the immediate film and film-granting community. I felt that the topic of love and the Internet would catch peoples’ attention and help generate energy, excitement, and perhaps a community around the film.
Before production, we started a Tumblr blog called, “Without the Internet, we never would have met…” which drew inspiration from stories of long distance relationships (“ldr”) and Internet love that we found in online communities. The blog was not intended as a marketing site for the film, but as a place to highlight and explore relationships like Gus and Jiyun’s. We hoped people with a natural interest in the topic would find us.
I made a list of friends, family, and colleagues to see if I felt comfortable asking them for money—I did. I assessed the community around The Line Campaign (the multi-platform outreach component of my first film, The Line) to see if I could possibly migrate the community to support this new film. The Line Campaign includes an active blog and a crew of bloggers, 2600 twitter followers, a Tumblr blog, 2 Facebook pages with about 3,000 fans, and a newsletter with 3,000 subscribers. I had interns who could help spread the word about xoxosms, and a community of friends and colleagues in the sex-positive, youth media, new tech and feminist blogosphere that I hoped would be interested in the film. So, with a decent size network, plus a healthy dose of shamelessness, I was hoping to get the money needed to finish the film.
I chose Kickstarter as my crowd-funding platform because I knew it would be a good tool to rally potential supporters that were already in my network, but I was also drawn to the sense of community on the Kickstarter website. I spoke to Justin, who handles PR at Kickstarter about the “stumble upon” factor of their website and learned that over 100,000 new backers to Kickstarter campaigns return to support other projects. Additionally, 44% of all projects launched through Kickstarter reach full funding. There is also a weekly newsletter and snappy blog that highlights projects, and helps them stand out.
There have been some stunning success stories for documentaries and independent films on Kickstarter. For smaller projects like mine, these heights can seem insurmountable—the bar is so high. Don’t be intimidated! There is room for you, and you don’t need a full-time team or thousands of followers to get it done.
Below I’ll present some tips based on how I navigated my Kickstarter campaign as a case-study. If it captures your imagination, I invite you to comment and ask questions about how I did it, or share tips from your own experience.
1. Study Kickstarter!
How did the successful projects conduct their campaigns? What is the language and tone of the site? How do people structure their rewards? What kind of video do they use?
While I was studying the site, I looked at a diverse bunch of projects – books, theater, art, film, and tried to gauge what attracted me to them. I was trying to find the right balance between intimate, aesthetically pleasing, descriptive and urgent. The breezy and familiar tone of Coming and Crying, the “Awkward Erotica” anthology, impressed me. The writing spoke to the reader like a friend, or a diary, and you felt invited to participate in the making of the anthology. The community of writers and supporters were sure to follow, too. Disclosure: I know the gals who created Coming & Crying, but with their 785% funding rate, you didn’t have to know them to feel like you wanted to, or already did.
2. Get Ready for Your Close-up: why you have to be in your Kickstarter video
Because your passion for the project is a critical selling point, you need to put yourself in the video. Every successful Kickstarter campaign for a film (and pretty much any project) had a video featuring the person heading up the project talking about why they were passionate about making the film. The word passion comes up a lot on the site, including here in the FAQ. It was clear to me that successful Kickstarters knew a good video was an opportunity to engage with site visitors directly about why they were making the film, show some beautiful and compelling footage, and explain why they needed the Kickstarter audience to help them complete their visions.
I scoured the site for documentary videos, and decided to merge the Angela Tucker and Jacob Krupnick approaches. In her (A)sexual pitch, Angela Tucker intros the piece and then lets the footage from the film speak for itself too. In Girl Walk // All Day, Jacob gives a brief intro, and then narrates throughout (over footage from the film, explaining what the film will do, who the character will meet along the way, and what the audience will see). Both filmmakers come off as direct and honest, with compelling film subjects. My take-away: be real, speak the truth, and keep it short.
3. Start The Presses: how/why you can get some
For xoxosms, a 21st century love story about teens, the Internet, and relationships, I targeted my existing list of sex bloggers, tech lovers and teen-culture folks, hoping they’d take interest in the story, and direct traffic to our Kickstarter page once we launched. For an extra hook for the media, I launched the project on Valentine’s Day. I sent a general press release about the film with a link to the video on our launch day to a large list of journalists who write about tech issues and young people. I also sent personal letters to folks that I know, either because they wrote about The Line in the past, or through other professional channels.
Within a week of our launch, we were profiled on IndieWire, Social Times, Break-up Girl, Kickstarter Blog, and About.com. We were also project of the day on Kickstarter (but see #8 on how we may not have maximized that opportunity). The press attention lent credibility to the project and attracted some donors that were not already part of my circle of contacts.
4. Three Touches: timing, and roll out
30 days is the average time it takes to get a Kickstarter project funded. It’s also a long-enough-but-not-too-long period that gives you enough time to email blast and pester friends, family and lists about three times (do you know that creepy marketing term “3 touches”?) without overwhelming them. I recommend personal emails first, then group emails.
30 days is also short enough to provide your potential supporters with a sense of urgency about making their donation. A 90-day campaign would just be torturous. You’d have to pester people for a longer amount of time, and wait with your stomach in knots for that much longer.
The 3 touches is very important. Be prepared to ask everyone you know and love AT LEAST THREE TIMES THROUGHOUT THE MONTH. We are busy, flakey, cheap, procrastinators. Most of us need to be kicked and nudged. In the FAQ of the Kickstarter site, it talks about average time and duration of campaigns. Notice, in the chart below, how large numbers of backers kicked in towards the end:
Here’s what I did during my 30 days to make the most of the time:
Day #1
I begged my close friends/family first so when I launched the counter wouldn’t be at zero.
Week #1
Facebook blasts – driving friends to my Kickstarter from my personal page and xoxosms page
Twitter blasts – direct messaged everyone, asked explicitly for RTs.
Rolled out the ask on our Tumblr blog
Emailed friends w/blogs or podcasts an abridged version of the press release with the critical details, video and link.
Week #2
I recruited a friend who had offered to donate a generous sum to the project to set up a funding challenge to inspire others to give. I gave her a key list of friends, close ones, and she emailed them offering to match their contributions. She nudged and pinged and kept them engaged in funding, and got them to ask their friends.
Week #3
I blasted The Line Campaign newsletter, a group mostly focused on healthy relationships and preventing violence, about my newest project and how the film relates to their work. I was concerned that the topics were too far apart, but we received a great response from the list.
Week #4
I begged my crew to reach out to their networks as we approached the home stretch. I got an awesome intern to re-email everyone on Facebook and round out the final asks. Late in the game the Documentary Doctor (Fernanda Rossi) offered a consulting session as a gift for a $150 donation and another friend donated a photograph for $250. Both got snatched up immediately, fetching high prices.
During all of these new pushes, I continued to reach out to friends, family and networks. I sent personal emails three times, Facebook emails three times, and twitter blasts three times, at the beginning, middle and end of the Kickstarter campaign. I made sure to use multiple platforms because everyone uses these platforms differently. Putting it everywhere (three times!) makes it hard to ignore. I promise, the self-loathing does subside! Remember to give yourself time to make the asks and do the pushing, and don’t get mad at people that don’t give. They are just overworked and/or broke, like you are.
5. Backer Updates: how to say thanks, ask for more, and keep backers engaged
People who back a project get backer updates from the filmmaker through Kickstarter. These are little messages about the project they supported, its status, screenings, and events. I kept mine short and snappy. I included comments from new backers, about how the story reminded them of their lives, and also frame grabs from the video footage of the film as we were editing. I tried to give a blow-by-blow of where we were in the editing process, and how the money coming in was actively helping. My goal in crafting these updates was to keep an authentic connection with them alive. I wanted them to continue to feel invested and proud of the thing they were helping to make as it built momentum. I wanted to make it fun and rewarding.
6. Attitude and Mental Health: how to be pushy and zen
Be prepared to go under for those 30 days while your Kickstarter campaign is active. You don’t roll out a Kickstarter campaign while your’re in the middle of tons of other stuff or really burned out. Kickstarter is not easy. I did not follow my own advice (I was editing my film while Kickstarting), and it was exhausting.
Warn friends and colleagues that you are about to be the most annoying person they know – but it will be worth it. Get excited and people will get excited. Be “that” person – the one always asking for posts, re-posts, tweets, re-tweets, and money. It will be over soon, and you can throw your backers a fun thank you party.
7. What Worked, What Didn’t and Metrics
What worked: Our trailer. Everyone loved it and got excited. Invest time and energy in pitching your project well.
What didn’t work: Image choice. My initial thumbnail photo for Kickstarter was way too dark to pop off a busy Internet page. When we were project of the day on Kickstarter, the image was too murky and had a sad vibe, I think we got lost:
I swapped out my initial shot for something bright that would leap of the digital page. Red was a better choice:
Overall Backer Metrics:
188 backers donated. We surpassed our goal of $8,000 and hit $8,538
132 of the backers were friends, family, and colleagues from The Line Campaign, twitter friends, and friends of my partner, Isaac Mathes.
56 were friendly strangers; 54 of them were backing several other projects.
Status Update:
We wrapped, locked and onlined xoxosms, in the months following our campaign. As I mentioned above, we’re excited for this weekend, when we’ll screen at the New Orleans Film Festival (opening for Angela Tucker’s feature doc (A)sexual). We can’t wait to share our Internet love story with a larger audience, and see what kind of conversation gets sparked. We plan to gather responses using Storify.
We are crafting our Internet outreach strategy with live events and festival screenings to make sure xoxosms reaches a broad audience. Check out our new website, and please to join the discussion: Can online love work IRL? Send us your thoughts about “digital intimacy,” online dating versus in the flesh, and whether technology connects us, isolates us, or both. Use the #xoxosms hashtag so we can find you on twitter. As I learn from my adventures, I’ll be sure to check back in with Cinereach and share more tips with you.
Nancy Schwartzman made xoxosms as a Reach Film Fellow at Cinereach, working with mentor Francisco Bello. Recently named one of the “10 Filmmakers to Watch in 2011” by Independent Magazine, Nancy makes work that explores the intersection of sexuality, new media, and navigates the complexities of modern relationships. In addition to xoxosms, she is the director and producer of the documentary film The Line (Media Education Foundation, 2009). Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Village Voice, The Daily News, Gawker, Jezebel, Alternet, MTV and more. The Line Campaign, an interactive, multi-platform audience engagement campaign, has been highlighted by the Center for Social Media in Designing for Impact and by the Fledgling Fund in From Distribution to Audience Engagement. In addition to Cinereach, Nancy’s work has received funding from the Fledgling Fund and the Playboy Foundation. She is currently developing a feature documentary about young women in Kabul, Afghanistan, among other projects. Nancy lives in Sunset Park, Brooklyn with her partner, Isaac Mathes.
With an incredible number of films culled across six continents, the Toronto International Film Festival is the largest North American film event of the fall festival season. Cinereach is proud to announce that six films supported through various Cinereach initiatives will be showcased at this year’s festival, running September 8-18.
The Forgiveness of Blood
Director: Joshua Marston
Fiction | Supported through Cinereach Productions & Winter 2009 Grantee
Festival Screening Information – Contemporary World Cinema
In The Forgiveness of Blood, the lives of a teenage boy and his younger sister are thrown into turmoil after a killing in a dispute over land draws their northern Albanian family into a blood feud.
Girl Model
Directors: David Redmon & Ashley Sabin
Nonfiction | Summer 2009 & Summer 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information – Real to Reel – World Premiere
Girl Model follows U.S. and Russian model scouts who travel through remote Siberian villages looking for thirteen to fifteen year old girls suitable for modeling jobs in Japan. This poetic film brings viewers into a modeling industry rife with mirrors, images, facades, and uncertainty. It is difficult to know who these young girls can trust and where the industry takes them when their eyes are covered.
Habibi
Director: Susan Youssef
Fiction |Winter 2009 Grantee
Festival Screening Information – Discovery – International & North American Premiere
Habibi, a story of forbidden love, is the first fiction feature set in Gaza in over 15 years. Two students in the West Bank are forced to return home to Gaza, where their love defies tradition. To reach his lover, Qays grafittis poetry across town.
The Patron Saints
Directors: Brian M. Cassidy & Melanie Shatzky
Nonfiction | Winter 2009 & Winter 2011 Grantee
Festival Screening Information – Canada First – World Premiere
The Patron Saints is a disquieting and hyperrealistic glimpse into life at a nursing home. Bound by the candid confessions of a recently disabled resident, the film weaves haunting images, scenes and stories from within the institution walls. Sidestepping conventional documentary methods for a heightened cinematic approach to storytelling, the film employs lyrical realism and black humor in its charged portrait of fading bodies and minds.
Pariah
Director: Dee Rees
Fiction | Winter 2009 & Winter 2010 Grantee
Festival Screening Information – Discovery
When forced to choose between losing her best friend or destroying her family, a Brooklyn teenager juggles conflicting identities and endures heartbreak in a desperate search for sexual expression.
Porfirio
Director: Alejandro Landes
Fiction | Supported through The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute 2011
Festival Screening Information – Visions – International & North American Premiere
Confined to a universe that stretches only from bed to wheelchair, Porfirio – a man in diapers who sells call time on his cell phone in a faraway city on the outskirts of the Colombian Amazon – dreams that he can fly.
08/24/2011
» One Amazing Race: Grantee Karin Chien Shares How Nonprofit Grants Helped Get Circumstance in the Can
As we anticipate the premiere of Circumstance (a Cinereach grantee) in New York and LA theaters this weekend, Cinereach asked one of the film’s producers, Karin Chien, to reflect on the struggle behind the now-apparent glory. Faced with a compelling and important story, but a hard sell from a commercial perspective, the resourceful and committed team behind the film charted a harrowing fundraising course — from pre-production to the final days before their Sundance premiere. We hope other independent producers will find the Circumstance team’s experience useful and inspirational. From our perspective, above all else, it is a testament to the dedication and bravery of the independent producers who bring vital stories into being. We’re proud we had a small part in the Circumstance story, and congratulate the team and its supporters, on reaching this exciting milestone at last.
A post by Karin Chien
Circumstance, a film about teenage rebellion and love in an oppressive Iranian society, could not have been made without nonprofit support. This is a subtitled film spoken in Farsi, performed by an unknown cast, shot in an undercover production in Beirut by first-time writer/director Maryam Keshavarz, with minimal distribution potential in the region where the story was set. Who was going to invest in this project? Even amongst indie films, it was a risky proposition.
The film was too provocative and too lesbian for Middle Eastern investors, too non-commercial for film investors. But while equity investors were turning us down left and right, something extraordinary happened – the film received over $300,000 in non-profit support – 14 grants and in-kind donations in all.
Circumstance is the fortunate beneficiary of a few extraordinary individuals and organizations who believe in meaningful filmmaking. Cinereach, not least amongst them, came along five years ago and took notice that indies with socially relevant themes were struggling to survive in a commercially driven marketplace. San Francisco Film Society revitalized itself under Graham Legatt and found several million dollars to give away to narrative films. Sundance Institute kept doing its thing and has attracted more grant money than ever. It’s the start of what I hope is a permanent trend.
Grants are a godsend for any indie film. Not only do they not need to be paid back, but they don’t dilute investor profit participation. With grant money, investors receive more profit participation than if the film were fully capitalized with equity, thus making it more attractive to equity investors. Grants also come with virtually never-ending support – amazingly, these organizations gave us money and they kept giving: referrals, introductions, publicity, and advice. No resource went unused.
This is a breakdown of our non-profit support, and a snapshot of how Circumstance got made:
1. Sundance Institute: Circumstance participated in the Sundance Screenwriter & Filmmaker Labs (note of caution: it’s harder to become a Lab Fellow than to get into the Festival.) Maryam met our cinematographer and composer at the Labs. And once you’re a Lab Fellow, you’re eligible for Sundance grant funding from sources like the $5,000 Adrienne Shelly Women Filmmakers grant Maryam received and the $15,000 Zygmunt and Audrey Wilf Foundation Award the film received. Sundance has done an incredible job of bringing in money and partners to ensure their Lab projects get made and seen. Sundance grants enabled us to cast around the world, scout in the Middle East (Middle East Filmmaker Grant), shoot on 16mm film (in-kind Kodak donation), continue editing when we ran out of money (Annenberg grant), and finish with a 35mm negative (in-kind eFilm lab donation). In addition to grants, Sundance gave us notes on our rough cuts, wrote letters to the Jordanian Royal Film Commission when we were scouting, and introduced us to vendors and crew. The value of their support cannot be overstated.
2. Cinereach: This relationship actually started unexpectedly. Cinereach turned down our first grant application. But like all persistent indie filmmakers, we tried again. The second time, we were funded, and at exactly the most crucial moment. Following the massive post-election protests in Iran in 2009, we decided to fast-track the production in Beirut. We were worried the situation would worsen in Iran, and that our window to shoot this film in the Middle East would disappear. Before the protests, we planned to bring art department crew from Iran. In the end, only the Iranian props that a Western journalist brought back from Tehran participated in the film; it was too risky for Iranian-based crew or actors. We wanted to do our part by telling a story about Iranian teens, thousands of whom were killed or disappeared in the protests. When Maryam and fellow producer Melissa Lee started pre-production in Lebanon, we hadn’t raised even half the budget. The $25,000 Cinereach grant came through right before I left for Beirut. It was not only much needed money, but an incredible validation of our decision. In a way, it told me that everything would be ok, though it was still hard as hell. During the final stretch, Cinereach contributed another $20,000 post-production grant, which paid for sound and music costs.
3. San Francisco Film Society (SFFS): We were in the midst of editing the film in LA when we received an email from Josh Welsh, Director of Artist Development at Film Independent (see below), that SFFS had created a film fund and the deadline for applications was the next day. We quickly pulled together an application that included 10 minutes of footage. Incredibly, SFFS granted us $50,000 based on that 10 minutes and our written application. They knew and they believed. We found out about the grant after having paused post-production due to lack of funding, and it gave us a huge push towards the finish line. SFFS told us that Circumstance is the first of their grantees to have finished and the first to have theatrical distribution, and we couldn’t be more proud.
4. Film Independent (FIND): Maryam participated in the FIND Producer’s Lab in LA, which was taught by producer Gina Kwon. Gina brought the project to me. Though my plate was full at the time, I never forgot Maryam’s script. It was one of the smartest and most engaging scripts I had read in a long time, and it spoke to my desire as a producer to work on films about women and about politically relevant stories. Six months later, when my schedule freed up, I made a call to Maryam to see if she still needed a producer. Melissa Lee had just joined the project, and I joined the team right around Obama’s election. I remember that great post-election sense of change and empowerment. In addition to connecting me and Maryam, FIND granted us an in-kind Kodak film stock donation. They also recently hosted a screening for their members to help generate word-of-mouth for the theatrical release. Josh Welsh continues to look out for us for any and all opportunities (see SFFS grant).
5. Women In Film: We received a $10,000 grant from WIF and Netflix that kicked in right when we were completing the post-production for Sundance. It couldn’t have come at a better time. WIF also featured us on a panel at the Sundance Film Festival and will be including the film in their “Fearless” screening series in LA.
6. Fonds Sud: Thanks to our tireless French co-producer Antonin Dedet we received two grants from France. The first was a $4,000 development grant from Antonin’s home province. The second was a sizeable $40,000 Fonds Sud grant to cover post-production expenses. We had originally applied for development and production grants from the Fonds Sud but we were turned down, so it was a huge relief to receive the post funding. The grant has a very restricted spend – only in France and only for certain post-production items – so we had to factor in travel to France, overseas shipping, and exchange rate increases. But the Fonds Sud grant allowed us to make the 35mm festival print, create laser subtitles on the print, and deliver an interpositive.
7. Hubert Bals Development Fund: A Dutch producer helped the film apply for a $12,000 development grant that was critical to allowing Maryam to hold auditions around the world. We found our principal cast in Canada, France, Sweden, and the US. Without this grant, our casting process would have been severely limited. We applied later for the Hubert Bals Plus fund, which funds production, but were turned down.
The financing of Circumstance often felt like The Amazing Race – Maryam, Melissa and I in last place, and the production budget in first place. We were constantly raising money to catch up to our spend. For the first time, I broke a major producing rule of mine – never go into production without all the money raised – but we knew we had to. With the massive social and political change about to rock the Middle East, this was the time to tell this story. Even two weeks before our Sundance premiere, we were still locking in another equity investor. It wasn’t until we sold the film to Participant Media 48 hours after that premiere that the producers finally pulled ahead of the budget, after 18 months of breakneck sprinting.
As you can tell from the partial list above, Circumstance was incredibly lucky. Organizations like Tribeca Film Institute and New York University also provided valuable resources and support. But we were also rejected by more organizations than I can remember. More than once we were turned away because of the US embargo with Iran (ironic since Iran would later denounce our film). But we tried every avenue because we felt this film had to be made. In the end, we raised little more than half of the budget in private equity, mostly from friends and family who believed in us, and the rest in grants, in-kind donations and deferrals.
At our Sundance premiere, after the standing ovation and before the Q&A, I read a long list thanking every organization that gave us funding. And, not surprisingly, someone from almost every organization that funded us was in the audience, cheering us on at the premiere. It felt incredible to finally say in public, thank you to the funders who believed in us from the beginning. Their belief was the greatest support of all.
A Scene from Cirumstance
Circumstance begins its theatrical run this weekend in NYC and LA. Click here for theaters, screening times, and the official trailer.
Karin Chien is an independent film producer based in New York City, and the 2010 recipient of the Independent Spirit Producers Award. Karin has produced eight feature-length films, including Circumstance (2011), The Exploding Girl (2009), The Motel (2005), and Robot Stories (2002) which have won over 100 film festival awards, premiered at Sundance and Berlin, and received international distribution. Karin is in production on Untitled (Structures), an installation by Leslie Hewitt in collaboration with Bradford Young, and in post-production on P. Benoit’s Stones in the Sun about exile from Haiti, and Bradley Rust Gray’s Jack & Diane starring Juno Temple and Riley Keough. Karin is the president and founder of dGenerate Films, the leading distributor of independent Chinese cinema. Karin is also the director of the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM) Fellowship and the curator of the Chinatown Film Project, an inaugural film exhibition for the Museum of Chinese in America.