Film Festival vs. Distribution

I've been having several conversations with filmmakers lately regarding the following: it seems that people want to know what to do first once they have a completed film in their hands.

Do they start submitting to festivals or start submitting to distributors?

My answer is almost always the same -- if you have a film that you believe has realistic chances of getting accepted to one of the bigger festivals, wheredistributors actually go to scout for films, then you want to go the festival route first.

Why? Because if you have the fortune of screening your film at one of the big festivals, there's a chance that Distributors will actually come to YOU.

And having Distributors come to YOU is a whole different ball game than going to them. What I've seen happen, and what you don't want to happen is to go to distributors prematurely and have them PASS on your film....only to find out later that you got accepted into Sundance or Toronto and you should of just waited until you were in more of a position of strength.

Think of it this way - when you have a completed film in your hands you have to protect it. So think realistically about your festival strategy - if you don't have a shot at Sundance,Toronto, Tribeca, Berlin, Los Angeles or one of the other big ones, then use the smaller festivals to accumulate press and build your press kit - and then go hit up distributors
yourself.

Also, if you've already run the festival circuit and
distributors didn't in fact come to YOU, then it's time to start approaching distributors yourself too.

In my new Distributors Hot List,I go step-by-step how and when to submit to distributors and give contact details on over 60 worldwide distributors of indepedent films that I've sold to over the years.

You can check it out here:
http://www.FilmDistributorsHotList.com

I've spent a lot of time and effort putting this eBook together over the last 6 months, and I just know it will be a valuable resource for independent filmmakers everywhere.

As always, if you have any questions, comments or success stories to share with us on submitting to festivals vs.submitting to distributors, please do let me know.

I'll be looking forward to hearing from you!

Warm regards,
Stacey*