I’m working through the financing and distribution strategy for my feature Barrage (budgeted at ~$15M), and it got me thinking about something I’d like to hear your take on.
Do you think there’s value in producers or filmmakers being able to follow a real, in-progress case study — not a course or pitch — but a transparent breakdown of the actual decisions, challenges, and strategy as a film moves from development to financing to distribution?
Not promoting anything here — I’m genuinely curious how helpful something like that would be to the Stage 32 community, especially for those navigating the business side of independent film.
Would a real-time case study actually help creatives and producers better understand how this side of the industry works?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
— Michael Gordon Bennett
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Michael Bennett This is essentially what the Producing Unique New Creators program does for early stage producers. Although, they don't just follow it, they work on it and get the entire behind the scenes story and mentoring along the way. But of course it's a black box to everyone on the outside, as it is a real produciton. The concept you describe is problematic for a number of reasons, not least of which is confidentiality with your funders. I cannot think of one who would be amenable to the idea. Transparency is in no one's interest, especially the producers of the film. Would it be of interest to other filmmakers? Surely. Would it be of use though? Well 99.9% of the "community" will never move beyond dreaming, so... not really IMO.
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I agree with part of your assessment to my query.. I would never reveal the names of funders nor sales agents/distributors for that matter, although I have had a couple of seasoned professionals who think I'm on to something if I can figure out a way to structure it. I've been at this for nearly 4 decades...that's an absolute no. Transparency in this business, unfortunately doesn't exist. I mentor a lot of people about the film business, and as you might imagine the first question out of their mouths has to do with funding, and I find there is a complete lack of understanding about the entire process. When I broke into this business back in the 80s, the access to information was awful, and to some degree it still is when it comes to film finance.