Hi All,

I just got back from the Newport Film Festival, where I had a fabulous time meeting new people, seeing great friends, watching excellent films, and presenting on a panel about Distribution. I’ll start at the beginning, I suppose.

I met Agnes Varnum, the jack-ess of all trades, at Toronto’s Hot Docs festival. Agnes is an amazingly accomplished person and just “good people”. http://www.agnesvarnum.com/ She has programmed many festivals in the past, including SilverDocs, and got a job organizing the panels at the Newport International Film Festival. After several long conversations about Indiepix and new models of distribution, she asked me to be on a panel at Newport called “The Distribution Game.”

Your film is done and you are ready to send it off to eager audiences, but for every festival slot or theatrical opening there are hundreds of films trying to get through the gate. The content bottleneck is causing heartbreak for many filmmakers trying to get their work in front of audiences, but for the creative and entrepreneurial, this challenge has produced new models. This discussion explores the variety of options when playing the movie distribution game. Sponsored by 35mm.it Magazine.

Get the details! The story continues …

Both nervous and excited, I travelled up to Newport via train on Thursday, where a lovely volunteer picked me up and drove through the fog and drizzle to my hotel. After checking in, I made my way to the town center, where I had the pleasure of seeing Rachel Dratch, Horatio Sanz, and some other hilarious comics from the Upright Citizens Brigade work their magic. Improv comedy at a film festival? I”m not sure the Why of this, but it was certainly a fun event. (As a sidenote, Rachel Dratch has been a running joke between myself and Jordan at Indiepix since South by Southwest, when a young filmmaker told me my mannerisms were similar to that quirky comedienne’s.)

After this, I met up with Erica Berenstein, the Contributing Editor of the Independent Film and Video Monthly, who was to moderate my panel the following day. We had a lovely sushi dinner with Chris from the Italian film magazine 35 mm (http://www.35mm.it/index.jsp) and then moved upstairs for a Filmmaker Party. There, I got to see and reconnect with some old friends — Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing, the talented, inspiring directors of BOYS OF BARAKA. As a New School grad student three years ago, I logged much of the footage on the film. As I expected after seeing how good the footage was, the film ended up a huge critical success, getting picked up my ThinkFilm and shortlisted for an Academy Award. http://www.theboysofbaraka.com/ I saw it at the Film Forum with my father, who was moved to tears several times. He was so affected by the film he insisted on buying tickets for my mother and twin sister (both are teachers, the latter in an alternative high school in Bed-Stuy) and a couple of her teacher friends. Anyway, it was great to reconnect with them. They were at Newport to show a preview of their “Hot New Doc,” Jesus Camp, which screened at Tribeca and is executive produced by A & E Indie Films. This of course, brings me to A & E Indie Films and the wonderful folks who work there.

I met Molly Thompson first at Full Frame, where Indiepix’s president, Bob Alexander, was on a panel with her. She is a really accessible, down to earth woman. I got to interview her a month later for an article about distribution I wrote for an upcoming issue of the Independent Film and Video Monthly. Ryan Harrington, who works with her at A & E Indies, http://www.aetv.com/indiefilms/ was a juror at Newport, and Molly very nicely had told him to look for me here. Ryan is a fabulous, enthusiastic, sweet guy and I think what A & E Indies are doing for docs is fantastic!

I didn’t stay at the party for long, as I wanted to be okay for my panel the next day. An episode of the L Word and a warm bath later, I was suitably tired.

PANEL DAY –

I got to see an incredible film just before the panel. BLACK SUN, by Gary Tarn: http://www.britfilms.com/britishfilms/catalogue/browse/?id=D9CF998213ec523062tKp20CCAD5

Fairly experimental in form, BLACK SUN tells the story of French artist Hugues de Montalembert, who was blinded when a mugger threw paint thinner in his eyes in 1978. He lyrically and phisophically narrates his path to spiritual recovery and independence, including a solo journey to Indonesia, as gorgeous images, sometimes abstracted, play against the audio. It’s an astounding and original film that tackles ideas of perception, knowledge, and ultimately, one’s understanding of the world — how one can see without seeing. It ended up winning the Grand Jury Documentary Award of the festival. The two other Jury awards went to more straightforward, yet equally important and compelling docs, that I had seen at Full Frame — THE TRIALS OF DARRYL HUNT and THIN. Both are actually HBO Films. DARRYL HUNT (http://www.breakthrufilms.org/) is a stirring film about an African-American man in North Carolina who, after a 19 year battle, is finally exonerated of a crime he did not commit. Apparently, Darryl himself, who I would have loved to meet, was at Newport for the two days before I arrived. My friend Erica had the opportunity to dance with him to Eighties music at one raging party! THIN, directed by Lauren Greenfield, is an intense, verite-style doc chronicling the patients and staff in a Florida eating disorders clinic. I got a screener and have watched it again since Full Frame; it is a very important movie. http://www.laurengreenfield.com/news.html

The panel unfolded to a packed house. Jordan from Indiepix was there filming, as was my mother. (Is that far too dorky to admit?) Erica proved an assured moderator, and the other panelists: Brian Brown, VP of Sales at New Yorker Films; David Dundas at youare.tv were articulate, informative, and supportive of the Indiepix project. The response to Indiepix was really positive for the most part. There were surely some naysayers, but even Brian Brown of the New Yorker did not priviledge the traditional model over Indiepix’s, saying that there is room for both, and places like Indiepix are making room for more content to get to more audiences, which is great. Check in for video blog updates of the panel!

Post-panel events included a lovely tribute to Brian Dennehy, who was a stately, articulate presence who was introduced by the hilarious, inimitable Joe Pantalioni (aka “Joey Pants.”) After this, dinner with my mother and Jordan followed, and then a party, where I talked to Rachel Dratch about how I was compared to her at South by Southwest! Also ran into another film festival pal– Ry Russo-Young, whose short, MARION has been making the rounds from SxSW to Tribeca to Newport. http://www.ryrussoyoung.com/ Ry is a really interesting and talented person. I actually lived with her cousin Vanessa for a couple of years. Fascinating fact: Ry was once featured as the NY Times Magazine cover story, as she has an unconventional background, having been raised by lesbian mothers. I also met Daniel DeVivo, director of the fine immigration doc, CROSSING ARIZONA. http://www.crossingaz.com/ Turned out he had just emailed me the day before regarding the submission of his film to the WOODSTOCK IN THE CITY screening series that Indiepix and Woodstock Film Festival are organizing together! Finally, I hung out a lot with Nick Poppy, the very funny director of the equally funny short ZOMBIE-AMERICAN. http://www.zombie-american.com/ I had just met him the Monday before the festival, as the film showed at the screening series I have just started coordinating (assisting curator Joe Pacheco), the Brooklyn Independent Cinema Series. http://www.brooklynindependent.com/

After a bit of schmoozing, Jordan and I were off to bed, to rest up for another invigorating day of films, panels, and parties.

I will post about the rest of the festival tomorrow.

For more photos and info: check out agnes’s site: http://www.agnesvarnum.com/

or my flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dandig/