Film Festivals: Positive Reviews & Deserved Boos: Pt. 7 - Dam Short, ICE & River Run International Film Festivals

AN ONGOING SERIES ABOUT ONE SILLY LITTLE MAN’S FILM FESTIVAL SUBMISSION EXPERIENCE

Film Festivals: Positive Reviews & Deserved Boos: Pt. 7 – Dam Short, ICE & River Run International Film Festivals

Article by Justin Bowler

An owner of a hardware store and a customer are standing outside a hardware store.
The customer asks, “Excuse me, is this your hardware store? I need some nails.”
Silence.
Again, the customer asks, “Excuse me, is this your hardware store? I need some nails.”
Silence.
Again, the customer asks, “I’m so sorry to bother you, but this is the third time I’ve asked. Is this your hardware store? I need some nails.”
Silence.
So, the customer goes somewhere else to buy nails.
Two days later, the owner of the hardware store approaches the customer and asks, “Why didn’t you buy nails from me?”

Last week, I posted that the London Classic Film Festival disregarded three email attempts to contact them over fifty days. So, I gave them a negative review for filmmaker friendliness. Two days after the article was posted, they responded. Hmmmm…

Hello filmmakers,

This is an ongoing review series about my film festival submission experience. These festival reviews are not based on whether or not I was accepted to their festival, it is based merely on my interaction with them as a filmmaker inquiring about their festival and if my genre film is the right fit. As you will see, some fests are extremely filmmaker friendly, whereas others can’t/won’t/don’t respond to simple eligibility questions. Seriously, there are only three questions, and they are “Yes or No”. It’s pretty easy. But, you would be surprised by the myriad of answers/NON-answers I get.

Filmmakers submit their films online to festivals. They can pay upwards of $100 just to be considered. Yet, they never get confirmation that their film was actually watched. They never speak with anyone from the fest. They don’t know who is judging the film. They just have to “trust the system”. It can be very sketchy. Some festivals take the time to make sure it isn’t, whereas others just don’t want and/or care to make it otherwise.

Check out my friend Paul Osborne’s documentary Official Rejection. It will give you some real insight into how unfriendly some fests are to filmmakers. Sadly, it will blow your mind.

Let me set the scene. I have a short film called OH, THE EFFING HORROR. (That’s right, the title is meant to be shouted.)

(Check out the teaser at HERE)

Clearly, it is a genre picture. It’s a horror/comedy or “Horr-omedy”. In addition to the gore and general subject matter, it contains nudity. Finally, with a run time of almost seventeen minutes, it may be too long for some festivals to program. All three of these points give rise to questions I have for festivals.

First, do they program horror films? (The majority of the fests out there are NOT horror fests, so I would like to know if they even consider the genre in their short film competition.)
Second, do they accept films with nudity? (Plenty of festivals have to keep it family friendly. I don’t have a problem with that, but, I would like to know that before I shell out my $45.)
Third, is a seventeen minute run time too long? (Many fests have time limits for their shorts, but don’t always post that info on WithoutaBox.com or FilmFreeway.com.) (For you newcomers, these are the two websites used for the majority of festival submissions.)

My journey began by contacting festivals through the informational email they listed on WithoutaBox.com or FilmFreeway.com. In my email, I stated who I was, the answers I was seeking and inquired who could answer. Typically, I was referred to the Artistic Director or Programming Director.

Dam Short Film Festival
Submission Price – Up to $45

As always, I emailed the informational email listed on WithoutABox. My first email was sent on September 1st. I immediately got a response back from the programming director, John LaBonney. His response is below.

We’re selecting the highest-quality films that are submitted, and then we try to arrange them in thematic blocks where the films relate to each other in some logical fashion. But what those program blocks are depends on what films are submitted. For example, last year we had a significant number of films from France, and though the styles and subject matter varied greatly, we made a program called “We’re the Coneheads, We’re From France.” So it’s really the other way around…we’re not starting out with a concept of what a program should be and looking for films to fill that concept, but instead we’re trying to develop a program out of the films that have been submitted. As far as what we’re looking for in horror this season, we’re really not that specific. One season we did have a Horror-Comedy block and it was a great success, but again we had the films in our submission stream to make it happen. Horror Comedy is awesome. Drama programs are a large part of the lineup, and we generally always generally run several documentary programs, an animation program, a sci-fi program, a horror program, a comedy program, and we have a special program for Nevada Filmmakers. But although we generally run these program types each year, they’re not set in stone. If one season we don’t have enough good films to program a sci-fi block, for example, we might replace it with something else. As far as nudity goes, it doesn’t automatically disqualify a film. It depends, you know how it goes.

We take care of filmmakers and do everything we can to help them travel here. Boulder City is a perfect place to hold the festival; all the screenings, events, and locations are literally a one-minute walk from each other. We give away hotel rooms when we can, offer rides to and from the airport if you need it, provide a filmmaker lounge with food and drink, and host some great parties. We’re a non-profit organization; what money comes in gets spent on the filmmakers and attendees.

The response was two days after I contacted them. I submitted.

REVIEW:
DAM SHORT FILM FESTIVAL gets a POSITIVE REVIEW for their filmmaker friendliness.

ICE Film Festival
Submission Price – Up to $50

I emailed the informational email listed on WithoutABox. My first email was sent on October 30th. I got a response back from the programming director, R. Zoe Judd. Her responses are the most entertaining that I have received to date!

Me: Will I be ineligible based on the genre?

We are an all genre festival… but I guess horr-omedies must be quite
popular because we’ve had several submitted…

Me: Is your festival against nudity?

Not against nudity… we usually have a few blocks of programming that
have more adult themes… we warn people of this… if they bring in
their kids (or crotch fruit as we’ve been known to call them – not that
we have anything against kids, I have three) then its on them to cover
their eyes or encourage them to watch, whichever the parents choose for
their spawn…

Me: Is seventeen minutes too long? Realistically, do you program seventeen minute shorts?

We program films from 1 minute to 150 minutes… I personally have
nothing against 17 minute shorts nor do my judges… well not that I
know of… we may have a weirdo or two who hates 17 minute shorts… I
hope not, though…

about being filmmaker friendly. Last year we had quite a few filmmakers attend and we were pretty friendly to them. I was the friendlies of friendlies, cuz that’s how I roll. Each filmmaker gets two all access passes to the festival and corresponding festival. Any other specifics, just ask.

Zoe was engaging, informative, and entertaining. I could not submit fast enough. I would love to attend this festival.

REVIEW:
ICE FILM FESTIVAL gets a POSITIVE REVIEW for their filmmaker friendliness. R. Zoe Judd is an excellent ambassador for their festival and several festivals should take note to see how this is done. I defy anyone to feel uncomfortable submitting after they interact with her.

RiverRun International Film Festival
Submission Price – Up to $75

I emailed the informational email listed on WithoutABox. My first email was sent on October 30th. I got a response back from the programming director, Mary C. Dossinger. Her responses were honest, short and direct.

Hi Justin –
Thank you for your interest in our Festival. We program a late night shorts section each year so we do accept some films in that genre. As for feature films, no, we do not program many horror feature films at our Festival. But, as a horror film it is not ineligible, I am just being honest that we don’t program very many each year. No, we are not against nudity.

I hope that answers your questions.
Thank you.
Mary

This is a great example of how easy it is to be friendly. It didn’t require a lot of her time, yet her info was of great importance to me. I submitted. Many fests could learn from this example.

REVIEW:
RiverRun International Film Festival gets a POSITIVE REVIEW for their filmmaker friendliness. Simple and direct is all I ask.

Brief, direct, or entertaining… All of these fests could give classes to others on how to be filmmaker friendly. It’s not that hard people. It honestly seems like some fests go out of their way to be indirect or NOT answer.

Once again, I’d like to hear your stories about festival submitting. If you think there is more to be said about any of the festivals I have reviewed, then I would love to hear it.

Thanks for joining me, check back next Friday to find which fests are fab and which fests are effed (see what I did there?).

Justin Bowler
IG @IndyFilmTwittic and @OhTheEffingHorror
Twitter @JustinTBowler