Found at the Discovery building employee cafe across from the HD Theater, to which I arrived half-an-hour early for the music Master Class because I can’t seem to work my Palm Pilot. Palm Pilot? What decade am I living in?.
Shame on me for not being aware of Sam Pollard, but then that’s also a testament to his talent. Sam is an editor and the best editing is invisible to the viewer. And Pollard has worked his subtle magic on such classic docs and features as Style Wars, When the Levees Broke, Bamboozled, and many other notable productions.
In his Master Class on editing, Pollard showed examples from the above works and more, and discussed his process and philosophy of combining images and audio, which is rarely as simple as it seems. Here’s some takeaways:
One reason I like Silverdocs is that almost anybody you talk with will have an interesting story and be articulate about telling it.
Provo, Utah’s Christian Jensen stopped by the Festival Hub to check his e-mail (free wifi!), and I quickly learned that he’s just out of film school and has a doc-in-progress, Peace Players, which concerns a group of Palestinian and Israeli kids who come together through sports. He came to Silverdocs on his own dime to learn how the film game is played.
Here he discusses his doc-in-progress, why it’s important for unproduced producers to attend Silverdocs, and Utah’s unsung film industry. While he’s often attended his hometown festival (something called Sundance), Jensen said that he prefers Silverdocs’ more serious-minded atmosphere.
The video is about four-and-a-half minutes, shot — again — with my Canon Powershot A590. (Come on, Canon — can I get some love here?)
F. Stone Roberts named his company If You Shave You’re Fired Productions, and appropriately, he shows up for an interview with a swank ’70s-style Fu Manchu mustache. Roberts’ gem of a short, Splitting Hairs, follows the follicular follies of a group of overly-committed men at the World Beard and Mustache Competition in Germany.
More than just the “eye candy” that first drew Roberts’ attention, the film pits super-mustacheoed Bruce Roe and his Whisker Club against mega-bearded Phil Olsen and Beard Team USA. Roe is the more organized—to the point of being a control freak, extending even to trying to dictate shots to the camera crew. Olsen is more anything-goes, though given to jingoistic proclamations such as, “There is no more important or patriotic endeavor than to support the United States of America at the World Beard and Mustache Championships,” and leading “USA! USA!” chants among the gentle beardos of other lands.
225 people from 20 countries attend to compete in 17 different categories — 4 goatee, 8 mustache, 5 full — with the looks ranging from Buffalo Bill to Kaiser Wilhelm to the Unabomber. Costumes play an increasing role, allowing opportunities for wannabe pirates, Civil War reenactors, and lonesome cowboys.
Olsen shares a truism about living the bearded life — you become recognized for your hair rather than your face. “They remember me because of the beard but I don’t remember them,” he says. I, with my stylish goatee, know this experience.
Splitting Hairs screens Wednesday at 10:30 p.m. at the Roundhouse Theater. Phil Olsen will be on hand to lead a Beard and Mustache Contest following the film.
In these two audio interviews, Stone Roberts discusses how he came to spend seven years on this project and offer stories that ended up on the cutting room floor.
Part One (6 min.):
Part Two (4 min.):
I ran into Dana Flor and Toby Oppenheimer lounging at the Festival Hub and took the opportunity to ask them about their film The Nine Lives of Marion Barry, which closes Silverdocs on Saturday. In addition to that honor, the pair has already sold the film to HBO, which will air it on Aug. 10. But don’t be lazy and wait — see it in the theater like a real person!
Dana calls the film a “universal story about power, drugs, sex, race.” Toby points out that most people “didn’t know the full story of Marion Barry.” The interview was interrupted by workmen installing a flat-screen TV, but the full 10-minute discussion may be downloaded here. Or, listen in two five-minute bite-size nuggets below.
Part One: The Prom King and Queen of Silverdocs
Part Two: How to Wear Down Your Subject
In a banquet room at Eggspectations, Amy Letourneau, Director of Acquisitions at PBS Distribution, gave a short presentation titled “How Can PBS Distribution Help You?” In PowerPoint detail, the former supervising producer for Antiques Roadshow laid out the case for selling your film to PBS.
PBS Distributing released 310 titles on DVD last year, she said, mostly new material, with some holdovers from the VHS era. (”We’re done with that,” Letourneau said with some relief.) The company sold two million discs and reached one million iTunes downloads. A catalog is mailed to seven million homes and a separate catalog goes to one million educators. In addition to wholesaling to Amazon, Netflix, etc., and specialty niche sites like MuseumStore.com and Acorn, PBS also manages e-commerce sites for itself (ShopPBS.org) and various public stations (like Boston’s WGBH). There is also a sales team hitting at least 70 trade shows a year.
Surprising to hear PBS in the same sentence as XBox and BitTorrent, but the company maintains a digital presence with those outlets, as well as Hulu, Joost, and others, in addition to streaming content at PBS.org.
Letourneau offered PBS Distribution as a way to “extend the film’s life beyond broadcast.” But even if there was no broadcast, there may be a deal. Docs like I.O.U.S.A. are in the catalog but not on the TV schedule. Such titles won’t carry the PBS branding on the packaging, an obviously valuable asset. Letourneau also noted that there is a firewall between the distribution and broadcast sides of PBS. While distribution can offer opinions, it doesn’t decide what is aired.
Letourneau said she was eager to commence discussions “at any point in the project,” positing PBS Distribution as a “turnkey” solution, handling design, menus, warehousing, fulfillment, etc., at no charge.
But filmmakers may continue to sell through their own sites. One woman said she had kept distribution rights on a previous project and “I don’t want it any more. You can have it.” This cued Letourneau to stress the importance to “make it easy” for consumers to find and purchase your work.
To that end, PBS Distribution offers “competitive” royalties, and all its deals are royalty deals. “Typically,” she said for a DVD, “we’re going to pay royalties of 20 percent of gross receipts. We’re paying top line, we’re not including any of our expenses. We’re really in this for a partnership, so we’re paying off of gross receipts. For digital it’s 50 percent, because there’s less costs.”
Asked how successful Silverdocs has been as a PBS pipeline, Letourneau said, “Silverdocs, in my heart, is sort of the Public Television festival, there’s so much stuff here.” Thus, she has “a bunch of meetings” scheduled with filmmakers. “My job as the acquisitions person is to go and talk to filmmakers about how we can work with them, so I’m always talking to people. Always looking, even in my free time.”
Interesting tidbits: In 2003, only half of US homes had DVD players. Today it’s almost 100 percent. While DVD sales are slipping, Blu-Ray is picking up some of the slack, but remains a very small niche, even among PBS customers, accounting for 5-8 percent of sales. However, Blu-Ray viewers expect the disc to be “awesome.”
Sitting in the Silver Theater’s cafe area, drinking tea and watching a hi-def TV screen showing the Good Pitch event, which is taking place next door at the Roundhouse Theater. This is kinda cool. Oh, the lovely Sky Sitney just walked by, looking surprisingly relaxed considering that she only took over as Silverdocs’ Artistic Director a few months ago.
The Good Pitch is part of the International Documentary Conference, which is the real heart of Silverdocs — like-minded documentary professionals meeting, greeting, and sharing war stories and tips. The Good Pitch is new at Silverdocs this year, a program from the Sundance Institute and the U.K.’s Channel 4 BRITDOC Foundation that brings producers and directors together with the nonprofits and foundations who may fund their work. Today’s two-part event finds eight hopefuls facing a roundtable of potential funders, PBS, SnagFilms, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, etc., etc.
Do not confuse the Good Pitch with a Hollywood pitch meeting. Yes, there is bottled water and perhaps some flop sweat. But the tone is utterly high-minded. One hopeful describes her work as “all about the control people have at the grassroots level.” While there are some questions about target audiences, one exec states sincerely, “There are different ways we can be helpful.” There is also talk of “giving circles” and a question from the floor asks about “outreach plan[s] to the Ethiopian diaspora in this country.”
Moderator Jess Search, CEO of Channel 4 BRITDOC (why the all-caps?) ends one presentation with the remark, “The two of you are so grounded in the power and clarity of your vision for this project.” Applause.
I’m a fan of Stella Artois. I even enjoy the ads that play at the Landmark theaters before the movies. They are rather cinematic, telling little stories. Much better than the repurposed TV ads that most theaters cram down your eyeballs before a show.
So label me a sucker and a brew no-nothing, but first watch this video. Stella was a sponsor of Discovery’s monster Silverdocs kick-off party Monday night and I was so taken by this barkeep’s skill I had to document it (with my trusty Canon Powershot A590). Enjoy.
This video is being blocked by the Panera Bread firewall, fyi.
After discovering I’m extra special, I wandered ’round the corner to the Silver Theater. And was surprised that the fancy marquee was turned off. What will all the filmmakers do if they can’t get a photo of themselves standing under the canopy with the title of their film or the Silverdocs name scrolling by?
I mentioned this to the green-shirted youngster in the ticket booth who assured me that he’d inform management. And then he gave me the thumbs-up sign in thanks. Also, he probably recognized that I’m extra-special.
Walked out the door to get my all-important press credentials and — there they were! Left on my doorstep by the Silverdocs Fairy. My first thought was to head back to bed, but I pressed on and trekked to “downtown” Silver Spring. Oh, excuse me, Candyland.
To underscore the “green” sensibility of the fest, the handy Silverdocs tote bag is…bright green. And pretty flimsy. For this fest, I’m carrying the complimentary Silverdocs laptop bag from 2003 — an actually functional item. And solid black for added hepness.
Inside the goodie bag was a black T-shirt (to differentiate from the increasingly ubiquitous green shirts staffers and volunteers rock), the guide book, ID badge and lanyard, a postcard (”Dear Mom: By the time you get this, the festival will be over”), and hard copies of the materials already e-mailed.
When I got to the Festival Hub, a staffer suggested that my home delivery was because I’m “extra-special.” Oh, Silverdocs, you know me so well!
Also ran into Docs in Progress‘ Erica Ginsberg, who was heading back to Documentary House where members from the D-Word were probably already trashing the joint. You know what happens when documentarians are let loose….
