REEL DEAL: FINDING A HOME FOR IRISH FILM IN EUROPE
European-based sales agents are evolving to become important co-financing partners from script stage and they want to get involved in projects early. But, creatively, they must be a bulls-eye. So said participants at the Reel Deal’s European sales agent Panel, who included Carey Fitzgerald (High Point Films), Tristan Whalley (Portman), Michael Ryan (IAC), Ashley Luke (Fortissimo Film Sales) and Ida Martins (Media Luna).Whalley said Portman (INTERMISSION and HONEYMOONERS) “prefer to be involved from the outset and help producers find the right recipe,” while Fitzgerald added that HighPoint (DEAD BODIES) “preferred to get involved from the very beginning” and Martins said Media Luna (COWBOYS & ANGELS) was actively looking to pick up more Irish content.
Agreeing with Ryan that it was all about “a good story, well told,” speakers emphasized that the nationality of the film doesn’t matter as much in attracting audiences as cast and original stories.
Luke noted that Fortissimo’s backbone is Asian content, with some US films and quite a few Australian pictures from script stage (including the Cannes selected SOMMERSAULT and JAPANESE STORY and the Berlin selected WALKING ON WATER), before the attachment of cast. Despite coming to Galway for three years, the company has still not committed to an Irish film, (but has not done a UK one either) but is still looking for “different, edgy” films and Fortissimo is hopeful of committing to one or two Irish films in the next year with an advance.
Martins said COWBOYS & ANGELS had been a long journey for her, having seen “the first draft and then suffered along with the producer over two and a half years” through various financing incarnations. She said she would do it all again, and felt the film was “a great case example” for financing of low budget movies and noted that the film had sold theatrically in several territories before its Irish release. Financially, she said, “we see light at the end of the tunnel, as will the Film Board.”
Fitzgerald said DEAD BODIES had found sales to major territories like Germany, Italy and the US because it was “a wonderful film, pacy and modern and fabulous for a young audience and has very good looking people in it, which is what people like to see.”
DVD, it was emphasised, is the main driver in the European market and the theatrical release for a title gives the extra push for the DVD market. Whalley warned producers to consider their content choices relative to the standards of prime time television, as anything that precludes a primetime broadcast significantly reduces the sales value of the film as broadcasters pay substantially less for non-primetime content.
All sales agents agreed that securing UK distribution is tough, given that the distributors only secure a 30% rental for their releases out of the UK. While the independent financing market was acknowledged as being very difficult, it was noted that when an independent film works and there is a good sales agent on board chasing reports and payments from local distributors in every sold territory, investors and producers can see rewards unlike studio backed movies where multiple territories are crossed and it is rare to see any money back.
Only the best content attracts a commitment, with Portman only saying yes six times a year, said Whalley, adding “The market is tough, so you need a bullseye and if you are two degree off, you are not in a good place.”