Glen Reynolds, Founder of Circus Road Films: This has not been exposed anywhere in the world,
no festival or anything. I'm giving you and a few other people a look at it first.
Sometimes that's a better message to a distributor
Film Courage: Glen, how do you get paid? Please tell us.
Glen: A couple of different ways. So always a commission,
a percentage of whatever my filmmaker makes. So there's an advance from the distributor
or royalties paid later on. I usually get a commission on whatever and that's a negotiable
commission depending on the circumstances of the film, whether it's already in a major festival or
if I'm working on it from the beginning, we can negotiate what the commission is.
Often I also work for a consulting fee as well because I spend most producer reps
I would say tend to throw films against the wall to see if they stick. If they don't make the deal,
move on. I deal with very much true independent films that need a lot of hand-holding and a lot of
tender loving care and so I fashion myself both as a producer rep and a consultant. I'm usually paid
an upfront fee in addition to my commission really to help with the fact that I'm going to negotiate
the contract. I'm going to handle all that. I'm going to spend time with them to make sure they
understand the industry, understand the buyers, help out maybe getting them an international
sales agent. I try to fashion myself as kind of a distribution consultant and a producer rep.
Film Courage: Are all your fees like one-time fees or are there any that are continual?
Glen: Just one time.
Film Courage: Just one time?
Glen: Yes, one time. Usually an upfront fee and then in the way I do it I don't I don't put a term
on my deals. I feel like I'm hired for however long it takes me to get the film distribution or
a festival (I’m also brought on as a festival advocate). Quite often that's part of the
the fee structure is that I'm going to advocate the film to festivals and programmers I've gotten
to know over time to try and help it get some kind of promotional boost before we sell the film
so I've gotten to know a lot of programmers over the years so sometimes I'm brought in pre-festival
to call programmers and just make sure they're watching the movie. Also to pitch it but I think
the biggest thing there is just to make sure they're watching it. If you add up the number of
entries into these festivals and you look at the number of people that are been hired to watch
them it's almost impossible right? That this few number of people are watching this number
of movies over a three-month period so their films sometimes are not getting watched or they're just
being watched by an intern or an underling. So I'm there to try to make sure that someone
of significance is watching the movie and given a chance
in addition to maybe consulting my filmmakers on what festivals to apply to. Is it
right for Sundance? Is it a SXSW kind of movie? If not, is it more of a Heartland,
Seattle there's all kinds of great festivals but there are different festivals of different
strategies. I'm here for that kind of in addition to everything else.
Film Courage: Have you ever had filmmakers say skip the festivals. I won't get into
this one and I won't get into that one and these other ones I don't care as much about?
Glen: Absolutely and from an advisory point of view I've even said that too to some people that
your film isn't right, it's commercial. If you have a family movie Sundance doesn't take a lot
of family films and they might have a section where they take like one or two really big
family films but they're not going to take small kind of dog or pony movies.
Those kind of movies aren't right for festivals. Horror films in general
of a certain level don't there's a horror audience out there that doesn't really
require kind of lift of a film festival to to get it out there and to a certain degree
festivals really only add so much value these days to a film festival and the real value at
least pre-covid for me for of Sundance and SXSW and Tribeca those are festivals that are attended
by buyers and so they're in a room they're feeling the audience watch the movie it's the only place
where distributors make mistakes right where they where they like they get a feeling like okay
let's go bid on the movie off this feeling they have in the theater they're never gonna
have that feeling when they're watching the film on their cell phone while they're driving or or
however they're they're watching your movie right it's so those festivals in particular have that
in addition to some branding value they also had the value of having the people there
watching the movie there's another several thousand film festivals in north America that
buyers just don't go to really great festivals and maybe one or two show up because they're
on a panel or something but they're not flocking there to watch the content to see if there's films
to buy they know that at some point those films will eventually get to them and they'll be able to
watch it in their office it's not worth flying all over the country to see these to these festivals
and the so the value to distribute the value there is maybe if we have a film that's not
right for Sundance didn't get Tribeca et cetera but it goes to Seattle then we're
going to the distributor saying hey here's this great movie and it just premiered in Seattle
check it out and you pitch the movie and then they watch it and take now now the fact that
it's in Seattle goes in one ear and out the other right it's not a heavy consideration for
them like oh wow I played Seattle not the one with flux I'm going to get all kinds of hate
mail about Seattle but Seattle is a great festival but the buyers just aren't there
and so the distributors are going to watch it on Vimeo at that point or blu-ray so
there's just there's just marginal value for festivals at that point but there's lots of
other good reasons to go to festivals other than will it get distribution because of them
it's the best experience you have with the film usually experience it with an audience
it's better than theatrical per se where it's which is it's kind of cold there's not like a
ready willing audience you go to the Laemmle Theatres and you're
there's five seats filled and this doesn't have the same impact as a as a festival screening where
people are there to to purposefully enjoy a film like they really want to enjoy it
and other reasons are to get feedback from fellow filmmakers to see other people's films
to meet other people you might work with in the future to maybe meet someone who wants to invest
in your next movie there's all sorts of good things that come out of festivals but really
for setting up distribution there's it's really minimal what what they what they provide for that
so when I'm talking to filmmakers
I have to kind of deal with their expectations of what they want to do and give advice on like
how to proceed strategically to get the film the best possible position and usually I'm going to
save it's not a Sundance or SXSW Tribeca kind of film we can go for festivals and do that but at
any time if you get tired of that and you're like we haven't gotten a festival can we go right to
buyers we can because it's only providing a little bit of color to the fact that you've
got a good film already in my view so and so when filmmakers do come to me and say
let's just go straight to buyers no problem really no problem at all it's to a certain degree too
some I I've had there are places like there's some streamer a couple of streamers that I've
approached the films before and they once a film's in a festival they've already kind of looked at
it not not that they've seen the film but they've kind of digested what it is and made an assessment
purely off of an image and a synopsis we want to check that out or we don't there's
a lot they don't so I've had a little bit more success with some films especially documentaries
if I'm going to them without anything and saying hey this has not been exposed
anywhere in the world no festival or anything I'm giving you and a few other people a look
at it first sometimes that's a better message to a distributor than hey we played Seattle
because sometimes I'll get yeah we looked we saw it in the listings not for us
you'll get sometimes then I've got to beg and play them to watch it and give it another chance so
yeah it's at the same time though lots of filmmakers just want to play festivals right they
just that's just a thing and very understandably there's a lot of great stuff about it so
the I'm here to advise on strategy and then once we've decided with the filmmaker what to do then
I'll implement it whatever kind of whatever they want to do so they want to play festivals do they
also want to attend or some are okay getting into these bigger festivals and not going
yeah you get different most I find want to attend I remember talking pre-covet again
but when you could but most I find want to attend occasionally I'll find someone who
doesn't really care about going but overwhelming 90 I think want to go and have the experience of
of the crowd and and all the things that you get out of the film festival yeah sure q a
yeah those are great yeah absolutely right feeling the energy yeah
what red flag should a filmmaker look for if they are considering hiring a producer rep well
so I would say look at all their go to IMDB look at their history of all the films that
they've sold call those filmmakers if dig in find a website address if it's not readily
available get to those people and and call them and see what kind of experience they had
I imagine that all producer reps and distributors and sales agents all have people that don't like
them but hopefully you find someone that's got more people that like them that don't like them
I think I think when I when I pitch myself for and I'm never really cognizant of like
who else they're looking at like I don't have a sense of my competition that way it's never like
me against the same three guys for a film it just doesn't it's it's fairly I find that
I think most films that I talk to about repping their films
aren't really considering many other options I that's the sense I get I don't really ask them
about it or really care but I can say this so I know when I decided to get into the business
I was working for an international sales agent at the time and looking around the landscape I
felt like there was a need for someone to do what I do a little bit more deeply than I felt like
other producer reps were doing it like I kind of alluded to before there's a lot of just kind of
okay toss it to the wall if none of these 10 distributors want it
moving on which leaves everybody empty and and so I really try to do I try to do the job of
making sure I understand the full distribution landscape who are the best possible options
for this film if none of them want it what are the possible second tier options for them to do
I also have my own tricks of the trade if something were to fall to self-distribution
per se what's the what are the best practices there who's the best aggregator to use those
situations so I'm trying to I'm trying to provide a full kind of consulting service around what I
do as opposed to that so I think that when you're looking for a producer rep it's kind of it's kind
of like references do you like the films they've sold in the past is your film feel like a fit
have they made deals can you can they point to films that have had
had deals with Netflix and Hulu and Showtime and HBO and and IFC etc
but yeah it's funny I should probably take another look at the at the landscape of
producer reps out there besides myself and see what options people have to to maybe give a fuller
answer on that but yeah to a certain degree I think that's probably the way to go about it.