Springboard to Distribution - The DGA's Director's Finder Series

By Darrell L. Hope

Recently, the DGA's Director's Finder Unreleased Films Screening Series scored another victory. DGA member Gil Cates, Jr.'s debut feature $pent is slated to bow in Los Angeles theatres on July 21, 2000, and in New York theatres the following week. Shot under a DGA Low Budget Agreement, $pent, a serio-comic look at life and its addictions, was picked up for distribution by Regent Entertainment after a Director's Finder screening last year.

"We were having trouble getting distribution so we showed it at one of the DGA's Director's Finder screenings a week or two before we went to the South by Southwest (SxSW) film festival in 1999," recalls Cates. "John Landberg, the head of acquisitions and productions at Regent, came. He'd heard about the film from someone who had seen it at the only other screening we had of it at the Laemmle, and he had been tracking the film. After he saw it, he arranged for us to have a meeting with Paul Colichman, the guy behind Gods & Monsters."

The DGA's Director's Finder Series is the brainchild of the Guild's Independent Directors Committee and is designed to showcase low-budget and independent films made under DGA agreements. The series demonstrates the Guild's ongoing support of its independent filmmaker members in their efforts to get distribution. The screenings take place periodically in the Los Angeles DGA building and are free to the 

public. The films are chosen by lottery and screened in the DGA's 150-seat theater at no cost to the filmmaker. Each screening is announced to the membership via the monthly calendar of events and the filmmakers are encouraged to send out their own invitations to nonmembers and potential distributors. However, since the series began, several distributors have called the DGA, interested in attending the screenings on their own.

Since its inception in December 1998, the DGA's Director's Finder Series has screened more than 40 independent films which met the eligibility requirements of being made under a DGA agreement, and not having a domestic theatrical, television or videocassette distribution deal. Of those films, several have gone on to find life via theatrical, cable television and video distribution deals. These films include Paul Lazarus' Seven Girlfriends, picked up by Castle Hill Productions and will be appearing domestically on video; Lynn Hamrick's Splitsville, which secured deals with HBO/ Showtime and Encore; Harvey Keith's Stand-Ins, which went into video distribution in November 1999; Bob Weis' Inconceivable, which captured deals with Showtime and Hollywood Video; Holly Sloane Goldberg's The Secret Life of Girls, which secured a domestic video distribution deal with Blockbuster Video; Iren Koster's Dead End, which found worldwide distribution by Showcase Entertainment; Laurie Agard's Frog and Wombat, picked up for distribution by both HBO and Showtime and Stu Pollard's Nice Guys Sleep Alone.

"A lot of good things have happened since our DGA screening," said Pollard. "We come out in two and a half weeks in Hollywood Video outlets nationwide and we're going to be on HBO in the fall. We've also sold it to Lifetime Television and Romance Classics. I know that a couple of the people who made those deals happen saw the film first at our Director's Finder screening. 

Pollard said that making the film under a DGA Low Budget Agreement, "was one of the best decisions we could have made. We shot 130 pages in 24 days and if we hadn't had a DGA crew, we wouldn't have made it. They ran a really tight ship on a ridiculous schedule and we ended up with a truly nice-looking film."

Cates echoed that fact. "The DGA Low Budget Agreements are incredible. It's so worth it to be able to get the benefits of all the Guild's efforts behind you. I couldn't recommend it more. As for the Director's Finder series, it's a 'can't lose' situation. Even if it doesn't result in an immediate distribution deal, you get your film seen in a wonderful theatre."

For Holly Goldberg Sloane, having her film screened in the DGA facility was a very important advantage to the Director's Finder Series. "It's a beautiful theatre and opportunities to put a film up in a theatre of that quality are very rare," Sloane said. 

Most recently, the Finder Series played host to DGA members Shawn Schepps' Kat and Allison and Amy Goldstein's East of A. Although they were each excited about the prospect of having their feature films screened at the DGA, both filmmakers acknowledged that the DGA Low Budget Agreement was what made it possible for them to have something on film to project.

"We didn't have any money so that's the only way we could do it," said Goldstein. "We got the ability to use DGA members to work on a project that was very meaningful to them, but on a low budget."

"I wrote the movie to be low budget," Schepps said. "The subject matter doesn't really lend itself to a studio picture. The Low Budget Agreement allowed me to do this easily and the Guild was incredibly supportive. Special Events Executive Jon Larson was on the phone with me practically every day and Field Rep Don Gold was on the set all the time. I had so much support from my union and I needed it."

For Goldstein, the DGA has been the source of much more than a place to screen her finished film. "The DGA is a great organization. I've taken some great workshops here, learned a lot of new skills and met a lot of great people. It's really a great center for the filmmaking community."

For more information about the Director's Finder Unreleased Screening Series, contact Pamela Kile in the DGA Special Events Department at (310) 289-5305. If you are interested in attending a screening, contact the DGA RSVP line at (310) 289-5300.

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VC Fest 2000 Scores With Indie Film Fans at the DGA

By David Geffner

Photos by Terry Lilly

Tthe VC Film Fest 2000, held at the DGA, was a weeklong celebration of Asian American and Asian international filmmakers and featured more than 80 films (culled from more than 220 submissions) offering up a feast of rising young talent. This was the 15th edition of the festival and the 30th anniversary of its L.A.–based sponsor, Visual Communications, the longest-running media arts group of its kind in the entire nation.

VC Film Fest 2000 was undeniably top-heavy with narrative shorts this year. But, it has had a storied tradition of debuting hot new feature filmmakers in the past, such as Ang Lee, John Woo, Gregg Araki, Wayne Wang and Mira Nair.

As Linda Mabalot, Executive Director of Visual Communications, explains, "this festival originally grew out of a collective of independent Asian artists who had little opportunity to showcase their work in Los Angeles. It began in conjunction with the Japanese American Cultural Community Center as a way to offer the Asian film community alternative screens. We then partnered with the UCLA Film and Television Archives and moved all the screenings to the UCLA campus. With our move to the DGA three years ago, we felt it was important to go to another level of media exposure and industry awareness and it's been a great match. The DGA is very supportive of the event."

DGA President Jack Shea welcomed festival filmmakers at a DGA–hosted brunch at Pinot Hollywood. "One of the most wonderful things about sponsoring this type of event," Shea said, "is that it's so rare for filmmakers to sit down and talk to each other. We're trying to do more of that at the DGA - bringing filmmakers together and fostering diversity among our members. The DGA considers itself the home of all filmmakers, and for many of you first-timers who are not members, we hope you will give us serious consideration on your next project."

As brunch was served, Shea asked the invitees to rise and introduce themselves. Filmmaker Michael Uno, a founding member of the DGA's Independent Director's Committee, said, "It's personally very gratifying to see all these young faces here because it represents the emergence of a new and dynamic Asian-American and Asian-Pacific cinema. Of course, other than this fantastic free brunch, you may be asking what does the DGA have to do with you? Maybe nothing at this point in your career. But, down the line, you may want to think otherwise."

Uno went on to note that if you work long enough in this business, you're going to need the DGA to back you up. "Things I took for granted back in the early days of my career, like pension and welfare, director's cut, and creative rights protections, are all provided by the DGA if you're in this for the long haul."

At that point, Uno held up an old T-shirt with the DGA emblem emblazoned on the back, in response to the question what has he gotten from the Guild over the course of his career. Far from being a humorous symbol, Uno explained that he received the shirt in 1987, during the only strike in DGA history.

"I've never had to do anything except exactly what I wanted to do, which is direct films," an emotional Uno relayed softly. "While you're pursuing your art, while you're building your career, while you're building a body of work, it's important to build your life too. And, that brings me back to this shirt. Because what it says on the back is 'Protecting the Future.' That was our slogan during the 1987 strike. At the time, I thought it was pretty corny. But, looking back now, I realize that that is what the Directors Guild of America is all about. It protects your work and it protects your life."

Mabalot, along with festival co-directors Abraham Ferrer and David Magdael, were careful to include many seminars in VC Film Fest 2000 appealing to up-and-coming artists. 

Without a doubt, the liveliest of the seminars was the DGA–sponsored "Afternoon With a Filmmaker." The event was moderated by Walt Louie and featured opening comments by DGA director member Wenda Fong. Featured on the panel were directors Waris Hussein, Sandy Tung and James Wong. 

After Wenda Fong's opening comments, which included reference to the Guild's newly formed Asian-Pacific Islander Committee, Louie punctuated a no-holds-barred discussion with clips from each director's work. Wong, in particular, touched a nerve with the predominantly 20-something directors and producers in the room when he was asked why he could not use his clout as a producer of The X-Files to cast more Asian-Americans in his feature or TV work.

"Just because you reach a certain level of success in this business," Wong said, "does not mean you have the power to do whatever you want. Steven Spielberg is executive producing a show I'm doing, and we were promised a 13-episode commitment by FOX to be on the air this fall. Are we going to be on the air? No. Our show is nowhere to be seen. And, that's with Steven Spielberg as our exec producer."

Hussein, too, lamented the dearth of Asians on television. "Just look at ER. There's not a single East Indian doctor in the cast, yet if you walk into any big city hospital in America, East Indian physicians are rescuing people from death every day. And, Filipino nurses are right there by their sides. The sad fact is that most of the producers and creators of hit TV shows do not even know any Asian or East Indian actors to create parts for. So, they simply don't bother."

Thankfully, for the more than 6,500 film lovers who attended VC Film Fest 2000, there was no shortage of strong Asian-American performances. A list of the festival's award winners (announced in the closing-night ceremonies at the Japanese American Cultural Center in L.A.'s Little Tokyo) pointed up the diversity Asian indie filmmakers have visualized onscreen. From the eccentric tone of Rock, Paper, Scissors and A Nursery Tale, which tied for the Audience Award short film, to the incendiary realism of Frank Abe's Conscience and Constitution, which chronicled the Fair Play Committee (85 Japanese Americans who refused to be drafted out of the Heart Mountain, Wyoming internment camp in 1944), to the period artistry of Turbans, which follows the fate of a Sikh family in Oregon in 1918, VC Film Fest 2000 was a feast for the senses.

Perhaps the festival's closing-night film, First Person Plural, directed by Bay Area filmmaker Deann Borshay, best epitomized the many cinematic risks Asian-American independents are taking. The story of Deann Borshay, born Cha Jung Hee, an orphan in South Korea who was brought to the United States at the age of 9 for adoption by Caucasian parents, works on so many levels that it requires an entirely new genre for classification. Part personal documentary, part narrative mystery, Borshay's film has touched off a mini-movement of similar projects in the Asian-American filmmaking enclave of San Francisco.

As director James Wong sagely noted during the Q&A portion of his DGA seminar: "When I began in this business there were very few Asian role models for me to look to, so I was forced to find my own path without a lot of clues or guidance. Now, with events like the VC Festival going on right in the core of the industry in Hollywood, that has changed. We still have a long way to go toward improving Asian representation. But, things are getting better and we're on the right path."

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LAIFF 2000

By David Geffner

photos by Robert Hale

Some of the highlights of this year's six-day run of the Los Angeles Independent Film Festival (LAIFF) never even happened on-screen. Take the festival's awards ceremony, for example. Voted on by audiences, estimated at more than 30,000, the prizes were given out in a lunchtime ceremony in Yamashiro's Japanese garden, and the raw enthusiasm which poured from so many first-time filmmakers was infectious. LAIFF Audience Awards, as well as the diverse slate of indie features, docs, shorts and industry seminars, confirmed what fest promoters have been saying since LAIFF began six years ago: independent filmmaking is alive and well in the same city where corporate studio movie-making reigns supreme.

Perhaps no filmmaker better symbolized the dedication indies hold for their craft than double-award winner Hilary Birmingham. The first-timer's What Happened to Tully captured the Best Directing Award, presented by filmmaker Alexander Payne (Election), as well as the prestigious Critic's Award, voted on by three of the nation's top entertainment critics - Stephen Farber, Lisa Schwarzbaum and Henry Sheehan. So stunned by the first, DGA–sponsored honor (which included $2,500 in cash prizes) was Birmingham, that the Boston native was too overwhelmed to speak.

While unknowns like Birmingham, or director Steven Cantor, whose documentary Bounce: Behind the Velvet Rope captured the Audience Award for Best Feature, stole the spotlight at this year's LAIFF, theirs were not the only stories to be told. The festival's opening night began with a jam-packed cocktail reception in the DGA atrium, followed by a screening of a debut director known more for his SAG card than his choice of lenses. Lakeboat, from a script by David Mamet and starring Peter Falk, Charles Durning, Robert Forster and Jack Wallace, was a project actor Joe Mantegna had been working on for more than five years.

Earlier that same day, the DGA sponsored a pre-festival kickoff brunch for all the visiting LAIFF filmmakers at Pinot Hollywood. The warm, familial gathering in Pinot's main room was led by fest director Richard Raddon, who succeeded LAIFF founder and former director, Robert Faust. Faust stepped down this year to begin an Internet startup company, MediaTrip.com, but was still very much a presence at this year's festival, introducing Raddon at many of LAIFF's key events.

"Whenever you're trying to brand an event in this city," noted Raddon at the DGA brunch, "it's easy to get caught up in the whole celebrity craze with high-profile star-driven movies. Thomas Ethan Harris, the festival's programming director, and I made an attempt to balance the program with emotionally engaging films regardless of who was involved in the projects. We really looked for filmmakers who were breaking new ground and avoiding any of the cliches which have begun to creep into the independent world."

Raddon went on to call LAIFF an "ever-changing" climate mirroring the marketplace. "We made a point of programming seminars highlighting areas like digital filmmaking and new media alternatives," noted Raddon, "because independents tend to anticipate these kinds of trends for the rest of the industry. They are more resourceful filmmakers by default."

Once the brunch got underway, DGA Assistant Executive Director Elizabeth Stanley passed around the microphone and encouraged visiting directors to introduce themselves to their peers and say a few words about their projects. As the mike passed from table-to-table, the sheer diversity of stories, themes, and eager new faces from outside the Hollywood community was abundantly clear.

Two-time LAIFF filmmaker and DGA director member Jon Reiss (Better Living Through Circuitry, Cleopatra's Second Husband) came back this year to speak at the Guild's luncheon. Reiss offered tips on how first-time LAIFF directors could maximize their festival experiences.

"I tend to look at film festivals in a mercenary light. Rather than just being pleased that I was accepted," Reiss told those assembled at the Pinot Hollywood luncheon, "I tried to figure out beforehand what it was I really wanted to get out of that festival so as not to waste the experience. Obviously, the thing uppermost in my mind was to try and get my film acquired, as I'm sure it is with many of you. The great thing about LAIFF is that it's the only independent film festival, other than Sundance and Toronto, that acquisition executives actually attend. So, your chances of being seen by people who can make a difference in your careers are great."

Reiss wrapped up his remarks by urging first-time LAIFF directors to "seriously consider" making their next projects under the DGA's comprehensive low-budget contracts. "I was very fearful of joining any type of union so early in my career," Reiss laughed, "because I thought it would cost me a lot of money. But, if I was able to shoot Cleopatra's Second Husband DGA and pay my AD $75 a week, which was just a little bit more than the $100 I paid myself for the entire shoot, then anyone can work under a DGA contract."

While Reiss' remarks generated lively questions from LAIFF directors, the real treat of the afternoon came when Robert Hawk took the microphone. A founding member of LAIFF, and a longtime board member as well as a founder of the Film Arts Film Foundation in San Francisco, Hawk is recognized as one of independent films' most passionate boosters for the last two decades.

"Seven years ago," Hawk began, "Robert Faust and I met in the House of Pies in East Hollywood and Robert laid out his vision for bringing an independent film festival to Los Angeles. Robert's vision was always that the filmmaker comes first, and what I want to say to you all here today, is that without you, the filmmakers, we're nothing. I promise you that by the time this week wraps up, you'll feel like you're at a big summer camp that you just can't leave. The DGA will, literally, have to blink the lights in the lobby on closing night because no one will want to leave."

Hawk went on to detail a few key suggestions to help first-timers better navigate the heady world of an independent film festival. "Don't obsess about winning an award," Hawk urged, "the way filmmakers do at Sundance. To me, awards are like the sprinkles on the icing on the cake. The awards are the sprinkles, the deals are the icing, but the cake, the film and this festival experience, is something you'll always have."

Family was a key topic for many of the themes explored by LAIFF 2000 filmmakers. Projects like DGA member Seth Zvi Rosenfeld's King of the Jungle, or 24-year-old filmmaker David Gordon Green's George Washington, or Bruno, the directing debut of Shirley MacLaine, all dealt with fractured urbanites craving families of one sort or another.

Of course, no better example of the power of familial ties could be found then LAIFF's 30th Anniversary screening of Bob Rafelson's cult hit, Five Easy Pieces. The Sunday-morning audience which flocked to see a restored print of the film, was also treated to a lively post-screening Q&A session with the film's creative team. Director Rafelson, producer Robert Wechsler, stars Karen Black and Susan Anspach, and editor Gerald Shepard, were all queried by director Curtis Hanson as to what made Five Easy Pieces such a landmark event for independents.

"We had gotten very lucky," laughed Rafelson. "We had formed an independent company to make movies and television. Our first project was The Monkees TV series, followed by the feature films Head and Easy Rider. Easy Rider was made for about $350,000, and the movie was so successful that Columbia got the impression we were all geniuses and they should leave us completely alone to make our next film. Our contract on Five Easy Pieces was that as long we didn't go over budget, which we didn't, the studio would let us do whatever we wanted. Ten weeks after Carol Eastman began writing a script about an alienated young man, who's the youngest son in a family of musicians, we began shooting the movie. The speed with which it all came together was remarkable."

Hanson went on to quiz the two actors on the panel, Black and Anspach, on how they achieved such relaxed and specific performances with such a compressed shooting schedule. "I think one of the main reasons we were all so good in this picture," smiled Karen Black, "was because Bob Rafelson gave us the time to be good. If the director has limitations, you can feel it and that will affect your performance. I remember Bob spending an hour on the side of a road with me discussing whether or not my character would say one single line at the end of the film. We had the time to do our work, and that's a quality that you just don't see in films anymore."

The afternoon before the Five Easy Pieces panel, LAIFF visitors had been treated to another insightful seminar, this one featuring Agnieszka Holland and Neil LaBute in the DGA's sixth floor conference room. LaBute and Holland traded production tales, revealing how much the two filmmakers have in common, despite their disparate careers.

"I was going to Brigham Young University and working toward getting a Ph.D. to teach," observed LaBute, "and writing plays at the same time. One of my plays was accepted to the Sundance Playwright's Lab. Some producers saw it and asked if I could turn it into a screenplay. I wrote Interior at the top of each scene, didn't change hardly anything, and from that a career writing and directing independent films began."

Traveling a more traditional road, the Polish-born Holland studied film directing in Czechoslovakia at the FAMU in Prague. She was mentored by Andrzej Wadja before becoming part of the Polish New Wave of filmmakers which swept the international film scene in the mid-'80s.

"For me as a director," Holland explained, "one of the most important things I can do is make the right choices in my casting. And, that is very much the difference between making independent films, either here or in Europe, and making studio films in America. Studio movies do not always allow you the choice of who will act in your movie. You are forced to pick actors, not so much by their abilities as by their bankability. It's a terrible thing to have an actor who is not right for a movie be forced upon the director. But, if you have the freedom to make the right choice in casting, 90 percent of your work is done, at least with regards to the performances."

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LAIFF: With the Directors

By David Geffner

DGA Magazine caught up with Agnieszka Holland (AH) and Neil LaBute (NL) after the DGA's Craft Series Panel on Directing had concluded for a conversation on their careers, their concerns, and the state of world film. 

How does being a part of the DGA compare to your early experiences in Poland, Agnieszka?

AH: I don't think you can compare, really. Solidarity was a political movement. They called themselves a trade union, but it was about creating a national ideology and gaining basic justice for workers. Of course, since the fall of Communism they have the problem of acting more like a traditional labor union, and that's difficult, as it is for unions the world over. There are corruption and stagnation within these large bureaucracies. I feel it to some degree when I make a studio picture here in the United States. Too many people on the crew, too many people standing around - it can get in the way of the creative process. The production becomes weighted down like a stone, inflexible and unable to make changes.

So, your experiences with studio movies here have not been that great?

AH: No, I have made some wonderful films here. But, I am always fighting to make my movies as cheap as possible. I know that every supplementary $100,000 that I want to spend is taken out of my personal and creative freedoms.

Neil, what's your take on that?

NL: Well, you hope that every dollar goes right onto the screen. It's certainly not about bragging rights: how many trucks did I have, or how many people did I have working on the crew. You need the money to make the vision more complete. That's always the priority for the director.

AH: I remember when I was shooting The Secret Garden at Pinehurst Studios in London, and there was very little work going on in the UK at the time. I had this huge studio, with all these incredible Victorian sets and 300 people on staff to shoot two little children playing in a garden! It felt like the film was suffocating with all those people.

Neil, you're moving on to bigger budget films. But, you're not far removed from your first indie hit, which you made for well under six figures. How do you retain that spontaneity and freedom you had the first time, when it was just you and a few investors?

NL: Well, as I said in the panel: I've been a viewer of films longer than I've been a maker. So, I feel blessed just to be in a job where I get to start fresh on every project. It's not like I'm working at the same insurance company for the last 20 years on the same forms. In fact, I'm working on a project now that takes place in the Victorian world and the present day. So, I'm learning all about Victoriana. Every new movie is a new career for me, a rebirth of what I love to do. 

But, what about as you move up in budgets and you have to deal with more external pressure? As Agnieszka said during the panel: "everybody seems to have an opinion on how directors should make their films these days."

NL: No one is ever going to put more pressure on a film than the pressure I put on myself.

AH: Yes, but it's a luxury to put pressure on yourself! And, that luxury disappears when you have 20 people, all the time, questioning your work. You're too busy defending the basic integrity of a project to have the time to see where your weaknesses or strengths on a film are. It's terrible and it's only getting worse with each movie.

Does it come down to the creative people you surround yourself with?

NL: For me it does. A good producer can insulate you from the battles. But, larger budgets have not added pressure to the way I work. On my first film I had to do every single little job and it took time away from directing. More money means more time and freedom to do what I want to do creatively.

AH: My experience has been that without a strong producer, the studios will intervene at every single turn. They will attack your creative judgment and turn the film into a battle. Meetings upon meetings until it becomes unbearable and you feel like this system is crushing you. Some directors thrive on the fight. But, for me, it's a waste of time, I could be working.

To what degree is the director responsible for gauging if his or her work is right for the marketplace? Maybe some stories are too obscure and difficult to justify all that money it takes to make a movie.

NL: You know, I went into a job where I never thought I would think about business, and I think about business every single day. I understand how agents and producers and studio executives approach this industry as a business. They have to.

Yes, but a lot of good projects would never have been made if the directors were worried about finding an audience.

NL: That is very true. All the more reason to go into business with people who have - I don't want to say passion [laughs]. But, it's going to be hard enough to go through that gauntlet of criticism - you have to go into business with people who care about the project as much as you do.

David Lynch was quoted as saying that a director can please many masters - the crew, the producers, the actors - except himself. How do you translate the creative truth you saw in the script to the time and budget limitations of a set?

AH: It's all about balance. You can't just please yourself, because after a few days the crew will turn against you and you won't get what you need from them. Sometimes it's like playing a role - you have to play the "director" because they will not tolerate doubt or indecision. You can only share these creative doubts with your closest collaborators. My daughter does all my storyboards and she is critical when she feels I am betraying my true self. You need people to stand up to you that way. If everybody's clapping after every shot you'll start to believe you're great and the film will suffer.

NL: I feel much the same way. You can't insulate yourself with just people who will say 'yes' all the time - that bubble will burst eventually. I think at the end of the day, you have to be able to walk into a movie house where your movie is playing and still find that pure pleasure of having achieved what you set out to do, regardless of what the film returns financially. You should enjoy the process - but the end result is making the movie you set out to make.

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