Bootleg Sites Take Note

[Guest]

Sorry, what's Against the Wild? I haven't heard of that one before.

 

Yes you have Travis don't act like you haven't. You have the top comment on this thread on the movie in the "On Screen" section:

 

http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=62791&page=2

 

R,

[Guest]

Thanks for answering some of my questions. I noticed there are a lot of "Walmart exclusive" releases. Where the film goes there first and then the other retailers. It makes one wonder whether Walmart, like blockbuster back in the day is asking filmmakers to do some cutting on the version of the film that they sell in their store. I doubt this is the case with yours since it's a family fllm but have you heard from any other filmmakers that maybe got notes from Walmart about trimming this or that?

 

Also, was the film tested? For how many screenings? How were the scores? That usually influences the degree of marketing. So any specifics of that with your experience are also welcome. Did you happen to notice if the distributor you had also dealt with any more arthouse titles and whether those had the same level of distribution, worse or better? By arthouse I mean, like your typical Atom Egoyan film. Intellectual content, not produced for a mass audience. You mentioned some stats but have you heard from any industry colleagues how those are typically treated by retailers?

 

I've never heard of Walmart requesting edit changes to a movie. I do know that they prefer family product to have the Dove seal of approval. As the current ratings system will allow the use of the "s-word" in a movie marketed as a "family" title. This is where the Dove Foundation came in. Too many parents get irate over the content in family titles marketed by the studios.

 

The film was not tested per se, the only public screening before the release was at the Rhode Island International Film Festival. I did not hand out any comment cards. Atom Egoyan's films do typically go into major retail. Are they considered "mass market"? Not really sure? The vast bulk of his funding comes from TeleFilm Canada not the Hollywood studios. TeleFilm does not require anyone to turn a profit or make "commercial" movies. The Hollywood studios are profit driven business enterprises. Atom Egoyan has made a long list of movies funded by TeleFilm he's their most successful recipient of funds.

 

So if you want to make non-commercial art house movies, move to Canada and apply for TeleFilm funding, they'll welcome you with open arms. Canada is the only nation on earth that gives tax payer dollars to directors who are not even Canadian citizens so they can make a movie.

 

R,

[Travis Gray]

 

Yes you have Travis don't act like you haven't. You have the top comment on this thread on the movie in the "On Screen" section:

 

http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=62791&page=2

 

R,

 

 

I was trying to make a funny there. Only because all of these posts do seem to be somehow promoting your film. Or dropping that you worked on the film just to get into arguments with someone.

 

It just doesn't seem all that helpful. But maybe that's just me.

[Guest]

Or dropping that you worked on the film just to get into arguments with someone.

 

Where's an example of that?

 

R,

 

If you read the entire board you would see that many forum members are interested in making and selling their own films. You may not be, but others are.

[George Ebersole]

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to once again remind the world:

Which company sued Sony in the 1970s (and lost!) over the allegedly copyright infringing capabilities of home VCRs, and then turned around and went on to make billions of dollars with home video releases (Beta, VHS, LaserDisc and later DVD) of their precious Intellectual Property?

 

Sure, but the problem they foresaw then has come home to roost, and eaten away at those profits. Disney probably saw the writing on the wall, tried to attack the problem early on with that law suit, and in spite of losing and making huge bundles of money from the technology, is now seeing their fears come true.

 

Making large amounts of cash from technology still doesn't excuse copying someone else's work for resale in portable media, or to attract users to your site in the form of a stream.

 

Just because the "big guys" make lots of money by virtue of who they are and what their product is, doesn't make it right for someone to profit off their work without getting permission.

 

Walt Disney himself wasn't born into the "Magic Kingdom" with Mickey, Donald, Goofy and all the movie characters there for him to profit off of. It was a lot of hard work by him and the talent he mustered to create the legacy that is Disney Studios.

[George Ebersole]

Here is a report from Japanese television regarding the ultimate illegal "upload" or "stream" or "bootleg" from Japanese television on a Chinese "Disneland", right down to the characters and castle (sorry, it's in Japanese).

 

*EDIT* I found a better news report with subtitles.

 

[Michael LaVoie]

Egoyan was a big influence on me back in my film school days. Another filmmaker I was inspired by early on was Jeremy Podeswa who won a Genie for directing and Best picture at Toronto in 1999 for The Five Senses. I was sure he was going to go far in features but he only made one after that in 2007. The bulk of his career has been episodic television. Really good shows though like The Walking Dead and True Blood, Queer as Folk etc. Seems like indie arthouse film just died in the late 90's and early 2000. I did see The Five Senses at an art house theater in NY and I remember listening to people as they left the theater saying it was the most boring thing they'd ever watched. I thought they were crazy. It was brilliant. But you can't argue taste. That's the problem with film in general. It's only a success if everyone likes it. But then, is it really a success? Given many people lack an appreciation for good cinema?

 

Soderbergh expressed frustration in a movieline interview not long ago that Television is the new frontier for auteurs and that studios don't embrace filmmakers anymore. I wonder if that's why we're losing filmmakers like Podeswa who have a style that's more arthouse and not necessarily profit driven. If the studios won't help them and funding is hard to come by, seems like television may be the answer. But that seems like a tough place for an artist to work since there's so many writers involved.

 

I think you'd have a tough time finding a copy of The Sweet Hereafter in any Barnes and Noble or Best Buy. Possible but unlikely. Our US cinematic retailers like Suncoast Video and Tower Video went out of business long ago. Those were the only places you could find films like that. Depressing indeed. If I made a film as good as Exotica, I have no idea who'd buy it or where it would sell. But that's not really why you make a film like that I guess. Try telling that to an investor though right?

[Guest]

I think you'd have a tough time finding a copy of The Sweet Hereafter in any Barnes and Noble or Best Buy. Possible but unlikely.

 

That was one of his more commercial projects, try Ararat. I don't know what the answer is? TeleFilm continues to fund non audience driven movies, and then the logical next question is....but if few people are going to see the movie why bother making it? I don't want to sound too critical of a film like Ararat, it is well made from a cinematic point of view. But certainly has little mass market appeal.

 

The only thing TeleFilm has told me with certainty is that "family films" will never be funded using the tax payer supplied dollars from TeleFilm. They will however embrace and champion the movies no one wants to watch or finance. In fact, they take pride in it. They spent 6.7 million on the Canadian romantic comedy The Right Kind Of Wrong, only to see it completely tank at the Canadian box office, and we won't even talk about the US. IMDB tracking reports $2, 022.00 on one(1) screen. I suppose that's not bad ROI? :wacko:

 

R,

[Michael LaVoie]

Is Telefilm more or less a closed door to "first time filmmakers' or do they actually consider unknowns? I'm sitting on at least 7 feature scripts. None of which are "family" or mass market. The companies I'd take it to would be Good Machine or Killer Films but I'd have to get in a time machine to do that. No one looks at anything unsolicited now. What's Telefilms take on that? Do you need an agent to send them a script?

[Guest]

Oh gosh have a look at the TeleFilm website and review their application process, if you start tomorrow you should be ready to submit by 2018. :)

 

R,

[Michael LaVoie]

Just checked it out. I see what you mean. The development applications start end of April but they are asking for a document proving a firm commitment from a distributor before you've even made the film. In addition to audited financial statements dating back 3 years of your consolidated gross revenue. They also want a completed budget for your project.

 

I've been planning on getting moviemagic and doing breakdowns of all the scripts anyway but it's hard to do a budget if you have no real ballpark of funds available. So I'm not sure what tier to breakdown the script for. I'm guessing Tier 1 but I can do most of them for much less than 5-7million.

 

It's a tall order if you're new to the process. I mean, if I could get a production company behind me with a long track record, it's less likely I'd need them at all. So, yeah, not a closed door exactly but certainly not for newcomers. At least, not anymore

[Guest]

TeleFilm is a joke. Are you American or Canadian? Makes no difference really, the end result will be the same.

 

Don't get me started, I could write volumes on these idiots.

 

R,

[Phil Rhodes]

They are asking for a document proving a firm commitment from a distributor

 

Do you blame them? The number of people out there who will claim they're filmmakers having done nothing and having no realistic prospects is enormous.

 

But in the main, Richard, seriously: what did you expect when you got into independent filmmaking? I should probably make it clear here that I find this starving-filmmaker story slightly hard to believe; my suspicion is that it's quite possible to make large quantities of money making films, and I know very well that it's possible to lose your shirt entirely, but I fear that the prospects for making only modest amounts of cash are probably quite limited. A large retail chain isn't going to print up a load of promotional cardboard without there being quite significant hunks of money involved.

 

Anyway, were you not aware of the issues of piracy and anticompetitive behaviour among the largest industry players, before you got into this? These factors, among others, are one reason why I have never really been that interested in personally producing what one might term mainstream commercial film. Yes, you get a degree of creative freedom that's unavailable in other circumstances, but the likelihood of complete financial apocalypse must approach unity. My main objection to it would be the near-impossibility of selling this stuff in an openly hostile market. I fear that's much more likely to wipe you out financially than a few latvian teenagers in back bedrooms.

 

And you need to understand that you can't do much if anything about piracy, and you really need to understand that banging on about it just makes you look like Dr. Evil, the wealthy movie producer chasing poor people for money. No, it isn't fair. Life isn't fair. Life isn't nice. Life isn't supposed to be enjoyable. Expect it to poop on you at every possible turn. It usually does. What d'you expect?

 

P

[Guest]

Ah Phil....I have been patiently waiting to see your bright shining face :D

 

I'm surprised it took this long.

 

R,

[Freya Black]

And you need to understand that you can't do much if anything about piracy, and you really need to understand that banging on about it just makes you look like Dr. Evil, the wealthy movie producer chasing poor people for money.

 

 

Ah well now that you put it like that, I mean Richard would never want to come across as Dr Evil... I'm sure you have totally put him off now! ;)

 

Freya

[Freya Black]

 

But in the main, Richard, seriously: what did you expect when you got into independent filmmaking? I should probably make it clear here that I find this starving-filmmaker story slightly hard to believe; my suspicion is that it's quite possible to make large quantities of money making films, and I know very well that it's possible to lose your shirt entirely, but I fear that the prospects for making only modest amounts of cash are probably quite limited. A large retail chain isn't going to print up a load of promotional cardboard without there being quite significant hunks of money involved.

 

I almost said something earlier in this thread as this is the second comment along these lines.

Richard has not done a special deal with Walmart. In fact I'm guessing the only person he spoke to at Walmart was the guy at the checkout.

 

Secondly in relation to other comments, if you are an indie filmmaker it's unlikely that your customers are the people watching your movie in the cinema or buying the DVD at Walmart. You will likely be selling to someone else and their first question is likely to be "who is in it?" and the next thing they will probably say is "lets see the poster then?"

 

I'm stating the obvious here but it seems like it is needed for some reason!

 

Freya

[Phil Rhodes]

I'm not sure it makes much difference whether it's a direct deal or not.

[Freya Black]

I'm not sure it makes much difference whether it's a direct deal or not.

 

Why would it not make a difference I don't get you?

Yes Walmart makes a fortune, the guy on the checkout bringing in all the money, not so much...

 

Where are you coming from with that? I don't get it, surely it would make a big difference??!

 

Freya

[Guest]

All of us in the industry should just stay silent on the bootlegging problem, then it will just magically float away.

 

As I keep trying to emphasize, 98% of the people on this board work on direct to DVD or TV movies. Very few are working on movies that receive a 2500 screen theatrical release. It's the first category of movies that are getting hit the hardest by bootlegging and that is definitely having an impact on job opportunities for everyone involved.

 

R,

[Keith Walters]

All of us in the industry should just stay silent on the bootlegging problem, then it will just magically float away.

It won't "magically float away" if you do nothing, nor will it float away kicking and screaming if you mount an industry-wide Jihad against it (Using "Jihad" in its proper meaning of "all-out single-minded effort"). The result is going to be approximately the same, for an awful lot of money and bad will.

 

Do you think the big industry players are all morons?

"I can't understand why XXXX corporation doesn't do so-and-so; therefore, they must all be idiots!"

 

They know damned well that the amount they can practically do about piracy is extremely limited. Most of the executives would privately rather accept that the alleged loss of revenue is never going to be recoverable, and move on from there to something more productive. Unfortunately, they're at the mercy of boards of directors, who are in turn at the mercy of anxious/rapacious shareholders demanding the "something be done" although exactly what is going to be done and who is going to do it are not dwelled upon, and anyway "that's the job of the board of directors."

 

You're possibly familiar with the expression "Sending good money after bad?"

 

Also lawmakers are generally not too keen on supporting unpopular laws that cannot be enforced, and if the industry tries to rock the boat too much, they may well find the laws that do exist get overturned.

 

You must do what you think best Richard, but you would be far better off directing your own personal Jihad toward making your next film, than chasing after imaginary lost revenue from your last one. You're sure as hell not going to get any footprints in the TCL Chinese Theatre chasing bootleggers :rolleyes:

[Guest]

You're sure as hell not going to get any footprints in the TCL Chinese Theatre chasing bootleggers :rolleyes:

 

Hmmmmmmm, maybe, maybe not.

 

R,

[Sean Cunningham]

Secondly in relation to other comments, if you are an indie filmmaker it's unlikely that your customers are the people watching your movie in the cinema or buying the DVD at Walmart. You will likely be selling to someone else and their first question is likely to be "who is in it?" and the next thing they will probably say is "lets see the poster then?"

This is exactly right. Not only that, the buyer for the film, the company who buys from the producer, since producers don't sell directly to consumers (though that is starting to change) and major retailers like Wal-Mart don't buy directly from producers, they will do everything in their power to never pay the filmmaker another dime once the initial deal is made.

 

Whether it does gangbusters or sales are decimated by Chinese knock-offs and torrent rips, they're going to try and keep everything the film earns from that point on. Whether you're dealing with a ghetto distributor or Lion's Gate.

 

Piracy isn't the biggest threat against the independent, however, it's the fact that audiences aren't going to look for small films with nobody in them that aren't being advertised. Even though today's technology has made it easier and easier to make a film and there are more varied possibilities than ever before for some kind of legitimate distribution, without the money to market your film or ensure some kind of preferential placement at a retailer the true enemy is obscurity.

 

It hasn't always been that way. Back in the '80s and most of the '90s if you did manage to get your movie nobody had ever heard of into a major retailer the browsing scenario for VHS and laserdisc was more sympathetic. All you needed was a good cover. Many an awful movie was bought or rented based on having a great cover.

 

Now think of how sterile and tedious it is browsing the DVD/BD section of a major retailer. Or video rental stor...oops, they've gone the way of the dinosaur, now it's little red booths and horribly designed online browsers, many of which don't even display all available titles for a given category.

Edited April 25, 2014 by Sean Cunningham

[George Ebersole]

All of us in the industry should just stay silent on the bootlegging problem, then it will just magically float away.

 

As I keep trying to emphasize, 98% of the people on this board work on direct to DVD or TV movies. Very few are working on movies that receive a 2500 screen theatrical release. It's the first category of movies that are getting hit the hardest by bootlegging and that is definitely having an impact on job opportunities for everyone involved.

 

R,

 

Just an FYI, I've tried several time to report illegal uploads of films on Youtube from some user. But apparently the only people allowed to file a complaint are the owners of the property.

 

And that's just Youtube by itself. How many sites are there that have illegal fresh digital streams of films just released on DVD?

 

The other thing about Youtube is that if the movie itself isn't there, then it's usually a link for a pirate site that promises to have the film. Apparently you can't report those either.

 

Ergo, to me at least, part of the problem is an inability to report the crime as it is happening. It's like seeing your neighbors truck get stolen out of his driveway, but then having the police tell you that only your neighbor can call them to enforce the law.

 

Just my $.02

[Guest]

 

Just an FYI, I've tried several time to report illegal uploads of films on Youtube from some user. But apparently the only people allowed to file a complaint are the owners of the property.

 

Yes, and even then it's a massive fight. I have had them take down a full French upload of my movie plus two English language sections. In each case what I get back from them is emails saying, "we don't believe you're the content owner we need more and more proof." Finally after many emails back and forth they pull down the content.

 

What is insanely annoying is that they let ANYONE upload anything without question. Then when a copyright holder tries to get the content taken down, they act like you're the criminal. Excuse me but the guy who uploaded it in the first place is the criminal! They also do not delete the accounts of the uploaders after they remove the content. They can just continue on their merry way. ebay is exactly the same! ebay is making un-told sums of money by allowing bootlegged DVDs to be sold on ebay, so why on earth would they pull the auctions down. ebay is very much complicit in selling stolen and pirated merchandise, I'm amazed they they are allowed to continue. You should see the emails I've had back and forth with them.

 

I will certainly be cheering the day Youtube loses a massive copyright infringement case and has to fork over millions. It will be the least they deserve.

 

R,

[George Ebersole]

In Youtube's defense I have seen a number of accounts closed for multiple copyright violations. But that's just an account. All you need is a hotmail addy, and you're back in business.

 

There is an element of "inmates running the asylum" here with a lack of policing.