I'm a person who likes these sort of movies... sad but moving 'art movies' that normally are at a festival and then they go to a small art house theater and disappear.
Toronto Film Festival is one of those festivals where there are 400 movies, and unless you have a distributor who is super confident and puts a lot of money into it, sometimes movies can go unwatched or unnoticed.
We're playing all these weird festivals, usually outdoors.
I'd made this film called 'This Little Life,' and it went round the fests and won awards and did well.
Tyrone, I think they're taking to festivals. I don't know which festivals it will be at. It's like a buddy picture. It's a couple of guys driving across the country and they get to a small town and they hit a guy. The guy turns out to be a drug smuggler.
Unlike with any other art form, filmmakers have this unique web of festivals. There are hundreds. It is a democratic system in which you submit films, and if they are good enough, they play. The only barrier to entry is the submission fee.
Every summer, around late July and into August, I find myself in Europe, performing at any festival that will have me.
The irony of a director going to film festivals is you never get to see any of the films.
Getting into Sundance is such a big platform for a director.
Then I did The Tao of Steve and that was at Sundance in 2000 where it did really well.
I think Cannes is usually pretty fair in choosing what will play well to the home festival crowd.
I'll just say it: I love Sundance; my very first film won Sundance.
The films that are coming out of SXSW are incredible, and they should get the same bids that films at Sundance are getting.
In starting to learn about film festivals and what were good ones - 'cause there are five billion of them - it was just a really good East Coast festival. And I thought this little movie was an East Coast film.
When most kids were doing summer camp, I was doing the Arkansas festival circuit, passing out push cards, and shaking hands and tagging along with my dad to every nook and cranny in the state of Arkansas.
Film festivals give less of a platform to mainstream films because they already have a market.
I always tell young filmmakers, don't go make a feature. Make a short. When you're ready to make a feature, people will tell you. Your friends will tell you. Your fans will tell you. Festivals will tell you. Listen to your audience.
I have seen many festival films and I will be blunt, I don't think 'Madras Cafe' was ready for festivals.
My first film festival and my first film that I've ever been in, 'Martha Marcy May Marlene,' that was at Sundance.
If you get to bring a little movie on the festival circuit, it's a nice experience because you get to see it with an audience. People who go to festivals to watch films are usually a little more eager to enjoy them. It's exciting because it's like you're going to the film's opening night at every festival.
I remember when I was like 19 years old and I started a desk calendar company to pay for my first short film, just so I could say one day that my daddy didn't pay for my first short film. And I really established myself in the film festival world.
I really love the festival circuit.
The bigger your songs get, the bigger the festivals you play at will be, until you make it to Ultra. It happened super quick for me. I'm still in shock, actually. I have to pinch myself a lot.
I've had something like seven films at Sundance, one of which won the Grand Jury Prize.
For any filmmaker who has just released a film and who is experiencing some measure of success, the temptation can be great to respond to every screening request that comes in.
