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BONUS EPISODE: The Ultimate Guide to Getting Money for Your Movie with Franco Sama · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Indie Film Muscle Podcast, Episode number two
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: O two. Only I can change my life, No one
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: can do it for me. Carol Burnett.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: Film Hustle Podcast, where we show you how to survive
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: the film biz.
• 0:20
  Speaker 3: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Indie Film Hustler, to another episode of the
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Indie Film Muscle podcast. I am here humble host Alex Ferrari.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Today's show is sponsored by Video Blocks. Now, guys, when
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: I was shooting my show for Legendary Pictures, and I
• 0:36
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• 1:13
  Speaker 1: is something you really need. So just head over to
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  Speaker 1: video blocks dot com, Forward slash Hustle, and today's show
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: is also sponsored by Masterclass and specifically the new Directing
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Masterclass by OSCAR winning director Ron Howard. Ron Howard has
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: grossed over one point nine billion dollars at the box
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: office and has made OSCAR winning movies like The Da
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: Vinci Code, Cinderellaman, Apollo Thirteen, and The Beautiful Mind, just
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: to name a few. And his master Class, which I've
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: been able to watch already and take was amazing. It
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: was just so insightful and it's a must for any
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: film director or any filmmaker who wants to direct. The
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: knowledge bombs that he drops are amazing. So just head
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: over to any film muscle dot com forward slash Ron Howard. So, guys,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: I want to ask you a question. Who here listening
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: today is looking for money for their next film, their
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: next short, their next TV series or whatever. Who here
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: wants money for their film projects? Please? I'll wait. Yeah,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: I thought so everybody, And it is something that all
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: of us struggle with and really there's a mystery, almost
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: almost a mythological mystery on how to you know, approach
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: people to get money, how to package projects, how to
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: put things together to get to get financing, to get money,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: and what is viably what is financially viable as a project.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: Sometimes filmmakers don't understand that their their passion project is
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: just maybe not investible in you know, it's just something
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: that's not going to return money at a higher budget range.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: And would you rather get that information at the beginning
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: of your quest to get the money for this project
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: or at the end of it. And I really wanted
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: to kind of pull back the curtain on this mystery
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: and talk to someone who really knows about how to
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: get money for your films. And today's guest is that person.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: Today's guest is Franco Sama. He is an executive producer.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: He is the man who you pitch to if you
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: want to get money. Now. He finds money, He has
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: relationships with investors, and he's the guy who connects everything.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: He's the guy who packages projects together with the filmmaker
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: to try to get money for their projects. And he
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: has worked on many feature films as an executive producer
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: and Franco's one of those guys who you know, literally
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: came up from the streets, if you will. He hustled
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: his way into the business, and he's an amazing guy.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: And I really learned, personally learned so much from talking
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: to Franco. And this episode is just a wealth of
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: information on how to get money for your film. It
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: is how to do it right, how not to do
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: it right, how to package a project, what needs to
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: be in place to go after money. We discuss the
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: one thing that all filmmakers need in order to receive
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: money for their movie, and we talk about it in
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: this episode. So I'm not gonna talk anymore. I really
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: think you guys are gonna get just a lot of
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: information out of this. So get a notepad ready, get
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: your iPad ready, take some notes because you're gonna probably
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: listen to this episode multiple times. And please, please, for
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: God's sake, share this episode with anybody and everybody you
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: know in the film industry who is actively looking for
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: money or going to be looking for money for a
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: feature film, a series, any kind of content that they're
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: going to be creating and looking for money for. Please
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: share this episode. Tell people about it because I want
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: this information out there, and Franco was so generous with
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: his time and knowledge and experience. So, without any further ado,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: here is my conversation with Franco Sama. I'd like to
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: welcome the show. Franco Sama from Samaco Films. Thank you
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: so much for being on the show. Franco.
• 5:14
  Speaker 3: Oh, thank you, Alex. It's a pleasure.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: So how did you break into this crazy business?
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: Uh?
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: Well, it's interesting because I started off. I moved here
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: from Boston in nineteen ninety seven and I was a
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: little over the hill at the time to be to
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: be starting off, you know, I was forty years old
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: competing with you know, people half my age, you know,
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: and the difference was I didn't have any experience and
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: they did. So so anyway, I started off as a publicist.
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: My strategy was if I could get in front of
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: the right people on the red carpets and kind of meet,
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: you know, mingle, that my help and it actually worked.
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: My first three gigs out of the gate were in order,
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: Francis Ford Coppola, Will Smith and and then Gary Olben.
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: So I really had.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: So you just worked as a publicist and then you
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: just met them on the red carpet and connected.
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: I worked as a publish for a for a celebrity photographer,
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: and so my job was to as a publicist, was
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: to kind of book the gigs and get the magazine
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: you know, various magazines to to hire him to do
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: you know, specific pieces on on on celebrities, and those
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: were the first three that we started off with. So
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: really my plans sort of worked, you know, because they
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: put me out in front very very quickly. I had
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: only been here for two months and I'm rubbing elbows
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: with some of the you know, a list stars in
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: Hollywood that said, you know, after a couple of years
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: of that, which was fun, it was great, and it
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: was great experience, but I wasn't really getting you know,
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: what I came here for, which was to promote my
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: own career. So I started my first production company in
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: two thousand and five with a business partner, and you know,
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: we didn't know what we were doing. We just kind
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: of broke out and started figuring, uh, figuring out, well,
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: maybe the best way to do this is to We
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: didn't have any of the criteria that some potential investors
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: were requiring for our films, and we had the investors
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: but we just didn't have the stuff that they needed.
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: So what we got on IMDb and we started searching
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: out for producers that had the stuff that we didn't have,
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: and we basically acted as matchmakers and put the investors
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: together with the producers and watched them all do their
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: their magic together. And the only thing we asked for
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: in return was some money and some credits and the experience.
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: And after five or six of those, we were like, Okay,
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: we get this. We can do this ourselves. And before
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: you know, before I knew it, I was I was
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: doing it on my own.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Very cool. So you're so you acted more as an
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: executive producer.
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: Yes, I do. I do. Even now. It's kind of
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: in my blood, you know. I've always been a business
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: oriented person in my whole life. I love business and
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: I love the business of the movie business. So I
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: do spend most of it. I do produce films. I
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: love that, enjoy it. I don't spend a lot of
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: time on set. Most of my time is spent putting, financing, distribution, talent,
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: you know, packaging, that kind of thing.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: So it is it is an art form what you do.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: You are one of those one of those you know
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: magicians behind the curtain that a lot of filmmakers and
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: a lot of people don't understand what they do when
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: they see that name fly up on a credit on
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: a screen. They really don't get what an executive producer
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: does because they're very integral. Without them, they really can't
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: make a movie.
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: Sometimes, well, yeah, I think, so I do. I have
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: this thing I say that, you know, executive producers is
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: code for money, right, yes, yes, yes. When people email
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: me and they call them and they go, Hi, I'm
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: looking for an executive producer, you can scratch that word
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: out and put in the word money, and then you
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: get the same thing. So so so. But yeah, there
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: is an art form to it, you know. I'm reminded
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: of a day, many many years ago. I walked into
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: some agent's office on a whim I was trying. I
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: was actually back in the days where I was talking
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: about with the photographer, and I heard him on the
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: phone packaging a new deal. It was one of the
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: most exciting things I'd ever heard, and it was just
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: I happened to be overhearing him because I was sitting
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: in his office while he was taking the call, and
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: I thought, I don't know what that guy's doing. But
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: whatever it is, I want it. I want to be
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: a part of that. I want to do that every
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: day in my life. It just I connected with it
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: on on so many different levels. So yeah, it really,
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: you know, became then a question of learning how to
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: do that, how do you put all those pieces together?
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: And a lot of it, unfortunately, is trial and error.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: You know, yes, you don't. You don't know. There's no
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: there's no school. I mean, there's no school you can
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: go to learn this kind of stuff. I teach it.
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: Now we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
• 10:10
  Speaker 3: But prior to that, you know, I mean even in
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: film school, they don't teach you that kind of stuff.
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: No, they don't. And it's and it is not only
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: an art form, but I mean it's a lot of filmmakers,
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: especially like the people listening under this podcast, a lot
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: of times they don't understand that it is about it's
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: a business. And a friend of mine, Suzanne Lyons, always
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: says the word show and there's a word business, and
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: the word business has twice as many letters as the
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: word show.
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: Well I agree with her, and actually know Suzanne, I
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: see her out a lot on the circuit because we're
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: in the same circles a lot in panels and stuff.
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: And my catchphrase in that regard is, and I say
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: this at the beginning every time I speak it, is
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: when it comes to these movies, and I think this
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: is very important, particularly for first and second time filmmakers.
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: My catchphrase is getting the money isn't the hard part.
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: Getting the money back is the hard.
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: That's actually a great say, right.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: And that really is true. I mean in the world
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: that I live in. You know, I got a million
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: people coming to me every day. I'm going to probably
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: have one hundred of them today at the summit, right,
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: the US China Summit Film Summit today at the Academy
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: of Arts and Sciences. And you know, people come up
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: to me all the time, Oh, you're an executive producer,
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: particularly when they see that on the business card and
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: they go, will you read my script? That's the first thing.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: H jeez, your poor man.
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and and and and unfortunately, you know, and again,
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: not to be smogger any the answer is always emphatically, no,
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to read a script because that's not
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: what we're looking for in the world that I operate in.
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: We're not looking for scripts. We got a million scripts.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: There's good scripts out there. What we're looking for is opportunities,
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: investment opportunities. Investors aren't looking to invest in one hundred
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: pieces of paper with words on them. They don't understand
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: that it does not compute. And what I try to
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: explain these filmmakers, which is why I do my best
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: to try to educate them, even if I have to
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: do it myself, is to say, listen, you have to
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: You can't expect them to understand your language. They're not
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: going to understand the language of the antagonists and the protagonist.
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: They're not going to understand the difference between your ending
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: and your alternate ending. They're not even going to read
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: your scripts. As an investor, what they're interested in is
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: how much money do you need? How much am I
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: going to get back? And when am I going to
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: get it? And those are the answers that I have
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: to address on a daily basis.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: And that is determined by many factors which we'll get
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: into as we continue our in because that is a
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: lot of different moving parts to get that money back.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: And I say it all the time, it's like you know,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: if you make a if you make a movie for
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: one hundred thousand dollars, to make one hundred thousand dollars
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: back is difficult, depending obviously on the cast and the genre.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: But it's a difficult thing. That's why. What's the percentage
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: of films that that actually make money in the in
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: the independent world. It's a small percentage.
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: Well it is a small person. You know, there's there's
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: a lot of different varying degrees in any and again,
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: even to what you just said, my response is this,
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: you know, it's not about making one hundred thousand back,
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: it's about making two.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Hundred thousand, right.
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: So now, I mean, you know, getting the money back
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: is great. You know it's better than not write because
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: I in fact, you know, I've coined you know the
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: term ROI, right, term return on investment. Well, I've recoined
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: that phrase as ROI, return of investment, right because in
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: my world, as long as the investors don't lose them. Right. So,
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: somebody gives me a million bucks for a movie and
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: I only had king him back three hundred fifty thousand,
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: I'm in trouble sure, right, And if it happens to
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: be my first time then how am I going to go, ever,
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: get out of that hole to be out raising money
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: on my second movie when I'm still in the whole
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: three hundred three quarters of a million dollars on my
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: first one. So the trick gets to do it right
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: the first time, and a lot of the times, what
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: that means is slowing the process down, managing your expectations,
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: and you know, giving yourself an opportunity to build and
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: to grow your career like I did. You know, I
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: started off making these really low budget and this was
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: fifteen years ago, really low budget horror movies. But I
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: did like five or six of them in a row
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: before I ever even attempted to make any kind of
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: a genre film. By the time I made my genre film,
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: I had so much experience and I had done so
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: many things wrong. I had made so many mistakes that
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: this was my opportunity to career to right those wrongs,
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: and I was able to do that. We made a
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: great movie. David Arquette, Vivoca Fox came on board for
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: that particular film, and we did it, and we did
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: it right, and then then we were able to sort
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: of set the president for ourselves to say, okay, now,
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: we go from this, you know, seven hundred thousand dollars
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: movie to one point two, and then in the next
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: movie we'll go to one point eight. And that's how
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: we graduate up to the kinds of films I'm making
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: now a right, And that's the thing.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: A lot of filmmakers don't want to hear it. They
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: don't want to hear that's going to take work and
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: time in years to do because it is Nope.
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: They don't want to put the time in. They want
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: they literally, I'm telling you, this happens to me all
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: the time. They walk into my office, they hand me
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: a script and they're waiting for me to write a check.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: You gotta be kidding me, Are you serious?
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: I like to say I was kidding, but I'm not
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: now I'm not saying that happens all the time. Happens
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: way more often than it needs to. And this is
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: the reason why I think people, this is why I
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: do shows like this, because you know, for me, it's
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: about really getting people to understand how this thing works
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: and the reality of it, not the fantasy of it.
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: The fantasy of it is. I'm gonna write a script,
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: I'm going to show up at some festival or some
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: kind of something, and I'm when I walk around AFM
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: and somebody's gonna discover me and they're going to think
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: I have the greatest script ever, and they're gonna and
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: they're gonna go give me the money. Right, They're not
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: gonna go make it. They're gonna give me the money
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: and trust me to go make it, even though I've
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: never done this before. So that's just not reality.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: So it do do you think that has a little
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: bit to do with the the early nineties kind of
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: lottery ticket mentality that Sundance created with the El Martiachi's,
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: the reservoir Dogs, the clerks, the slacker that, you know,
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: all these kind of movies just showed up. And you know,
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: at the time, the big man on campus, Harvey, it
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: was not so much anymore. You know, he just walked
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: in and would you know, give millions of dollars and
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, these careers were launched, and everyone thought,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: like that's the they We just wouldn't They only saw
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: the lottery ticket winners. They never saw the millions of
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: people who bought tickets and never won, do you.
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: Great, Yeah, And that's a grant analogy because that's exactly,
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: and I'm not saying that there was anything wrong with that.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: I think that those will I remember those days it
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: was that was fun and exciting and thrilling, and just
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: the just if you walked into that thing with the
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: realization that that there's a chance at that, I say,
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: you know, that's great, but don't don't have that be
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: your plan A.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: Right, That's right, That's that's so many plays.
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: And you can't do your plan at Your plan A
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: has to be a strategy and a structure and hard
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: work and dedication and commitment and sacrifice and loss. That's
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: your plan A. Your Plan B is somebody coming in
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: and ret us check. You know. So those those days
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: have have changed, but it goes to everything else too.
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: I mean, look, I you know everybody uses the same examples.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: I'm so if I hear one more person come to
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: me and say, well, look at Sylvester Stallone, Oh you're kidding,
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: Look at Matt and Ben Are you kidding me? I'm
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: not kidding. Or look at look at uh paranormal activity.
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: Blair Witch, Yeah, sure you know that today, even.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: Still today, when I get the pitch decks that they
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: said that Blair Witch is still on. This is like
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: thirty years ago and they're still using that as the
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: example of what this could be.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: Is the lottery ticket mentality?
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: Crazy talk.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: It's yeah, it's actually you know, we were pitching. We're
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: a friend of mine is putting together a pitch deck
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: right now for a project, and they were starting to
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: pull out some stuff. I'm like, guys, ten years, that's
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: the that's the don't go past ten years. Don't don't
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: go like, well, the matrix. I'm like, I don't want
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: to hear about the matrix.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: And don't compare of your seven hundred and fifty thousand
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: dollars budget film to one that was made for fifteen
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: point five million. Yeah, just you know, you can you
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: can do your comparables in terms of the genre or
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: the feel or the flavor of the movie, but you
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: can't compare the box office, right, you can't do it.
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: It doesn't make sense. Yeah, you know, the goal at
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: the beginning shouldn't be look, in my opinion, this is
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: just me and my experience and you know my take,
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: but the goal shouldn't be, you know, first time out,
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: big huge hit, five million dollar budget, first time director,
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: five thousand theaters, because you know, it just doesn't it
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: just doesn't make any sense. I'm not saying that that's
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: not a possibility, a remote possibility. But what I'm saying
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: is if you go into that first and second film
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: with the understanding that my only goal is to get
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: in there, make a great movie, something that people will
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: respond to, that the general public will respond to, that
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: investors and distributors will respond to, because that's the big
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: part of the business. Because if the distributors aren't buying,
• 19:23
  Speaker 3: you got nothing. So you can spend a million bucks
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: and still end up in the movie that nobody wants.
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: But at the end of the day, if you can
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: succeed on your first and or your second time by
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: getting a budget a low budget movie somewhere in that
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: like five hundred to maybe a million dollar range, and
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: you're or even a little bit lower to fifty three hundred,
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: and you're able to actually make a good movie that
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: gets distribution and returns money back to the investors and
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: make profit for the rest of the folks, like the
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: distributors and yourself as a filmmaker. If you can do that,
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: I don't care if your movie is two hundred and
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: fifty three h one thousand dollars.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: Now you've got your first building block, you've earned your stripes,
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: and it's time to move on to the next level.
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: Do you did you ever see I'm assuming you saw
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: the movie Dumb and Dummer years ago. Remember that moment
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: where Jim Carrey was trying to pick up that girl
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: and she's like, look, there's no chance for you to
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: you'll ever And he's like, so you're saying.
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: There's a chance.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: I think I think that's basically the mentality of filmmakers
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: that they go into like you have no chance of
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: winning Sun Dance and getting a you know that five
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: thousand you know, the theater run of your of your
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: twenty thousand dollars movie. You like, So you're saying, there's
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: a chick. Of course, there's a remote chance that win
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: the lottery tomorrow.
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: But any possible anything is possible, and you know, and
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: and and you know, and I and I look at
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: I look I look at like Elena dum for example,
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: is an example of that. Right. Sure, I'm not saying
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: that stuff doesn't happen.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: It does do Boss Brothers. Yeah, I got a bunch
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: of them.
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Look, and that doesn't mean that Lena Dunham didn't
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: pay her jus I don't know her story. But my
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: point is that, you know, sometimes you do hit it.
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: It just hits the right moment is the right time,
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: and that's great. But in the meantime, look, this is
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: what I say to my filmmakers. I go, I teach
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: these free classes, if you know that, but I teach
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: film finance class, and it's free because I want people
• 21:29
  Speaker 3: to be able to come and get this information. And
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: what I say to them is, look, there's usually eighty
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: one hundred people in the room, right, And I go, Look,
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: if you're here, there's only two categories for me. Either
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: you're here to make a movie to get a movie financed,
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: in which case I am not your guy, or you're
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: here to build a long term filmmaking career and play
• 21:52
  Speaker 3: the long game, in which case I'm the guy you
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: want to talk to. I'm all about playing the long game,
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: building relationships out, taking your time, having patients, having a strategy,
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: and making one move after the next after the next
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: to get to an ultimate goal. And instead of the
• 22:09
  Speaker 3: one the one off person who's coming up to me, going,
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: I want to make this movie. It's my passion. You know,
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: I understand passion projects, right, I have one. But at
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: the end of the day, this is what I say
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: to the first time erst. If somebody comes to me
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: with a three or five million dollar film that they
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: want to direct it, it's they a passion project and
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: they have to direct it. My response to that is,
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: that's great, except don't do that one first, right, do
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: that one fifth, or fourth or third, But go out
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: and make another movie, you know, on the lower end,
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: and cut your teeth and get your experience on set
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: and earn your keep and save that quote unquote pasion project.
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: If it's not, if you're that passionate about it, then
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: don't use it as your guinea pig. Save it for
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: a day when you have experience and you have some clout,
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: and you have investors behind you, and you have a
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: little bit of a track record distributors, that's when you
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: want to do that.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: That is some amazing advice. It's it's so true because
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: you see all these filmmakers and I've got I've worked
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: with them, and I've seen them, and they show up
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: and they like, look, this is my baby. I've been
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: working on this script for five years. I'm like, well,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: that's mistake number one. You shouldn't be working on a
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: script for five years. You should have at least five
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: scripts at least during that. Do you agree? You know,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: you can't. You can't put all your eggs in that
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: one basket. You kind of have to. It's you know,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: as a creative process. You know, Da Vinci didn't just
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: make the Mona Lisa and.
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: That was it.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, he had a lot of other art
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: projects going on at the same time. Now, how does
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: a filmmaker go about finding financing for their indie film?
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: How do you how do they approach it? Like can
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: you explain maybe a pitch deck, or like, I let's
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: say I have a movie, I have three movies. Let's
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: say I'm a little bit ahead. I have three scripts,
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: but I have no talent attached, I have nothing. What's
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: the steps that I have to go to try to
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: get any of these projects off the ground?
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: Okay, well, I guess the first place to start is
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: with your genre, right, because that happens to me a lot.
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: People will bring me three or four projects, say which
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: one do I do first. You know, one of the
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: questions I get a lot of people send to me
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: what kind of movies do you like to make? Well,
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: my stock response to that is I like to make
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: the kind of movies that sell. All right, So good
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: advice right now. That said, it's because there is a market.
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: You know, this is a business, and at the end
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: of the day, there are certain things that are going
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: to take a lot longer to get around to recouping
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: you know, investment than others. So there are certain genres
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: that sell right now, and thriller is among them, very
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: high up there. Any kind of a thriller, also action movies,
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: and believe it or not, family movies. Now I'm putting
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: park horror aside to the to the side, because to me,
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: that's like a separate entity all of its own, you know.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: So I'm talking about just in terms of the genre base.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: But at that point, the first thing you need to
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: do is be organized about your approach. I mean, I
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: can't tell you how many people come to me and say,
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: I'll say to them, well, what's your budget, and they
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: they literally throw a number out out of the air.
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: They're like, oh, I can make this for one point five.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: Oh really, no budget, no schedule, no breakdown.
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: Nothing right, Right, So I'll trick them and I'll go, oh,
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: your budgets one point five and they go yeah. I go, okay,
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: can you mean favor and eat? Email that to me.
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: I want to take a look at your budget. And
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: they're like, well, I don't actually have a budget or
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: schedule or schedule. And I'm like, well, then, how do
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: you how do you know? How do you know? How? How?
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: And you're actively out there right now trying to raise
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: money for a movie when you don't even know how
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: much you needed, right.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: It's the only business in the world that does that.
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: It really is. It absolutely blows my mind how this
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: can be the case because it and it happens more
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: often than you believe. Most people won't even admit that
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: they don't have a budget. And one of the biggest
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: problems with filmmakers, and I think this is an important
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: point because this affects all of us, by the way,
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: but what I'm about to say has a domino effect
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: and a dramatic impact on us as an industry, as
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: a community of filmmakers, is that if you've got people
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: going out there that are making the rounds trying to
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: raise money prematurely, which is the majority of these people
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: out there trying to raise money when they're not ready.
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: They do not have the right to be knocking on
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: investors' doors. I'm not talking about my investors or your investors.
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: I'm talking about their own investors. They should not be
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: doing it. It's different if they're going off for our
• 27:06
  Speaker 3: friends and family round and they want to raise twenty
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: thirty thousand dollars to make a short film. But if
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: they're out legitimately trying to make a feature film that's
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: going to potentially pick get picked up and get distribution
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: and maybe even someday go to theaters, they have a
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: responsibility to do it right. And running around with the
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: script and saying can I have a million dollars please?
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: Is insane. It makes no sense, and it reflects poorly
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: on everybody else that's out there busting their butts trying
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: to do it right. So you've got to have a
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: plant for me. It's development, development, development. You've got to
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: go through the development phases. And not only do you
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: have to have a budget in this schedule, because all
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: that's going to do is tell you how much it's
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: going to cost to make, but you better have some
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: kind of projections or evaluations in the in the world,
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: you know, and how do you get those?
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: By the way, So some people understand.
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: That's a tough one, I will admit because that's easier
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: said and done. When I was starting out, you could
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: just walk into any distributor at the AFM, or you
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: can in anybody's office and PLoP down a script and say, hey,
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: this is my cast list. Can you run some numbers
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: on me? If people would be more than happy to
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: do it. Uh, that's changed dramatically over the last five
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: or six years. And part of the reason it's changed
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: is because what was happening was the filmmakers were going
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: in and getting these numbers from these distributors, and then
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: once they raised the money somehow, they would they wouldn't
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: come back, right, They'd go somewhere else to do their deal.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: And now these these distributors felt used in abuse because
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: they were being used for their for their projections and
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: then not being able to cash in on the business,
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: so they just basically stopped. So that does that's a
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: little tougher. I do have my own exclusive deal with
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: distributors to be able to provide those, although there's a
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: cost to it, but I'd rather pay for them and
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: have them be accurate. Because the other thing that you
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: want to be careful of is there's a lot of
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: companies and websites and all the internet now where you
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: can get quote unquote algorithms right right, which look, I
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: get it's the age of technology, and I'm an old
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: fashioned guy, but at the end of the day, an
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: algorithm isn't going to give you the real numbers. What
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: we do when we go out for our sales numbers,
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: I have a team of people who pick up the
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: phone and actually call buyers around the world and talk
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: about specifically your film at your genre level, with your
• 29:44
  Speaker 3: director choices, your actor choices, and we collect data and
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: we start off with a minimum guarantee from a big
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: domestic company whose name I can't mention, and then we
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: work off of that and actually pick up one. So
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: for us doing established establishing valuations for a film takes weeks.
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: and now back to the show. Now, can you explain
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: a little bit about what you're so when you're getting
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: those evaluations that's based on genre, that has nothing to
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: do with the creative. This is strictly on genre, director,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: and cast.
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: There's yeah, there's four well, there's four categories. There's there's
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: budget or budget range called budget range, director, cast, and genre. Yeah,
• 30:39
  Speaker 3: those are the four things. And you're absolutely right. Actual,
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: that's like the point I'm trying to make here is
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: that none of this has anything to do with your story.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: It's as rough as that sounds.
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: It's when you're at when you're at that level, which
• 30:53
  Speaker 3: is where I'm at, like daily in conversation, nobody at
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: that point when not maybe just discussing that this is
• 31:01
  Speaker 3: a mathematical equation that has to be solved. I have
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: a movie that's going to spend one point five and
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: I need to get back a minimum of three to
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: break even. And so what I'm looking for from my
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: sales estimates are three numbers, usually the low, a medium,
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: and a high, and that if of my personal rule
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: of thumb is that my low should be two times budget.
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: So if I'm going to spend a million five on
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: a film, I need to know that at the worst
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: case scenario, I can bring in three million in the
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: low column around the world. If I were to sell
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: the rights to my film to all of the territories
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: in the world and concluding the United States. So if
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: my low is three and my medium is four, and
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: my high as five, then I know I'm safe. That's
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: the only time I am then willing to put myself
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: in front of an investor and go, look, the this
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: is not a promise, there's no guarantee. But based on
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: our research, extensive valid, accurate research, based on this particular
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: the criteria of this film, these are our projections. And
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: then I'm entitled to ask that investor to write me
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: a check for one point five million dollars. And only then,
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: and when you think about going to that extent. Now,
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: of course you can have a presentation deck, but the
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: pitch teck is just designed to peak their interest. The
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: pitch deeck shouldn't be designed to, in my opinion, to
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: convince somebody to write me a check for a million
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: five All that should be is say, oh, this is interesting.
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: I like the idea, I like the people, I like
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: the concept. Let me sit down with these people and
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: find out what the skinny is. And now you start
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: presenting empirical data that shows an investor why this is
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: a good investment. And it can't just be because I'm
• 32:51
  Speaker 3: gonna win an Oscar someday and this is my first script.
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: That can't be the reason.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: I laugh because I've heard that story too many times.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: This is gonna win an Oscar, or this is gonna
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: win Sundance, and it's gonna be good. We're all gonna
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: make millions of dollars.
• 33:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't, but I don't have a budget or
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: a schedule yet. I'll let you know what I do
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: so or cast or cast well, I mean cast. I
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: understand that's gonna take some time. But my point is
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: you have to take the steps. You just have to,
• 33:22
  Speaker 3: and you know, it's just it's gonna work against you,
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: and it's gonna and you know, and to your point earlier,
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: I got people that literally come back to me five
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: years later with the same project, right, and they're like
• 33:34
  Speaker 3: they've been through it all. They're like, okay, Franko, you know,
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: can we is there anything? And I'm like, well, what's changed? Like,
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: do you have any money in the bank, have you
• 33:42
  Speaker 3: attached any talent? You know, have you done this? Have
• 33:45
  Speaker 3: you done that? No? No, no, no, no, Well then
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: you're exactly where you were five years ago, and those
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: are the same people back to what you mentioned before,
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: that don't have any other projects. This is their film.
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: This is the one that they've been fighting for for
• 33:57
  Speaker 3: five years, which is great. I'm I'm all for fight
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: mm hmm. But don't just sit around with that one film,
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: you know, and not have any other options to present.
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: Uh, can you do me a favor? Can you turn
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: off your or close out your mail program my mail? Yeah,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: because a hepa a ding, so it looks like emails
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: coming in.
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: Okay that, yeah, you're right, let me do that.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: I'll edit this part out. No words, no words, No,
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: this is great. This is great.
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: That should that should have done it? All right? Great?
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: So with all the with all that you were talking
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: about selling overseas and selling different territories, how does the
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: new digital landscape play into all of your distribution plans
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: like the Netflix and the iTunes and the t V
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: O D and the s vo D. How does that
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: work now comparatively to just like five years ago, which
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: that really didn't exist in the same way.
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's essentially taken over, you know, which
• 34:57
  Speaker 3: isn't isn't a bad thing. It Look this, if you're
• 35:01
  Speaker 3: going to survive. I've been doing this for twenty years.
• 35:04
  Speaker 3: You're going to survive in this business, you have to
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: be willing to kind of, you know, move along with
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: the technology and go with the advancements. I mean, I
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: remember back when DVDs was the way we made our living.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: Oh god, it was so much money back then.
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: So much money. But you know, those days are over,
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: and that was a big shift to have to make.
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: And back in those days, when you went to a distributor,
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: there was no such thing as anything other than them
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: having the whole world to sell, right, So they had
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: the international and the domestic, and there was no distinction
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: in domestic within the domestic between theatrical or VOD or
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: digital because there was no such thing, like you said,
• 35:50
  Speaker 3: so there was no distinction. It was all one thing.
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: And then there was a moment I remember when some
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: of these companies started popping up, and there were some
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: of them are very good at it, that decided, oh, well,
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: we're good at digital, so let's just just your digital
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: mm hmmm. So now you're separating your rights three ways. Right.
• 36:09
  Speaker 3: You might have an international company for your foreign sales,
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: you have a domestic company for your domestic sales, and
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: then you separate again out yet one more time for
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: the for the for the digital. Now hopefully your domestic
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: people have a good enough relationship on that on those
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: platforms like we do, where you can kind of keep
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: you know, keep those things together. And but again, it's
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: so complex, and it goes back to what we're talking
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: about throughout this whole interview is that, you know, people
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: think it's so easy. They literally say to me, oh,
• 36:41
  Speaker 3: I'm going to bring this to Netflix right right, First
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: of all, you have to make it before you bring
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: it in.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a perfect Netflix movie. Do you have
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: a budget?
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: Well? No, do you know you got? You got to
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: make it first, and look and look, I'm gonna go
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: back to even even more basic, is that when I
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: talk about these films, you know, I'm hard on a
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: lot of these first and second timers because I want
• 37:06
  Speaker 3: to help them. I'm not trying to embarrass them. I'm
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: not trying to make them feel foolish. I'm trying to
• 37:11
  Speaker 3: educate them and say, listen, guys, if you want to
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: fast track this thing, then you've got to pay attention.
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: You got to pay attention what's happening in this industry?
• 37:19
  Speaker 3: And when you make a film, there are three films
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: you make. It's the one that you write, and the
• 37:25
  Speaker 3: one that you shoot, and then the one that you edit.
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: And at the end of the day, it's up to
• 37:29
  Speaker 3: you as the filmmaker to deliver the good film that
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: we're all expecting here. So I don't care how great
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: your script is, and I don't care how amazing your
• 37:40
  Speaker 3: shoot was. If you get into the editing room and
• 37:42
  Speaker 3: you botch this thing up and it turns out to
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: be a piece of crap movie, which it can't happen,
• 37:47
  Speaker 3: and it has happened to me. I've had that happen
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: to me, where everything went great, but then the final
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: cut was just a disaster, and we had to keep
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: recutting it and recutting it to the point where we
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: cut it so bad that it came a loss. We
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: just couldn't get We just couldn't keep up with it.
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: So whatever you're out there, oh sorry about that, I
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: don't That's all right, We'll keep on all right. Whatever
• 38:12
  Speaker 3: you're out there, you know, promising that you're going to deliver,
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: you actually have to deliver, because otherwise, not only do
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: you run into the problem or potentially losing money for
• 38:23
  Speaker 3: your investors, but you could end up in a position
• 38:26
  Speaker 3: where you know you're going to have a hard time
• 38:29
  Speaker 3: getting a job.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: So, Franko, there's a big myth out there that I
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: hear a lot of, and I want you to see
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: if you can clarify this for me. A lot of
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: times filmmakers are like, oh, you know, we're trying to
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: get money, but they always told us. They always tell
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: us that if you have some money first, even if
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: it's a little bit, it helps. So if I'm looking
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: for a three hundred thousand dollars budget and I have
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: fifty grand in the bank that I raised with friends
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: and family, is it easier to get the gap financing
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: or for the rest of the money to show.
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: Up one hundred percent? Yes, So let's talk about that,
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: because that's another one of my little peeves. Right. Yeah, again, Look,
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: because because it is it is what it is, and
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: and and and and if you if you're going to
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: play the game, then you have to play by the
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: roles and and you can't make up your own as
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: you go along. Right, So the reality is absolutely not
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: only is it a good idea, it's a requirement if
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: you don't have at least thirty percent of your budget
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: on your own, then where is your skin in the game.
• 39:36
  Speaker 3: That's my question. This is your project, it's your you know,
• 39:40
  Speaker 3: life livelihood, it's your creation, and maybe you might even
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: be the director. So you cannot expect somebody to come
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: in and take one hundred percent of the risk on
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: your dream. Right. So if I'm going to go out
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: and raise three hundred thoughts, if I need three hundred thousand,
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: absolutely if you that's actually my structure.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: Will be right back after a word from our sponsor.
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: And now back to the show.
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: People who work and do films with me and through
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: me are required to bring in thirty percent. Now let
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: me explain that they don't have to go out and
• 40:23
  Speaker 3: get somebody to write a check for thirty percent. I
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: will help them. That's my skill set, right. So your
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: skill set might be creative, writing, directing, that's not my
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: skill set. My skill set is financing money, distribution and
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: closing investors. That's my skill set. So you do your job,
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: I'll do mine. But your job, as the filmmaker or
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: the rights holder of a project is to identify and
• 40:50
  Speaker 3: qualify a potential investor who could put up thirty percent.
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: So if you have that person, all you need to
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: do is set up a meeting or a Skype call
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: with me and you and that person, and I will
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: I will give them the information required for them to
• 41:06
  Speaker 3: make a sound decision about whether or not they should
• 41:08
  Speaker 3: put one hundred thousand dollars into your production account and
• 41:12
  Speaker 3: start the ball rolling. And then once they do that,
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: I can take it from there. I'll help you raise
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: I will raise the Adler two hundred thousand for you. Right,
• 41:23
  Speaker 3: that's part of my job. That's part of my function.
• 41:26
  Speaker 3: But I can't start from zero with just a script,
• 41:29
  Speaker 3: even if you have a great package, even if you've
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: done the development properly. You know, you know, I have
• 41:34
  Speaker 3: a lot of rules of thumb. One of them is
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: and again this depends on the budget, because most of
• 41:39
  Speaker 3: these budgets that I work with are like a million
• 41:41
  Speaker 3: to three million, right, So in that when you're in
• 41:43
  Speaker 3: that world, you should expect to spend at least twenty
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: five thousand dollars in development money. Okay, that should be
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: the first thing they're out looking for, is where am
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: I and a lot of people doing Kickstarter and all
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: that other stuff. Well, just great, there's a million ways
• 41:56
  Speaker 3: you can. You can find that money. But if you're committed,
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: you'll find a way to get that twenty five thousand dollars.
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: Twenty five thousand dollars put you in a position to
• 42:06
  Speaker 3: properly develop the film and do the things we talked about,
• 42:09
  Speaker 3: like a budget and a schedule and hiring a casting
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: director and bringing in an attorney, right, and all of
• 42:15
  Speaker 3: the getting an LLC and all of the things that
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: you need to do to make this thing real for investors.
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: That's you're comparing that to walking around with the script
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: and saying, give me a million dollars, or here's my
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: business here's my LLC, he's my business plan, here's my
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: bank account. And by the way, I got thirty percent
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: of that money in the account. Mister investor, would you
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: like to talk right, And.
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: Let's not forget the product placement memorandum as well.
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: You need the PPM.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the PPM isn't that needed as well?
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: Not really, I don't. I don't use them.
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: Oh, good, good to know. Yeah, i've heard, I've heard. Yeah,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: but the LLC is something very important as well as.
• 42:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you need an LLC because you need a bank
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: account to get this to accept this money. Yeah, Because
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: here's the other thing. I will literally say again in
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: the class, how many of you, how many of you
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: guys are actively raising money for your features in like
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: you know, seventeen or twenty hands will go up, and
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: I'll say, okay, so, how many of you actually have
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: an LLC in the name of the movie. Now I'm
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: not talking about in the name of your production company
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: you or with right, but if you have a movie,
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: you should have an LLC set up in the name
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: of that movie. And then once you have at LLC,
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: you need to set up a bank account. Because and
• 43:30
  Speaker 3: when I asked that question, out of the eighteen people
• 43:32
  Speaker 3: who might have raised the hand, only two of them
• 43:34
  Speaker 3: still have to hand them right, which means I'm saying
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: to them, okay, So if you're out raising money right now,
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: when you came to me after the class and you
• 43:43
  Speaker 3: asked me to write you a check for one hundred
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: and fifty K, and I said, yes, who will I
• 43:46
  Speaker 3: make the checkout to? Jesus, I'm not going to make
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: it out to you because I'm not investing in you.
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to make it out to your production
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: company because that's not who I'm investing in either I'm
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: investing in your movie and you don't have any place
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: for me to put my money, and you're wondering why
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: you can't raise any because you haven't even get the
• 44:08
  Speaker 3: universe do you haven't provided a place within the universe
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: to receive this money.
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: It's so basic and logical that it's scary. But there's
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: also that. But there's also when you create an LLC,
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: it's like, oh wow, this is starting to get And
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: I know how filmmakers think because I'm a filmmaker and
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: I've worked with so many that they think, Wait, if
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: I open up at LLC, now I have to do taxes,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: and if you open one up in California, for God's sakes,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: it's eight hundred dollars and I have to put an
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: investment in.
• 44:37
  Speaker 3: Guess what else you can do the exact same thing
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: for fifty bucks. Wanting to tell you how, please do
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: the exact same thing for fifty bucks. Tell me you
• 44:45
  Speaker 3: get out of this county clerk's office in LA one
• 44:49
  Speaker 3: at the courthouse and one in I don't know, there's
• 44:52
  Speaker 3: two clerk houses in Los Angeles. If you live here
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: and you open up a DBA for twenty five dollars
• 44:59
  Speaker 3: in the of the movie, and you walk out of
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: the and I've done this a dozen times. You literally
• 45:05
  Speaker 3: walk out of that office at eleven o'clock in the
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: morning with a stamp, you know, form that they hand you,
• 45:10
  Speaker 3: and you by noon you're at your bank opening up
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: a bank account in the name of the movie under
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: a DBA. Doing business jazz.
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but that DBA would open up that DBA is
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: based off of your existing company.
• 45:24
  Speaker 3: Correct, Well, no, it's a brand new This is a
• 45:27
  Speaker 3: brand new DBA. The only difference is technically and legally
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: it's actually a sole proprietorship, so it's it's under your name.
• 45:35
  Speaker 3: It's still it's like opening up an extra personal banking account,
• 45:39
  Speaker 3: but at least it's in the name of the film.
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: At which point later, when you create the LLC, you
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: can flip the account.
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: That's genius, man.
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: You can turn it from a DBA into an NLLC
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: so you don't have to pay the eight hundred dollars
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: in taxes. You can you can set up shop in Louisiana,
• 46:01
  Speaker 3: open up a LLC there if that's where you end
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: up shooting the film. But it's an interim time while
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: you're raising the money. You actually have a bank account
• 46:10
  Speaker 3: legally set up, you know, to that Now you're personally
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: responsible for that for that as income. So somebody writes
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: your check for one hundred grand, it's it technically looks
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: like you personally receive that money. That's a small price
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: to pay because you can flip that later.
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: Sure you get in taxes, you can, yeah, you.
• 46:28
  Speaker 3: Can liability later. So all I'm saying is that not
• 46:32
  Speaker 3: opening an LLC is okay if you're not ready, But
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: that doesn't mean you can't open up a bank account
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: and start receiving funds.
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: That's brilliant that that That's worth the entire interview just
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: for that little piece of advice because I know a
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: lot of filmmakers have an issue with that. I did
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: when I was opening up my first films. It's a
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: pay especially here in California. Yeah, now, what can we
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: talk a little bit about project financing feasibility which is
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: such a big thing and I know that's a big
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: word for a lot of the listeners, but man, you know,
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: I get I get I get pitched. I get pitched.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: For God's sakes, I'm not even a money guy. I
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: get pitched movies constantly, which is I find hilarious. But
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: and they send these projects and you're just like and
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: they're like, look, it's I just need fifty I just
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: need twenty million. Just twenty million. I can make this
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: thing happen.
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah about how about Robert de Niro and Brad Pittan
• 47:30
  Speaker 3: dying to do this film.
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: Together together?
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but I just need the money. I have everything
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: I need except the money. That's the other one.
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: I go, Oh, that's the that's yes, I have. All
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: I need is a check and we could we could start.
• 47:47
  Speaker 3: We're ready to go, We're ready to rock.
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: We could pull the trigger tomorrow. We're in production. So
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: I know it's funny, but it's we laugh because we've
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: both been through it, and it's and they've heard all
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: of that.
• 47:59
  Speaker 3: I've heard.
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: I've heard the Oh yeah, all I need is just
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: a check and we could get the ball rolling. Like
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: everything else is in place. We could just need a
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: little gas of this engine. We've built the car. All
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: I need is a little gas.
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: Come on.
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: So can you talk a little bit about project finance,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: feasibility and the truth, the raw truth of what that is?
• 48:20
  Speaker 3: Well, I mean, I mean, it's all of the above.
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: You know, like I said, it really comes down to,
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: you know, how many of these movies actually get made?
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: You know, when you consider how many areut there, people
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: say to me all the time, they're like, oh, Franco, Wow,
• 48:34
  Speaker 3: you know I looked at your IMGB and you got
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: like thirty eight films on you, And I'm like, yeah,
• 48:38
  Speaker 3: but that doesn't you can't see the three hundred and
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: eighty that I didn't get done right. You can see
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: the ones that I did, but you can't see all
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: the ones that didn't get done right because there's so
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: many factors involved, and sometimes you get so close and
• 48:56
  Speaker 3: sometimes the money isn't even real. I mean kidding me.
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: There's these schemes and these scams, and if you could
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: put in ten percent, we're gonna bring you to the
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: other ninety percent. You know, when people hear stuff like this,
• 49:08
  Speaker 3: you have to run the other way. You know. For me,
• 49:11
  Speaker 3: there's only one way to raise money is to sit
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: down in front of a check writer, an actual person,
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: a human being, and tell them your story. You know,
• 49:19
  Speaker 3: not your movie pitch, but your story. Because what these
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: people are doing is they're believing in you, right, and
• 49:26
  Speaker 3: they believe in you that you can execute what you
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: say you can execute, you know, and some people they
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: oversell themselves. It's not necessary. Sometimes what you have is
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: already enough. Don't have to exaggerate. You don't have to
• 49:41
  Speaker 3: paint this pie in the sky. What nobody's going to
• 49:45
  Speaker 3: respect you for that. If you're gonna sit down in
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: front of somebody who's going to potentially right you a check,
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: you're gonna be honest with them. You're gonna be able
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: to say things like, look, you may never see this
• 49:53
  Speaker 3: money again. You're gonna invest in me, and that's possible
• 49:57
  Speaker 3: that this thing might not work.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: But I'm going to tell you that I'm going to
• 50:12
  Speaker 3: do everything in my power, and I'm going to bring
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: all the resources that are available to me. And it's
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: what I say to my own investors. And I've done
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: this all one hundred times. But that doesn't guarantee it's
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: going to work this one this time, right, I can't
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: promise anything as soon as I hear people say to me,
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: But Franco, can you guarantee I go stop whatever is
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: going to come out of your mouth next? The answer
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: is no, right, because I do not use that word
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: in my presence. I cannot guarantee you a thing. There
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: are no guarantees. This is a business, this is a investment,
• 50:52
  Speaker 3: This is risk, and this is supposed to be fun. Right.
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: So what we're looking to do here is bring a
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: bunch of talented people together and make something really special,
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: something great. It's going to hopefully work, It's going to
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: resonate with the audience, with the movie going audience, and
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: it's going to maybe get some accolades along the way.
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: But it's going to do its job, and its job
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: is to get a message across to the world. Well
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: at the same time be able to at least pay
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: the investors back, make some money for the distributors and
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: for ourselves, and be able to live on, you know,
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: live to see the next day. So in terms of feasibility,
• 51:31
  Speaker 3: it really comes down to how practically you are going
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: into the situation and whether you're going to look at
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: this thing as a systematic approach. Look, I developed this
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: entire development program that I represent purely out of selfishness.
• 51:50
  Speaker 3: It really was because when I first started, I was
• 51:52
  Speaker 3: pulling my hair out, which is wild heavy. I was
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: pulling my hair out trying to figure this thing out,
• 51:59
  Speaker 3: because I was like this, this is insane. This is
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: the wild wild West, you know, running around town trying
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: to piecemeal this thing together. And I thought, here, we
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: have the studio system, which you know, I am not
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: a part of, nor am I interested in being a
• 52:14
  Speaker 3: part of. But the studio system works because it is
• 52:18
  Speaker 3: a system, right, there is a system. A project comes in,
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: it goes through a process, it gets green lit, some
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: more writers come in and work on it, and blah
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: blah blah, it ends up in five thousand theaters across
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: the country. That's a system. Well, we don't have that
• 52:33
  Speaker 3: in the independent world, and it was driving me nuts
• 52:36
  Speaker 3: because I operate best when I'm organized and I'm operating
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: with a system. So I created one for myself selfishly
• 52:45
  Speaker 3: by bringing in this twenty five thousand dollars for dilimaly,
• 52:48
  Speaker 3: spending that money. And by the way, what I do
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: with that twenty five thousand that comes in in development
• 52:53
  Speaker 3: If somebody invests in my movie as a development investor
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: for twenty five k, I return that money plus twenty percent,
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: but I return it out of the budget, right, so
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: those people get their money back thirty thousand before I
• 53:10
  Speaker 3: even shoot my first frame. They're out of the out
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: of the deal. They get their money, they get their
• 53:17
  Speaker 3: principal back, they get their twenty percent, and they're and
• 53:19
  Speaker 3: they're out. And then now and I and I add
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: that in as a line item in my budget as
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: a development cost. Right. So these these are little things
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: that I've learned along the way to help make this
• 53:31
  Speaker 3: thing make sense to the people that are involved and
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: to go down this track where there's a system in
• 53:38
  Speaker 3: place that it makes it feasible for an investor to
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: want to come in and pluck their money down.
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: Now, is there is there a system that because I've
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: heard many different kind of kind of financial structures of
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: how investors get their money back. I've heard the eighty
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: twenty rule. I've heard you know, all first moneies go
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: out to some people, and you know, filmmakers don't get anything.
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: What generally, is there a general rule of thumb? Is
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: there one that you go by as far as like
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: first moneys in X amount of dollars go back to
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: them and X amount of dollars and filmmakers, I don't know,
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: what's your financial breakdown? Is that something you can discuss.
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: There's there's there are industry standards. So like I just
• 54:18
  Speaker 3: got one the other day in the email model just today,
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: I actually last night, and it said we're looking for
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: something like, I don't know, five or seven million dollars.
• 54:26
  Speaker 3: They were asking me personally to invest and they said
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: that they're looking for five or seven million dollars and
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: they were going to and that they were offering their
• 54:33
  Speaker 3: investor twenty five percent. Well, that's not how it works.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: You know. How it works is you know, because the
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: first money is usually equity, because equity is the most
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: important thing, and that's what that thirty percent usually it
• 54:48
  Speaker 3: has to be. It has to be equity. It can't
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: be you know. People say to me, oh, I have
• 54:51
  Speaker 3: thirty percent. I go, oh, okay, can I see your
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: thirty percent? They go, well, I'm going to get a
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: tax credit in Louisiana. Well that's not your thirty percent.
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: That's a tax credit. That's a step thing. When I
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: talk about thirty percent, I mean I mean real hard
• 55:03
  Speaker 3: cash that has to be in your account, spendable cash, right,
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: So that's the money that gets returned first, is your equity.
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: In theory, but there are a lot of other people
• 55:13
  Speaker 3: by the time you get to the point where your
• 55:15
  Speaker 3: movie is actually funded and as actually recouping revey, there
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: are a lot of people that didn't get in line
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: ahead of that person, for example, the distributor, right, because
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: they're going to take twenty percent.
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: Off the top if you're lucky.
• 55:30
  Speaker 3: So if you so, if you make a sale for
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: one hundred thousand, that one hundred thousand dollars sales technically
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: only eighty thousand because you have to give up your
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: commission to the distributor, so that eighty thousand becomes the
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: first money in, and that is the money. What happens,
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: is what's supposed to happen, is that whatever the investors
• 55:51
  Speaker 3: put up should be returned, yes, in first position, until
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: they recoup one hundred and twenty percent. So if they
• 55:59
  Speaker 3: put up a million dollars, then you're on the hook
• 56:03
  Speaker 3: for the money to go to the investors until you
• 56:07
  Speaker 3: recoup one point two million. So now you've you've repaid
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: your principal, your your interest has been paid to your investors.
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: So now they've made their money and their profit. But
• 56:20
  Speaker 3: then it's a fifty to fifty split, right, and fifty
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: cents of every dollar from that point for it goes
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: to those investors and the other fifty percent goes to us.
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: So we should be making money on these movies. We
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: should be making money if I make a movie for
• 56:37
  Speaker 3: a million two. If I make a movie for a
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: million and it makes five point two million, then after
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: my net one point two is paid out, this four
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: million dollars left over, two million of which goes to
• 56:49
  Speaker 3: the investor pool, and two million should come to us,
• 56:53
  Speaker 3: which gives me more money to be able to make
• 56:56
  Speaker 3: my next movie. And speaking of that, I often see
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: this is that the the investors aren't usually most investors
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: savvy investors who are investing in film. They're not doing
• 57:10
  Speaker 3: it because they're going to make twenty percent. Somebody who
• 57:14
  Speaker 3: can write a check for a million or two million
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: dollars doesn't need us to make twenty percent on their money,
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: right right. They're doing it because of the potential upside.
• 57:25
  Speaker 3: So when you talk about things like a Paranormal Activity
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: or My Big fut Greek Wedding, and those movies they
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: did exceed expectations, those are the ones we hear about
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: for that reason. Because somebody put in a million bucks
• 57:39
  Speaker 3: in May, twenty million or one hundred.
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: Million that's and that's what they're looking for.
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: That's what they're looking for. Is the potential upside is
• 57:48
  Speaker 3: that because it's not about the twenty percent return, it's
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: about what happens after that.
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: Now, can you give any advice on how to attach
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: bankable stars to a project? I know that's a I mean,
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: that's a big value if you have someone attached? And
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: what is the term attached? Really mean? Letter of intent?
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: All this kind of stuff. There's a lot of gray,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: murky water in that situation.
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: You're really trying to get me going, aren't you? Oh?
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: Boy, Yeah, I got I got a letter of intent.
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: I got a letter of intent from Brad Pitt. Look
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: he signed it, and I could I just need ten mil?
• 58:25
  Speaker 3: Who cares? That's how I feel about Lois? Who cares?
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: You know what I care about? I care about picking
• 58:32
  Speaker 3: up the phone and calling the agent and saying, is
• 58:35
  Speaker 3: Brad attached? As you read the script? Because nine times
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: out of ten, no Christian, ten times out of ten,
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: that is not the case. To me an, LOI is meaningless. Okay,
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: it really is for a couple of reasons. Number one,
• 58:50
  Speaker 3: a lot of the ones I get are three and
• 58:52
  Speaker 3: four years old. They're outdated. Sure, they've been holding on
• 58:56
  Speaker 3: to this thing for dear life.
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: Yes, they do hold on to dear life, don't they.
• 59:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I have somebody bring me an LOI for Shirley maclan.
• 59:04
  Speaker 3: I was so excited. I've always wanted to work with her.
• 59:06
  Speaker 3: And I looked at the thing and I swear to god,
• 59:08
  Speaker 3: it was day of two thousand and nine. Oh god,
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: I'm like that was in one of her past lives
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: when she said it.
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: I actually, I actually once had a LOI that was
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: from an actor who had had recently passed.
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: That's the way. Yeah, I'm telling you it's insane. So,
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: but more importantly, you're going to look at the content
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: of these lois. They mean nothing. They're so tentative, and
• 59:33
  Speaker 3: they're like, you know, if maybe possibly someday you might,
• 59:37
  Speaker 3: you know, happen to stumble on a few dollars, we
• 59:40
  Speaker 3: might think about reading the script and possibly considering having
• 59:44
  Speaker 3: our actor be in your movie. I mean, it really
• 59:46
  Speaker 3: doesn't mean anything. They just don't hold any water. And
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: a lot of the times, what if they're issued at all.
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: A lot of the time it's just to get you
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: off their back, the agent, to get you off their back.
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: Right, We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 3: Because here's the problem. And again I get criticized to
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: saying stuff like this, but you know what, I can't
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 3: worry about that. At the end of the day, we
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 3: should not be going out and using these actors in
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 3: order to raise our money. We should be getting the money.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: Because it's the catch twenty two, right, Sure, the catch
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 3: twenty two is I can't get actors unless I have money,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: and I can't get money unless I have actors. Well,
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: if you had to pick one of those, go get
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 3: the money first. That's what I do, and I'll tell
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 3: you how in a minute. But the fact is, if
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: you're running around using Shirley MacLean or Brad Pitt or
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: any of these people as a way to raise money
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 3: for your movie, you're doing it wrong because you don't
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 3: even have there. Just because you have a letter of
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 3: intent doesn't mean anything. The chances that these people have
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 3: any idea who you are or that you even exist
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: on this planet are no. They don't know. They don't
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 3: know that you exist, and the agent does. The agent
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 3: might because somebody had an issue that LOI. But at
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: the end of the day, you don't have anything. You
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: don't have anything. When you have somebody attached for me,
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 3: that means I can pick up the phone and I
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 3: can call their attorney or their manager or their agent,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: and I can and I can hear somebody on the
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: other end of the phone say, yes, he or she
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 3: has read the script. There love the script, and pending
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 3: their schedule and an offer, we are willing to talk.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 3: We're willing to come on board this project, you know,
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 3: pending pending schedule in a formal offer that's attached to me.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 3: That's somebody who I can work with, because now I
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 3: know what I have to go to do in order
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 3: to get them. But as far as an LOI is concerned,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 3: it's so flimsy, and you know, it's really raising money
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 3: off of profosset pre tenses, because what happens if you
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 3: do raise that money and then those people say, no way,
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 3: I'm not interested in this movie. What are you talking about? Right?
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 3: And now how are you going to go back to
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 3: the investors. So the answer to that is to get
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 3: your investors to put up the money on a contingency basis.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 3: Have it be cast contingent. Say listen, I need a
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 3: half a million bucks and I needed to put in
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 3: my production account so I can show proof of funds,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: so that I can show the world the agents and
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 3: the talent that I'm for real, because otherwise it just
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 3: like everybody else running around, you know, talking about something
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 3: that doesn't exist. So put the money in my account
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 3: and have the contract with your lawyers say which is
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 3: something that you should be buttoning down during your development phase,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 3: Which is why that's twenty five thousand dollars development money.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 3: So important is that you have the right lawyer who
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 3: can do these things and knows how to do these
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: things properly, and have that agreement be contingent that I'm
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 3: going to put up this five hundred thousand dollars contingent
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 3: on you getting one of these five actors. And you
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 3: make a list, and if you don't get those fab
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 3: five actors, you don't get my half million. So you
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 3: can sit and play with my half million for six months,
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: but if you haven't locked so many down in six months,
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: I'm taking my money back. Because now, as the filmmaker,
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 3: you have power because you get to go out and
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 3: have that conversation because what do you think there's two questions.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 3: There's three questions the agent's going to ask when you
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 3: pick up that phone. Number one, who's directing? Yes? Number
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 3: two are you financed? And number three do you have distribution?
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 3: Those are typically the questions that I get asked. But
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 3: I'm coming in as an executive producer, so they're usually
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 3: going to say instant if I'm calling, I probably have money,
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 3: right right, But that's just because I have a track cricket.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 3: But if you don't have a track record, they're not
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 3: going to make that assumption, and you have to be
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 3: able to say, yes, I have proof of funds. Can
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 3: you money?
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: Can you discuss real quick about first time directors, because
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: I've gone through this in my career multiple times, this
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: whole concept of the first time director. And you know,
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: filmmakers have a script and they wrote the script and
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: they want to direct, but they've never stepped foot on
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: a set and they want ten million, like it does happen,
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: but it doesn't happen often. Can you talk a little
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: bit about the realities of first time directors and based
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: on budget, like if you're making a fifty thousand dollars movie,
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: one hundred thousand dollars movie, I'm assuming the first time
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: director is a little because there's less risk. But on
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: a one, two, three, five million dollar movie with a
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: first time director doing an action movie, for god's sakes,
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: you know how, what's your perspective on it?
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 3: Well, the perspective is simple, it's not gonna happen. Who's
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 3: gonna work with you?
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: Straight up?
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 3: Who's gonna work with you? Because if you're gonna make
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 3: a million here we go again. If you're gonna make
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 3: a movie for five million dollars, you got to know
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 3: that you can return seven to ten million if you're
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 3: if you're going to come out of the gate with
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 3: an expectation upon yourself to bring in seven to ten
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: million dollars in gross revenue a on your first film,
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 3: you need some major, major name talent in that movie
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 3: to make the draw. And who is going to work
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 3: with you? That's my question. It's that simple. Who are
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 3: you going to go get three action stars to come
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 3: and work with you as a first time director, Because
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 3: if you think you are, and unless you're you know,
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: related to them.
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: Which I've worked with those as well.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, either related to them or married to them, then
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 3: it's not gonna happen. So at the end, of the day.
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 3: It makes no sense and it's a to me, it's
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 3: just a fantasy. And it's exactly what I was talking
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 3: about before. It's like, I don't support that. I just don't.
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: I'm not saying it doesn't happen. And God love you
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 3: if you're able to succeed, but don't come knocking on
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 3: my door. I'm sorry.
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: Too.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 3: That's because I'm in my car.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah I got to I got to see someone was
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: literally knocking out your door.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 3: No.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: I always tell filmmakers the advice I give them is like, look,
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: if you got a five million dollar movie you want
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: to direct, go make three or four fifty thousand dollars movies.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 3: Well I was about a fifty thousand. But that's what
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 3: what I was saying to you earlier. Is that graduate
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 3: you know, Yeah, you know, because because fifty thousand is
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 3: going to be tough to sell just as bad because
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 3: the production value, you're not going to be there. So
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 3: the goal, the goal is you want to make a
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 3: decent movie and you and you know, make something for
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 3: two fifty to fifties, reasonable to fifty something that most
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 3: people who were committed to having a lifelong career in
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 3: this business can figure out how to do, you know,
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 3: make a movie for two hundred fifty thousand dollars. Have
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 3: enough money to do the things you want to do
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 3: to make this movie. Don't make don't try to make
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 3: too big of a movie for that kind of a budget.
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 3: Make something small and contained that works, you know, and
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 3: get distribution.
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: I got a Can you talk a little bit about
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: like some keys to getting a distribution?
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah? I mean I had a filmmaker who came to
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 3: me and it was her third time, it was a
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 3: third film, and I looked, great, she's not a first
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: time filmmaker. Blah blah blah. She was graduating from like
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 3: a half a million dollar movie to one point five
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 3: million dollar movie, and it all seemed to make sense.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 3: The problem was, once I started shopping her out to
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 3: a lot of my distributors, they quickly did some research
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 3: on her and realized, although this was her third feature film,
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 3: neither of her first two films ever got distribution. Oh
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 3: so that so you have to really understand that this
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 3: is how this thing works. Is so now just being
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 3: able to say I made a three hundred and fifty
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 3: thousand or a five hundred thousand dollars movie isn't enough
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 3: if the movie never went anywhere and it's sitting on
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 3: a shelf and nobody's ever going to see it except
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 3: your family of Thanksgiving, right, So that's not even enough
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 3: to have it be your third directorial, you know, attempt
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 3: because you haven't succeeded in the first two to get
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 3: distribution right. So one of the things you want to
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 3: do is why a lot of people do go to AFM,
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 3: you know this time of year, is to start building
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 3: relationship with distributors and see if you can get somebody
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 3: who's interested in your project enough to the extent that
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 3: they'll start a conversation with you about coming onto your film.
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 3: It's you know, especially if it's a low budget feature.
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: So I have a few last questions because I don't
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: want to take up any more time. I know you're
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: in the middle of your conference, so thank you so
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: much for taking the time out that you have. These
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: are questions. Ask all of my guests, Uh, what advice
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: would you give a filmmaker wanting to break into the
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: business today?
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 3: Take your time, take your time and learn as much
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 3: as you can. You know, go to these classes, go
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 3: to these seminars, go to these events, get out there
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 3: and meet people and learn, learn, learn. You know, it's
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 3: one thing to learn the craft of writing and all that,
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 3: and that's great, but learn the craft of business in
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 3: the in the in the film business.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: Can you tell me what book had the biggest impact
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: on your life or career?
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 3: Oh? Boy, oh, I can never I can never remember
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 3: who his name is? Bernstein? Uh, it was something. It
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 3: was something called You're nobody unless you've been sued in
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: this town.
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: That's a great diet. Well, yeah, we'll be right back
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: after a word from our sponsor, and now back to
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: the show.
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 3: And I can't remember. And then there was another book
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 3: about David Geffen's life. I can't remember the title of
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 3: that either. Early on, but those were two books that
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 3: really had a profile and effect on it.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: And what lesson took you the longest to learn, whether
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: in the film business or in life.
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 3: The longest to learn probably would have to be fake
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 3: it until I make it.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: Yes, amen, brother, that's a good one. Hey, can you
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: name three of your favorite films of all time?
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 3: Well, my favorite film of all time. People make fun
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: of me for this is a sunset Boulevard.
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: Okay, that makes sense.
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 3: I just think that's a classic.
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: It is wonderful. It's wonderful, And.
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 3: I hate to say it because I don't don't have
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 3: any really contemporary because I'm an old film buff. Sure,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 3: but I love All About Eve.
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: Okay, another good one, Yes, and pretty.
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 3: Much any any any Betty Davis movie, anything that Betty
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 3: Davis or Joan Crawford did, including uh, the one when
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 3: they both were together and they played sisters.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, the one that they didn't they
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: just make that show about it.
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, whatever happened to Baby Jane?
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Okay, what was that? What was that Preston Sturgis
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: movie about the writer who goes on the train and
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: discover and wants to discover like what it's real? Do
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm talking about?
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 3: I think so. I can't grab the title out, I can't.
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but Preston anything Preston Sturges is amazing.
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I loved also, if you know why, because I
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 3: love the days when there wasn't a lot of special
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 3: effects and it was just real storytelling and the art
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 3: form of acting and telling the story through dialogue. And
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 3: I love those old movies so so.
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: And I'll ask you this question. I'm not sure if
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: you want to answer it, But where can people find you?
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 3: Listen, I'm I'm not you know, I'm not difficult to reach. Okay,
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm I'm you know. People can call me
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 3: or email me, and I think even my cell phone
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 3: is like on my IMDb page. But the best way
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 3: to reach me is through my website, which is somacofilms
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 3: dot com, and they can also I can be emailed
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 3: directly if people have any questions about any of the
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 3: stuff that we're talking the more deeply at Franco at
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 3: samcofilms dot com.
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: Franko, Man, thank you so much for taking out the time.
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: I really appreciate and I hope that we've done some
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: good here today.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 3: I hope well, Alex, I hope so too, and I
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 3: thank you and I appreciate the opportunity to to vent
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 3: a little bit. Thanks Recca, all right, man, take care.
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: Did you guys take notes? I hope you did, because
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: I definitely did. I want to thank again Franco for
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: coming onto the show and again being so generous with
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: his time, his experience, and his knowledge and really helping
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: filmmakers out there really understand the process of what it's
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: like to go get money and how to do it properly.
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: And I think it's been an amazing service doing this episode.
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: And I really again share this episode with as many
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: people as you can because it is just so valuable
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: this information. It's essentially a masterclass of something that they
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: do not teach at any film school that I know of. Now,
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: if you want links to anything we talk about in
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: the show, please head over to Indie film Muscle dot
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: com fort slash to zero two for the show notes.
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: And today, guys, is November twenty eighth, and it is
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: early morning on Tuesday, And if you're listening to this
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: episode at that time, today is the last day of
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: the ten dollars sale for all filmmaking, screenwriting, cinematography marketing
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: courses on You Demi. All you gotta do is head
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: over to Indi film Hustle dot com forward slash d
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: e m y. That's Indie Film Hussele dot com forward
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: slash you Demi. Now, it is the holiday season, and
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: as always, Santa Alex has a bunch of gifts and
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: a bunch of great stuff coming up for you in
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: December and an insanely explosive January twenty eighteen on the book,
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: So get ready for some major content coming your way
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: and some major hopefully value as well. So thanks again
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: guys for everything. And I posted images from our first
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: winner of the Stephen Pressfield contest on our Facebook page
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: as well as our Twitter, so please check that out.
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: And if you guys any of the winners get when
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: you guys get the packages, please take a picture and
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: tweet it out or email us or faceboo, book us
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: or whatever, just get it to us so we can
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: share it with the rest of the Indie Film Hustle tribe.
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: And as always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you soon.
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 2: Indiefilm Hustle dot com. That's I N D I E
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 2: F I L M h U S T l E
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 2: dot com.