MovieBar (almost) Fail...

Last night we claim dangerously close to an epic fail. Since we changed the venue to the Caroline setting up has been a breeze so I was in no hurry to get started last night. We ate in the pub (their burgers are amazing by the way) and then I casually wandered upstairs to switch everything on. Only for some reason the projector can't find the DVD player and I have no idea why. This happens to be the only night that the pub's owner hasn't been there and Brother Pete (who is better at technical stuff than me) wasn't due to turn up until later. So I start panicking and we spend half an hour turning things off and on again in a desperate attempt to make it work. Finally I speak to the owner on the phone and we get it working. Fine.

Then I realise I haven't brought the pens for the quiz. After a super-busy weekend I'd been a bit rubbish at getting everything ready so it was inevitable I would forget something. So I call Brother Pete who is on his way and ask him to look out for emergency pens. Of the things I could've forgotten it wasn't that bad, it just added to the gradually increasing sense that things were not going to go to plan tonight.

Then there was another minor issue - I think copying 200 copies of Jenny Ringo and the Monkey's Paw (please sign up to the mailing list at www.jennyringo.com) had killed my DVD drive and the DVD I'd put the trailers and an intro to one of the films on wasn't working. Pete managed to get it to work in the end, but again it wasn't helping my growing anxiety.

So everything is working, we have pens, we're ready to start. Just in time too - it's 8pm which is when we generally kick off the night and screen the first film. So why is no one here?

Aside from the four of us running the night there were 7 other people there. In a room that seats 60. This did not look good.

Most of the 7 had already been waiting around for half an hour (as they turned up at the advertised and correct time of 7.30pm!) so I couldn't really keep them waiting. I tried to act like this was normal and did the introduction to the first film as if it was a full room. Luckily a couple of minutes into the film, more people turned up. A lot more people. By the end of the film we had somewhere between 30-40 people in which is closer to our regular numbers. And from then on everything ran smoothly and it turned into a really good night. Which is fantastic, but I really could have done without the stresses at the beginning.

Anyway, next month is the Halloween special, which I don't have to worry about because loads of people will be there. I hope. Seriously, if you are in Brighton or anywhere near on Monday 31st October you should definitely come along to the Caroline of Brunswick. Preferably at 7.30pm. We will be showing short horror films all night and dressing up in daft costumes and awarding a prize to the best daft costume. I already have some fantastic and genuinely scary horror shorts lined up so I seriously recommend you check it out.

As always we'll be posting the rundown of last night's event on the MovieBar website in the next few days.

Jenny Ringo website and stuff...

We have a shiny new website, designed by the awesome Richard Badley (Factoid  -Rich also played a witch in the film!) -

www.jennyringo.com

There you can also sign up to receive the newsletter, which you can also do on the right of this page>>>

Why would you want to do this? Because we will be letting people know how and when they can see the film as well as providing updates on the sequel as it develops.

So this weekend I was at the Entertainment Media Show in London in a desperate attempt to get people to see the film. There were various reasons I thought this might be a good idea, but I suppose the main one was this -

Most filmmakers submit their films to festivals, where they are screened and win awards and make people famous (see my previous post on this subject). I've been to film festivals. For the most part the people who go to film festivals are other filmmakers, usually those with films screening on the same bill. Obviously I have nothing against filmmakers, but I didn't make Jenny Ringo and the Monkey's Paw for them. I made it for people like me. The non-filmmaker me, who is an obsessive fan of films and music and stuff. 

I figured this was an ideal way to get my film to the people most likely to enjoy it. Hopefully, some of those people will enjoy it enough to want to see more and by the time we actually finish the sequel we may even have some kind of audience already waiting for it. 

So I booked the table, made 300 copies of the film on DVD, printed some posters and fliers and came up with a plan to give the film away in exchange for e-mail addresses. That way I can hopefully keep up some kind of interaction with people despite the fact that there won't be a new film for quite some time.

Here's how it went down...

Saturday 

Got up at 5.30am to get the train from Worthing to Clapham and then on to West Brompton. This bears no significance to the wider story, I just want to point out how early it was and that as far as I'm concerned getting up at 5.30am really is suffering for your art. Met Rich on the train as he had very kindly agreed to help out, which was awesome as I would have been stuck behind the table all day otherwise. Andrea had already set up the table the night before so when we got there we just had to grab a coffee and get started.

Then John Hurt walked past and said 'Good morning!' and I kind of waved in a rather starstruck fashion. And I imagined an alternate reality in which I walk past John Hurt on the way to work every morning, which would be awesome.

Shortly after 9am people start turning up. I didn't think anyone would be that interested first thing in the morning - I assumed they would all be in a hurry to get to the guest signings. We actually did really well in the first couple of hours and had managed to give away 20 DVDs by 11am. I'd only brought 100 copies along and was starting to wish I had more. Our strategy at this point was to wait for people to glance down at our table then ask them if they wanted a copy of the film. At this point most people would either run away shaking their heads or move in closer with a suspicious look on their face. Then we would explain what we were doing and 99% of them would sign up to the list for a DVD.

Another friend, Joel, turned up to help. With 3 of us there this would be a breeze. Then things really started to slow down.

A couple of things made it difficult. The positioning of our table wasn't great - we were at the opposite end of the hall to the main talk area. The most popular guests were in the middle somewhere. Other than browsing to kill time, there was no real reason to come to our end of the hall. Added to that was the more serious problem of low attendance that day. I was basing my experiences on the last event I attended in July where you could barely move down the aisles because there were so many people. This one was looking a little dead.

We struggled on through lunch time, then Joel tried a new tactic - shouting 'Free DVD!' at people walking past in the manner of a super-enthusiastic carnival barker. It worked surprisingly well. By the end of the day we'd given away 87 copies of the film, met some really interesting people and found ourselves struggling not to shout 'Free DVD!' at strangers on the train home. It had been a lot of fun, if not quite the success I'd been hoping for.

Sunday

On Sunday it was Producer Andrea's turn to help out. We got up at a slightly more reasonable hour as the earliest train from Worthing wasn't until ten past seven, which also meant we didn't get to the table until 9.30am. It was already busier than it had been on the previous day. David Tennant had really pulled the crowds in.

We had another advantage - Andrea was brilliant and jumped right into the 'Free DVD' routine with surprising effectiveness. She should totally be on The Apprentice. Within an hour we had given away the thirteen that remained from Saturday and had made a dent in the 100 copies I had brought along for the Sunday. By 1pm we had no DVDs left and I was wishing I brought along a lot more. I'd left another hundred at home because I'd run out of labels and I wasn't sure we'd be able to shift them...oops.

Meanwhile a couple of people who picked up the film on the Saturday came over to tell us what they thought. Even though I had been hoping this would happen I was suddenly incredibly nervous. What if they hated it? What if everyone hates it!?! They didn't hate it. They gave me some constructive criticism but on the whole really enjoyed it. Which is a good sign.

Overall I had a fantastic weekend and getting out there and putting my film in people's hands did feel like a more positive step than sending it off to festivals/competitions and waiting for a response. It was a bit of an expensive experiment (though I could easily have spent more entering a handful of film festivals)  and I'm not sure I'd do it again without some way of making at least some of the money back, but that's something to think about for the future. For now I'm more interested in whether the people who have it like the film or not.

So 200 people now have copies of the film, which is loads but not enough. The next stage of my plan is to figure out a way to get people to see it online, without just sticking it up on YouTube. I'll let you know how that goes...

Jenny Ringo at the Entertainment Media Show this weekend...

I had the idea back in July at the London Film and Comic Convention. A failed 'Britain's Got Talent' contestant had set up a dealer table and was selling autographs, and as we walked past Brother Pete said 'Anyone could set up a table. You could come here with Jenny Ringo.'

I'm not sure he was serious, but this Saturday and Sunday I'll be at the Entertainment Media Show at Earls Court giving away copies of Jenny Ringo and the Monkey's Paw on DVD and trying to get people to sign up to our mailing list. This mailing list...

Subscribe to the Jenny Ringo mailing list...

I have no idea whether this a good idea or not but I'll report back on how it goes. If anyone reading this is planning on going along this weekend I'll be there both days so please pop by and say hello. You can find full details on the website for the event here.

I will also be showing off our awesome new poster courtesy of Darren Berry (who also shot and edited the film!)...

Dream Festival...

So for the first time ever I have a finished short film that I'm really happy with. It's not perfect, but it's better than anything I've made before and it's the first film that I feel really represents the kind of stories I want to tell and the type of characters those stories are about. So I ask myself, what now? What does one do with a short film?

Why enter it into festivals of course! Film festivals, where independent no-budget films are shown all over the world. Where influential rich industry people crowd into screening rooms to snatch up all that fresh, juicy new talent. The first step on the road to fame and fortune. Not really 'film' festivals at all - more like DREAM FESTIVALS.

When I screened the film at the beginning of the month a friend mentioned that the submission deadline for Cinecity - the Brighton Film Festival was coming up. Best of all it's free to enter for Brighton-based filmmakers (which I'm not technically but considering I used to be and the film was shot entirely in Brighton and Hove I figure I'm okay). Great, I pop a copy in the post and wait to hear back. And if it doesn't get accepted, fine - submitting it was no problem at all. And I think to myself 'I'll enter my film into every festival if it's this easy'.

Then I find out that the deadline for the London Short Film Festival is also on the horizon. They showed a couple of Brother Pete's films a few years ago. I'll definitely enter this one. The submission is via Withoutabox. That's fine, I set up an account ages ago in anticipation of this very moment. So I fill out the forms for my film and submit it. There's a fee for this one, but because I'm submitting early it's only £10. Yes, I am now paying someone to watch my film which seems a bit backwards, but I appreciate they need to cover their admin costs and it's not all that much really. No problem, I pay the fee, pop a DVD in the post and wait to hear back. And I think to myself 'I'll enter my film into a great many festivals if it only costs £10 a time'.

But two festivals isn't enough. Not if I'm going to get everyone to see my film and become rich and famous off the back of it. I need to enter more! So I start trawling through the other festivals on Withoutabox. And there it is, the festival I've been looking for. The British Horror Film Festival! My film is definitely British!! And it's a horror film!!! And the deadline is in 4 days!!!! I'm totally entering this one.

And then I get to the fee, which is £60. That's £60 for someone to watch my film and decide whether they like it or not. And if they don't like it I've paid £60 for someone to not screen my film. And, as a friend warned me on Facebook, they may not even tell me they don't like it.

Okay, maybe it's a one-off. Maybe there are some other festivals out there that I can afford to send my film to. I check almost every upcoming UK festival in the listings. The prices generally range between £30 and £60. If I'm going to enter as many festivals as possible, or even just the relevant ones, I'm going to run up a cost equal to or perhaps greater than the cost of making my film. And for all I know the film may not be accepted into any of them.

Before anyone tries to explain to me that film festivals cost money to run I should point out that I run a film festival. It's called MovieBar and takes place on the first Monday of every month at the Caroline of Brunswick in Brighton. It doesn't cost anything to run aside from the few quid we spend on daft quiz prizes. Mostly it just costs time. There are six of us involved, and we put the time in because we enjoy it. And because I think it's really important that these films get the chance to be screened for an audience. We don't charge for entry on the night, we don't charge for submitting films and we don't have any submission guidelines. We don't show everything and I'm really bad at getting back to people with a decision but we do watch everything that comes in and at least when we don't show something no one has lost any money over it.

From running MovieBar I've noticed there are two types of short films - those made with money and those made without money. Some people are lucky or talented or determined enough to get funding, some people decide to go ahead anyway with whatever they can scrape together. Those in the latter category are unlikely to have money left over to enter festivals and it becomes further proof that you need money to make it in the film industry. That principle works fine in the feature world - even if you make a film for nothing you need a distributor to put money in so you can get it to people. Ideally it then makes the money back. The festival circuit seems like the short film equivalent of distribution and marketing in the feature world. The difference is that short films do not and will not make any money back.

Despite all that, I hover over the 'Submit Now' button for the British Horror Film Festival for some time before finally deciding against it. And I think to myself 'There has to be a better way to get people to see short films...'

Jenny Ringo Plans for the Future...

This is one of those blog posts where I'm not really going to say anything of anything substance because all I've got right now are vague ideas of things I want to do and I'm a bit wary of writing them down in case you all come back here a year from now and say 'What happened to all that cool stuff you were going to do?' And with a tear in my eye I remember the man I once was, before my hopes and dreams were stripped away by the killer space robot invasion of 2012...

Mostly I'm just filling space because I haven't posted for ages. Because I've been busy with plans I daren't talk about yet.

I can confirm I have started work on another Jenny Ringo script. Except it's not me doing the work this time. Someone else is writing it. It's looking really good so far.

I can't imagine too many people care about that right now, but that's the other thing I'm working on. Figuring out how to get people to see Jenny Ringo's first cinematic adventure so they'll care when I make another one. Without just putting it up on Youtube and hoping for the best. I'll let you know how that goes.

For now I recommend you check out The Organ Grinder - a weeky music podcast curated by Charlie Khan which regularly features some of my favourite bands, especially when I request them like what I did this week:

Short Film Diary - Week ???

I've lost count. I could go back and work it out but I've had a few drinks so I'm not sure it would be entirely accurate. I'll try to keep this brief.

Wednesday I went round to editor Darren's place to watch the finished version of the film and pick up a DVD copy. We went to the pub while his Mac was doing magic Mac things to get the film onto a DVD. We came second to last in a pub quiz. And when we got back the magic Mac things hadn't worked. I started to wonder if there was some curse preventing me from ever actually screening the film.

Saturday I tried again and this time came away with a copy of the film.

Saturday evening Andrea and I watched the finished film on a TV for the first time. I really couldn't tell  whether it was any good or not but it was at least finished. Apart from a handful of glitches but for the sake of it being finished I'll take the hit on those.

And I just got back from screening it at MovieBar where it played to a packed room and was very well received. Surprisingly well, actually. I was a bit concerned as we were running late and it's quite a long film but everyone seemed to really enjoy it. The gags got lots of laughs, the serious bits were taken seriously, and the feedback I got afterwards was really positive.

I then did a rambling Q&A in which I tried to cover everything from the origin of the character back when I was in university up to seeing the finished film on Saturday. Luckily I had a lot of help from the various crew members who came along and from friend and fellow filmmaker Ross who did the Q part.

One thing I forgot to do was thank everyone involved. So thank you, everyone involved. We made an awesome film and I couldn't have done it without you.

I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do next. At one stage I had a plan to pitch it as a TV series. I also had a plan to use the internet and my fellow bloggers to build an audience. Somewhere along the way I had a plan to use the film to help me get an agent. Recently I had a plan to make another short with the same characters. I had a lot of plans, but they all seemed a long way off. Suddenly they're not so far away and I kind of need to start doing something about them.

So please check back for more updates. I'll be posting details of how you can see the film once I've figured that part out, and once we get to work on the next short I'll start up the regular film diaries again...

Jenny Ringo DEFINITELY screening tomorrow...

I have a DVD of the finished film in my hand which I'll be keeping on my person at all times until the screening. I've got people coming with back-up copies just in case. We may even bring a laptop along to give us a further back-up option. There is no way this film isn't screening tomorrow. If you're anywhere near Brighton please come along to the Caroline of Brunswick for MovieBar where you will finally get to see Jenny Ringo and the Monkey's Paw which myself and several others have been working on for well over a year. Hope to see you there.