You put story first, and you do your damn hardest to make the film airtight and technically flawless. From sound to shot composition, a lot can throw a viewer out of the experience of taking in a film. While the bigger films often lack the creative and truly unique surprises that some smaller films manage, they are masterful story tellers and understand the fundamental rule of filmmaking; it's about the audience.
Whatever comes with our remaining 250 submissions pending acceptance, this experience has taught us a lot about what festivals want from films, and the standards of polish and excellence we need to achieve to make sure 2017 leads to a more fruitful outcome. We went back and edited The Hallway with these things in mind, and with our second batch of submissions for this heartfelt dramatic short, we hope to be blasting your social media news feed with good news for months to come.
As our dedicated followers know, Pensare Films currently has 5 short films on their respective festival circuits. There's a certain delusion filmmakers have about their own films; either they're much worse than we fear, or considerably better than we imagine. Our festival tour has been a mixed bag of emotions with surprise acceptances and heartbreaking rejection letters from both large and small festivals.
With failure, hopefully, comes growth. While the original ambition was getting into nothing short of the best and brightest festivals, as a Sundance coordinator recently told us, 70% of their submissions are complete toss-outs, and the remaining films, while sometimes decent, usually lack the professional polish and attention to detail they demand. So there you are. As an independent studio with limited resources, how do you compete with the bigger films?
A Journey to 350 Submissions
Robert Misovic | December 8, 2016