...better late than never.

I'm at a “Going Global” two-day workshop in Santa Monica. The reason I'm here is because I've discovered something all independent filmmakers discover at some point in the production schedule: The marketing and distribution of a film is one of the most difficult aspects of the entire production.

Filmmakers get pretty excited about their films. That's good because it takes a lot of passion and energy to make one! They do the preproduction, they do the shooting, they do the postproduction, and then … then they start asking questions like, “Who's going to buy this thing?” “How will I get this out to my audience?”

I was very fortunate to come across Stacey Parks and her company, Film Specific. Stacey has a long history of working with independent filmmakers and getting sales and distribution deals put together for them.

Stacey had a nine-week, weekly conference call that about 50 of us from around the US and Canada were part of and the topic was, “Distribution in Reverse.” The premise being; whatever stage of production you're in right now, you need to be thinking clearly about the the final stage, which is, marketing and distribution.

To that end, our conference calls were useful in getting us to think about questions like international financing deals, global distribution, the film festival circuit, and the mother of all deal breakers: deliverables.

Deliverables are the myriad nit-picky little things that any TV distribution deal worth its salt, or any deal for that matter, will lay out in the fine print. The list of deliverables can stretch to nine pages long and will include things like:

E&O Insurance: Errors and Omissions Insurance. After I've proved that I did everything possible to mitigate possible lawsuits by having all those who appear in the documentary sign releases, making sure my music is legal, having no intentional slander and so forth, I still have to purchase an E&O policy in case something should arise down the road that could get me or the production company into legal hot water.

Music and FX. For global distribution, there may have to be some recutting, say, in Japan, to make the movie more palatable for a Japanese audience. Music, dialogue, sound FX: all these need to be delivered in a specific format so the editors over there can move things around, make changes, etc., to fit their audience.

Title Tracks. If the Slum Documentary gets shown in, say, Germany, all the subtitles, credits, even the Title, will have to be changed into the German language. There's a very specific way that all these titles have to be delivered to a third-party vendor to expedite that process.

There are a LOT more deliverables, but I'll just copy and paste a few from our notes so you get an idea of what goes on behind the scenes of every movie that actually makes it onto TV or the bigscreen or to your Netflix account:

(a) Original Picture Negative: The original first-class completely edited color 35 mm Film Stock Picture negative, fully timed and color corrected.

(b) Original Optical Soundtrack Negative: A first-class completely edited 35 MM Film Stock optical sound-track negative (including combined dialogue, sound effects and music made from the original magnetic print master described in Paragraph 5 below conforming to the original negative and answer print. The Sound track is to be in Stereo.

(c) 35mm Low Contrast Print: One (1) first class 35mm composite low contrast print fully timed and color corrected, manufactured from the original action negative and final sound track, fully titled, conformed and synchronized to the final edited version of the Picture(if available).

(d) Color Interpositive Protection Master: One (1) color corrected and complete interpositive Master of the Picture, conformed in all respects to the Answer Print for protection purposes without scratches or defects (if available).

(e) Color Internegative/Dupe Negative: One(1) 35 Internegative manufactured from the color interpositive protection Master conformed in all respects to the delivered and accepted Answer Print without scratches or defects (if available).

Get the idea? I'm becoming more and more convinced that trudging through the slums of the world is the easy part. The marketing and distribution is where it gets tough.

So that brings me back to Santa Monica. Our nine-week call sessions are ending with all of us here together at the Viceroy Hotel on the beach, discussing these issues, listening to experts in a variety of fields, and learning a lot. None of us want to join ranks with the countless filmmakers out there who have made a good movie, but then get hung up in this final stage of things.

Will this delay the release? Hopefully not … but better late than never.