Another day at SXSW means less and less sleep for your author. Yesterday was another amazing day at the fest, as you would expect. I started off with a few panel discussions, workshops, and meetups. The best talk of the day was a panel discussion about American Experience's The Last Days of Vietnam which aired on PBS last year(If you just want to hear about celebrity sightings and movies skip down below the numbers). If you haven't seen the film you need to, it is one of the most powerful films about such a difficult time in the world. On the panel were American Experience Executive Producer Mark Samels, American Experience Producer Lauren Prestileo, and Last Days in Vietnam Producer and Academy Award nominee Kevin McAlester(KEVIN!). The discussion opened with a sample from the film, from there Samels' and McAlester discussed how they didn't want to make a political film about Vietnam. The politics of Vietnam remain a difficult subject and there have been many films that cover different angles pertaining to that effect. They wanted to tell personal stories that surrounded the war from those who fought to the civilians of Vietnam whose lives were changed forever. The subject of the panel was: "Analog to Digital: Synching an Engagement Campaign". Last Days in Vietnam was obviously always intended for PBS but after playing at Sundance it became apparent that theater distribution was a must. A few lessons for filmmakers out there:
1. They made no money in theaters, the cost of distribution on their own dime only evened out at best. Why? Because they wanted to retain the rights(actually kind of had to) they patch worked a release across the country and had success in the markets they played in, but didn't turn a profit. This also opened them up to Academy Awards eligibility, which is its own reward.
2. This helped launch the PBS broadcast, not take away from it. They explained how although the film had been in theaters the audiences are still different for both, and if anything, the theater broadcast helped spread the word and hype for the release.
3. They also organized community screenings across the country and hired coordinators and researchers to find the markets that had audiences of Vietnam veterans and Vietnamese. This was a huge thing for the film, and for the people who were impacted by it.
4. Now the film lives online, is being distributed for educational purposes in chunks through PBS Learning Media and Storycorps.
So the take away is that your film is not just broadcast, not just theatrical but something that can live and breath across multiple platforms, life cycles, and distribution.
I find myself living and working in the PBS Lounge, it's kind of like home for me, and Cookie Monster shows up from time to time. Check the picture roll. It's a cool place with cool people and it's very chill.
On the film front I saw a few good movies, ran into a few celebrities and continued my streak of just having amazing SXSW moments. Now I'm starting to think it's not even amazing but rather par for the course. For instance while waiting to check out Bone in The Throat, the British film based on celebrity Chef Anthony Bourdain's novel, Rainn Wilson just happened to be coming out of his premiere of The Boy, but rather than take off he stopped and chatted with a small group of us about movies, his recent work, and KTTZ's Office Parody for our spring pledge drive! This was outside of the Alamo Ritz on 6th street and within 5 minutes, Rainn Wilson, Ron Perlman and Elijah Wood all came by. It was crazy. The film I was there to see, Bone in The Throat, was just ok. I really don't have much else to say about it, decent performances, decent direction, pretty good cinematography but a story that falls really flat in the final act with moments of brutal violence.
Next up it was the North American premiere of Ryan Gosling's Lost River, his directorial debut. The film is far out and his work in Drive and Only God Forgives with Director Nicolas Winding Refn has really made an impression on him. I was really tired and the movie is slow in spots, haunting in others, and in all honesty I think I love it. I'm not sure yet though, expect a full review soon. Lost River hits theaters and digital April 15th. My favorite part of the night was when Gosling introduced the film he said, " I wanted to have my North American debut in Austin at SXSW because I hear you like to keep it weird...Well let's just see how weird you like to keep it." Afterward during the Q&A in which I actually asked a question, a woman got up, interrupted the proceeding and https://youtu.be/mD0pbINaxto">asked her girlfriend of 11 years to marry her. It was quite a magical night. See you tomorrow!
