Idea to improve submission process
A festival programmer posted yesterday to assure filmmakers that their festival watches all films (https://www.reddit.com/r/FilmFestivals/s/Gt7WAeAVdc ). This led to a much warranted discussion about the flaws in the process and a call to action to try to come up with a better system. I had an idea I wanted to share. What if screeners logged the total number of minutes watched during the initial screen. If it’s an obvious No (for whatever technical or narrative reasons cited by screeners/programmers) they are permitted to turn it off and not finish. They then log the minute mark of their stop, and the total number of minutes of the film. Festival then refunds the filmmaker percentage of fee proportional to unwatched minutes. Screeners save time, filmmakers save money, you get de facto feedback by learning when a screener is turning off your film and/or if you weren’t a good fit for the festival. Yes it would be disappointing to learn the screener didn’t “hear you out” - but it would at least be realistic and helpful and more frugal for filmmakers. The refund logistics would probably be annoying for the festival - but it would be made up for by the time saved by not screening the films in their entirety if they’re obvious nos. Is this too wild? At first I thought so, but the more I think about it the more I think it makes some sense. Festivals would of course need to be honest with their refunds etc. for it to work.
EDIT: Not implying that film festivals are greedy or a cash grab whatsoever, I’m genuinely curious if this would be feasible as a kind of win-win compromise to save time and money.