HOW TO BUILD A FUNDING STRATEGY

Public funding bodies playing an important role in the process of film financing. The lecture provides an insight into the thinking of funders and what they expect.

How to choose the proper funding organization. How to build a productive and trustful cooperation with funders. The right moment for an application. Developing a reasonable production structure. How to cooperate after the application succeeded. How to react if your application failed. What you never should do.

HOW ONE SHORT FILM CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE

Feature Launch’s 2018 Creative Talk 1 will host Serbian film-maker Stefan Arsenijević, who will talk about his personal experiences as film director. In 2003. his short film (A)torsion won Golden Bear at Berlinale, European Film Award and was nominated for an Academy Award (Oscar) in short live action film category. Later on, he took part in an omnibus film Lost and Found which opened Berlinale’s Forum and directed his first feature film Love and Other Crimes that premiered in Berlinale’s Panorama. Arsenijević will discuss perks as well as disadvantages of big success, short films as platform to explore your own personal film world and challenges of European co-productions.

HOW TO SURVIVE IN THE BIG JUNGLE OF CO-PRODUCTION MARKETS

Midpoint Feature Launch’s 2018 Plenary Lecture by Alessandro Gropplero is a complete survival kit for emerging producers ready to explore the “wild” and diverse world of international co-production markets. The plenary will focus on how to best choose the market for your project, when is the right time to expose yourself, what materials you are supposed to prepare and whom you could try to meet, always keeping in mind that not every market fits your project so before taking any decision better to know what you are exactly looking for.

TRUTH OR DARE: THE KEY TO FINDING A WAY IN

We all want the same thing, breaking into the industry. Some do, some don't and some will and some won't. Obviously, there are many different reasons why some make it and some don't, but if having to single out one primordial trait, it's honesty as honesty travels, honesty touches and that's exactly what we'll be delving into here: getting honest with your characters, your team, the industry and most importantly, yourself.

DOs AND DON’Ts IN (SHORT) FILM SALES

New Europe Film Sales is Warsaw-based directors’ driven boutique sales company where Marcin Łuczaj is
responsible for acquisitions and short film catalogue. The company is known as talents discovery label and work with great directors such as Ruben Östlund, Tomek Baginski, Magnus von Horn and Qiu Yang, among others.
Among company's short films line-up there are 10 Oscar short-listers and the 2017 winner – Sing by Kristof Deak as well as Cannes, Berlinale, Sundance winners. This plenary will address topic of reaching worldwide audience and when to think about the distribution in a production process. Where and when to find a sales agent? What’s the role of a sales agent in various stages of your project? How to find a right sales agent for your film? How to prepare for your premiere?
DOs and DON’Ts in working with sales agents, festival strategies, marketing and pitches at parties. Who's actually buying and what's kind of shorts actually work and attract buyers?

LESSONS FROM ONLINE DISTRIBUTION

In an increasingly digital world, how to approach VOD distribution? This lecture will be about the basics of VOD: what are the main legal and economic aspects, the main business models, and how to prepare for it. With Feature Launch’s 2018 Digital Distribution Specialist Océane Portal we will take a look at what the marketplace looks like today and the trends for the next years as well as study several business cases from Under The Milky Way’s distribution experiences. 

THE ROLE OF A SALES AGENT

Feature Launch’s 2018 Sales and Festival Expert Olimpia Pont Cháfer will examine the role of a sales agent: when and how to access sales agents; important markets & festivals; finding the right agreement; the relation between sales agents, producers and distributors; festival strategies and more.

MARKETING AS STORYTELLING

Overstressed, overworked and overextended, producers and directors rarely rate marketing as a priority when preparing their projects for development, shooting and release, viewing it as an afterthought at best and a luxury at worst. Little do they realize that working on the marketing side of things early and consistently enough solves many of the challenges they will face when their project ventures into the world. The lecture centers around the notion that film marketing could, and should, be viewed as an adjoining part of the storytelling process for nascent projects and eventual films. We will keep revisiting this notion throughout the marketing timeline, from deciding on SWOT analysis, positioning and benchmarking, to producing materials that best articulate the aforementioned marketing decisions to the industry and the audience. Because film marketing is not only about the films we make, but also the stories we tell.

EUROPEAN FILM FINANCING SOURCES

The plenary lecture of Danijel Hočevar, Head of Studies and Producer Consultant of Feature Launch’s 2018, will explore the main characteristics and different possible financing sources for film and audiovisual production, available in Europe today, from public support to market sources and from fiscal / tax incentives to private equity.

HOW TO PITCH YOUR FILM – 6 QUESTIONS FOR THE PITCH

To pitch your project means to know everything about your project, to be aware of its strengths as well as of its weaknesses. The lecture will introduce in the essential elements of a pitch and underline the possibilities to include your specific vision in the presentation. A focus will be put on the elements that help writers, directors and producers to analyze the status quo of the project and to find a language to promote your current story to decision makers.

Project Development – A View of the Producer

Danijel Hočevar will in his plenary lecture explore the creative relationships between the producer and the director (and writer). How to develop the same creative idea and avoid possible different views, approaches and some-time even disagreements? What is the (right) role of the producer during the development? How to discuss the creative and other aspects of the project with your director? How to convey a (common) vision of the future film? This are just a few questions each producer is addressing when developing the main idea of the pro-ject together with the director (and writer) during the development, usually the most creative pro-cess for the whole creative team. Part of the lecture will also be dedicated to the main characteristics of the development financing from European perspective.

Film Analysis : Manchester by the Sea

The second lecture by Elma Tataragić will be the analysis of the Oscar award-winning film Manchester by the Sea (2016)
directed by Kenneth Lonergan. Film received two Academy Awards, for the Best Original Screenplay for Lonergan and for the
Best Actor for Casey Affleck. It will be a comparative analysis of the script and the film focusing basically on the structure,
characters and their development, narrative and the visual approach.

Ten Jokes that Will Teach You Everything You Need to Know About Screenwriting

In truth, it takes most people a lifetime to learn how to write a screenplay, and even the most accomplished screenwriters never quite feel that they have truly mastered the art of creating screenplays.  Despite this, we are often tempted by the promise that some magic rules exist that can instantly teach us how to write a script.  And, in the event that such magic rules really existed, it would also be convenient, if these rules were simple, easy to learn, and and maybe even entertaining.  So, in this hourlong lecture, we will not actually solve all the problems that screenwriters and directors have when writing films, but we will explore some common concerns and open up some discussion about some basic principles that could maybe be useful. And hopefully, once or twice we might even laugh a little.

FROM LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT TO OSCARS

Čedomir Kolar, MIDPOINT Feature Launch 2018 Guest Producer will share his vision with workshop participants about the role of the producer.
“Producers' work is a complex job. It’s also an art but also a stressful pleasure. The frontier between pleasure and stress depends only on us. The major pleasure is to see the film exist, live and travel. The stress is the responsibility of making it exist.”

Off the Beaten Tracks

Thanos Anastopoulos, MIDPOINT Feature Launch 2018 Guest Director, will explore, during his open dialogue with participants the wanderings between scriptwriting and filming.

PITCH OR PERISH

Public presentations of new projects and professional talent have become widespread and filmmakers and producers must always more master the skills of verbally expressing themselves in brief. The plenary examines what the pitch means for the various players attending a public forum or a one-to-one meeting, what it implies at different levels and how to structure and handle. 

Screenplay - The Origin of the Film

Plenary lecture will focus on the screenplay as the basis and the beginning of the process of filmmaking.
The lecture will focus on both the form and the content of the text as well as on other elements important for the story and its narrative. It is aimed not only at screenwriters and directors but also at producers who are often neglected but are an equally important part of the creative process and can be valuable at the very early stage of the project’s development.
What are the important elements to focus on when developing a script? How to recognize the essence and the core of the script? How to find the “secret ingredient” and to be able to explain the unexplainable? In general, how to read a script in a proper way that will push the project forward and gather the writer/ director/ producer as a team