For several years, the Maryland Film Festival has set up a cluster of tents across from the Charles Theatre and dubbed it the "Filmmaker Tent Village." This year the MFF will see whether it takes a village to make a cinematic revolution. "Filmmakers Taking Charge," a day-long village conference about "reaching audiences," aims to inspire moviemakers at all stages of their careers with the varied possibilities for distribution made available by new media.
Kate Ewald, the festival's director for public-relations outreach and the tent-village coordinator, considers Linas Phillips, the creator of "Bass Ackwards" (see below), a key participant.
Phillips' eccentric road movie has taken a direct route to the audience, using the Sundance Film Festival as the ignition to an immediate broad launch via digital-download and video on demand.
Case studies like Phillips, she says, will be central to the conference, but not in a clinical way. Referring to three scheduled sessions as "roundtables," not "panels," she says organizers will try to foster "a conversation among filmmakers that other filmmakers, and aspiring filmmakers, and film students get to listen to." She wants the experience to resemble a kind of creative "eavesdropping."
The directors on the roundtables will include Ed Sanchez, whose 1999 horror sensation, "The Blair Witch Project," was a creative and commercial inspiration for "Paranormal Activity," and Joe Swanberg, among the most prolific of the "American New Wave" of independent directors ("LOL," "Hannah Takes the Stairs," "Nights and Weekends," "Alexander the Last"). They'll get a chance to exchange war stories and learn whether strategies that used to work are now, well, bass ackwards.
Jason Foster, head of Now We Are Free Records, will be part of a discussion that uses "the music industry as a model for film distribution." Salon.com's Andrew O'Hehir will weigh in on "generating buzz in a digital world."
Ewald has built breakfast, lunch and happy hour into the schedule; admittance comes with your conference badge. And, Ewald says, "Networking is encouraged."
"Filmmakers Taking Charge" will take place from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the first full day of the festival, May 7. Discounted "early bird" registration ends April 30. Contact Ewald at kate@mdfilmfest.com.