Mikael Opstrup writes: Dear Louise, Thanks a lot for your thoughts on the future for documentary. I think you are pointing out the right issues, I will try to address a few of them.

For me this debate started with the question about independent feature film docs and the decreasing TV financing that the filmmakers meet when pitching at the many sessions around Europe and abroad.

It’s been easy to see that over the last 5 years it has become much more difficult and this of course causes frustration. Frustration can be very negative but it can also be the starting point of new ideas and necessary changes. I think this is key issue. Think back, the technical changes have always changed art and the production conditions. And that’s where we are, digitalization and the web is changing almost everything: TV, production, distribution etc.

What is hasn’t changed is storytelling, the need for strong stories is eternal. So – still focusing on documentary and TV – I think we need to see it like this:

Storytelling, no problem. The technical development offers a variety of newshooting and distribution formats, in fact it’s much richer than the existing slot-length tyranny. TV programming, where the film is available online, needs no length limitations. The web, mobiles, VOD etc. opens to all kinds of formats. Where it will take us is extremely difficult to predict and I think we will have to live with the financing-limbo for some years but at a longer perspective I think the development offers more opportunities than restrictions.

Feature length ‘creative documentary’, the format we know today, will have a smaller place in the television of tomorrow. So in terms of financing I think we need to think differently. Of course the national or regional funding will have to

be strengthened. Whether it’s realistic (I’m not thinking of the current financial crisis but beyond this) I’m not sure but it’s for sure necessary. But also other ‘non-media’ funding is important and I could imagine that the sales agent will play a bigger role here – the professionals who know the increasingly fragmented market. We see more and more players who are mediators in finding funding that relates to the subject or the format and I think that today’s sales agents need to go down this road as well.

And again I would like to raise the question of future cinema, which will be totally digital. The cinema is THE place for many creative documentaries but audience wise it’s always been for fiction. Of course the cost reduction from 35mm to bits is one thing but it will probably also open the cinema to sports events, concerts etc, and this could break down the fiction-tradition of this temple and pave the way for documentary.

Enough for now, it’s getting dark in Riga, Latvia where the Baltic Sea Forum in its 15^th year one again holds a variety of wonderful projects that will be pitched in 2 days – and for quite a few of they face some financial difficulties! Yesterday I saw the strong film “Give up Tomorrow” (photo) by Michael Collins and Marty Syjuco – stresses the importance of the documentary genre go and see it!

Let’s keep up discussion …

Mikael Opstrup was a producer of international documentaries since the 90’s. He worked as production Adviser at The Danish Film Institute 1998-2002 and was from 2002 – 2008 co-owner of Final Cut Productions in Copenhagen. He is currently Head of Studies at EDN (European Documentary Network).

Louise Rosen, who started this Doc Discussion writes: Dear Mikael (Opstrup), Reading the posts is uncomfortable – the humiliation and frustration of the filmmakers, the sense from the CEs/funders of being overwhelmed and likewise frustrated. I feel both sets of experiences – as a consequence of representing filmmakers and being approached by filmmakers to represent them. Everyone’s trying to find their way in a profoundly changed and changing world. Right now it’s futile to speculate on the financial potential, or lack thereof, in digital distribution. In any event, there’s nothing to suggest thus far that the digital world will be a robust source of widespread production funding.

What can be done to improve matters – in the near and long term? We share a framework for considering the issues as the documentary form encompasses a broad range of formats and styles. Doc series, and single docs that fit into existing formatted series on TV are doing quite well these days. But for the sake of discussion here, let’s assume we are focused on single, longform films of an hour or feature length and filmmakers whose goal is to reach as wide an audience as possible.

So, what can filmmakers do? What can funders and CEs do? How can we collectively make a more effective case for the value of documentaries?

Demonstrating the power of docs

Are there data and metrics that can be compiled to make a more compelling case for feature docs – to networks, funders and investors? How can making an anthology strand/home for single docs on a network prove or improve their ratings potential? What can be learned about marketing, promotion and branding by all parties?  

Making docs more cost effective/designing new business structures

Are there ways of making production and post-production more cost efficient,

approaches that will help reduce the cost of items such as clearances and insurance? What are new models of sustainability for indie prodcos?

Training

What can filmmakers, network execs and funders learn to do better, particularly in relationship to one another? Leadership skills, communication, talent and project development are among the areas we all need to be better at.

Transparency

The power of shared knowledge – participants can help create “terms of trade” even without official adoption of guidelines.

I want to believe it’s never too late for labor organizing 101 for culture workers (1). But, are we “whistling past the graveyard”? There are now so many aspiring filmmakers, the documentary ecology has been transformed. I’m a Luddite (2) in many respects yet I know there’s little point (and no comfort) in mourning the passing of the old ways. Let’s keep talking about the future.

(1) Means basic lessons (101 is the first year curriculum in any subject) in union-type political organizing. “Culture workers” is a term I first heard from Rudy Buttignol. That’s what we all are, right?

(2) A social movement of textile artisans in England in the early 19th century who tried to destroy the mechanical looms tthey saw were taking away their jobs. Has also come to mean someone who clings to old ways.

Photo: A film from the catalogue of Louise Rosen.

Louise Rosen is a media executive with over 25 years experience in all areas of the international television and film business. She runs an agency specializing in the financing and distribution of documentaries with particular focus on pre-sales and co-productions, and she has been invited to tutor and lecture all over the world.

Charlie Phillips writes: Tue has kindly given us an opportunity to respond to some critical comments about Sheffield Doc/Fest in the last few months on his blog.

We think this blog is brilliant, especially with the recent discussions over the direction of documentary, so we’re certainly not using this opportunity to complain about anyone’s right to express their opinions here. We love documentary for its democracy and its diversity of views – if anyone doesn’t feel we’re serving their needs as doc professionals, then that’s their welcome right. We’re just using our right to reply.

First, we want to respond to Tue’s comments on 7^th June that we were looking a bit provincial at the 2011 festival. There were 21 different countries represented in the film programme, of which the UK and US were just two, and the diversity of delegates attending numbers about 50 different countries.

We think we’re truly international, but regardless, festivals aren’t a numbers game. It’s about showing the best work, and though the process of reducing 2000 submissions to under 200 screened films probably does miss some treats and involves hard decisions, the greater evil would be a tokenistic geographical spread. Public funding for festivals especially involves a need for diversity and spread that doesn’t implicitly reflect quality. We’d be criticised for implementing a quota system – isn’t that the greater evil than a system that puts quality first ? Albeit of course subject to the idiosyncrasies of human programmers.

The other blog we’d like to respond to is Doug Aubrey’s of last week. Many of his criticisms of commissioning and the current risk-averse culture of some

doc funders are accurate and are opinions we sympathise with. But surely it’s not fair to blame us for that? Especially when events like MeetMarket and our year-round training and mentoring opportunities are attempts to support and showcase as many people and projects as possible that need personal attention and matchmade meetings rather than a remote closed one-size-fits-all attitude.

We think that what we do is the polar opposite of the ‘pole-dancing’ pitch scenario in that it’s focused around private meetings and consensual encounters. We try and give you what you want in a way that funders or resource-holders have a chance to understand and respond to consensually. If they show interest, it’s real interest, it’s not constructed by us for show. If they’re not interested, that’s a wider problem of taste that yes, perhaps all of us together need to discuss and combat. But we’re not the enemy in that scenario.

It’s worth stating for the record that all of us at Doc/Fest have a massive passion for documentary and documentary filmmakers, and that you  – the documentary-makers are our top priority. We’re not brand managers, we’re not profit makers, we’re running a festival we love for the benefit of all in the industry making brilliant work, or with the potential to make something beautiful. It’s that naïve and that uncynical.

We’re not perfect, but we are led by you – if you help us to be what you want us to be, then we can build something constructive together.

Charlie Phillips is Marketplace Director at Sheffield Doc/Fest

Comments on the Doc Discussion have been posted on facebook as well. They take different directions. Producers Marie Olesen, Scotland and Sinisa Juricic, Croatia characterise the pitching  as “a fool’s game” and “a showcase of big ego’s from the other side of the table… not a useful tool for film financing”, wheras several acknowledge the contribution of Philippe van Meerbeeck. Mark Daems, producer from Belgium writes: “I’d like to click the ‘like’-button, but in fact I don’t like that Philippe is so close to the truth”.

The debate can, and should, go on but in this round the idea is now to ask Louise Rosen and Mikael Opstrup to make some closing remarks that could very well deal with: What can be done, what’s next? Their texts will be brought asap, before that you may want to read what others have to say:

Simon Kilmurry, very active commissioning editor for POV in the US writes: Hi Tue, This is a fascinating discussion, and Louise (Rosen) and Mikael (Opstrup) make some interesting and troubling observations. Another part of the problem, I think, is the sheer volume of work being produced. We are seeing twice as many films as we did 10 years ago. But resources and slots have not increased commensurately. While we have a few more slots at POV, overall broadcast space has diminished. Thanks for sharing this.

Kilmurry kindly refers to two articles about “The Fate of Documentary”, the first one, with that title, to be found in New York, August 16, written by Leslie Stonebraker – to be responded by guest blogger at POV, Heather McIntosh. I quote the end words of her article, but read both articles in full length, through sites below:

“… Documentary is an amazingly flexible, versatile and innovative form, and its makers and believers have been remarkably creative in applying it and bringing it to audiences. The mainstream presence is new, and it will become part of the documentary history as we move through the changes over time. The mainstream presence certainly expands the documentary conversation, but it is such a small part of the rich form with an even deeper and more nuanced history. Not to mention, an even deeper and more nuanced present.”

Photo: Armadillo, Janus Metz, recently broadcast on POV.

http://www.nypress.com/article-22735-the-fate-of-documentary-film.html

http://www.pbs.org/pov/blog/2011/08/the_fate_of_documentary.php

Iikka Vehkalahti writes: Dear Tue and others. I am delighted, that Louise and Mikael took the cat on the table (or how do you say in it real English?).

Anyway, now after one month out from the position of a commissioning editor (who very often has a quite weak position in his or her own organization) and when writing from  Finland, the former “heaven of documentaries” here are some few sentences. I have written during the last months so much about melancholy and the situation in Finland and in the world, that I don´t want to repeat what has already been written – and maybe the situation was very much worse some 20 years ago: There are more documentaries produced in the world than ever?

But what kind of future and possibilities do we have for that kind of films Louise, Mikael and Tue have in their minds?

Feature length documentaries. When aimed for the big screen they should also get the financing from the same sources as any film aimed for big screens. It means public funding ( Art Councils, Film Funds etc…) and cinema distribution in co-operation with tv-stations,  who will also in the future have interest in having well known, brand products for transmission. The budget for these projects is and will not be huge compared to the fiction films, but big compared to the so called normal docs. But their surviving strategy can not depend on the television.

TV-docs. Television is another platform than festival and cinema distribution. It has to be accepted and seriously considered what kind of docs are best for television (not at festivals or in cinemas). Documentaries were very strongly tied with the television distribution some 10-15 years ago. It has changed when festivals and cinema have become players in that field.  We need to go back to television and to make docs, which will conquer the television of today. Instead of using the television as a funding source for films that aim foremost to big screen or festivals.

Personally I would love to see the life and development of the challenging, demanding real documentary films – very often seen only at festivals. The question is; how to arrange the financing of those?  Rich patrons, public funding? Or different kind of production process: “returning to the origins”: man and  camera?  But in every case we need new steps in the area of the distribution.

So many net platforms have been created for the distribution of documentaries. I don´t know any that functions really well. Why?  For two years we have developed and tried different concepts and one of the solutions is to build a co-operation with broadcasters the same way as has been done with the co-production of individual documentaries.

Co-operation would make possible to charge the fee when downloading the films (what is difficult or impossible to the public broadcasters in most of the cases) even if the sum would be quite small (my guess is somewhere between 1, 99 -2, 99 euros). If and when by a real co-operation of different partners a global reach of the platform can be build, can also these docs reach a substantial amount of  audience.

Iikka Vehkalahti, filmmaker and for many years commissioning editor at YLE, Finland. Famous for his international orientation and pioneer work with for instance Steps for the Future”. Now visiting professor at School of Communication, Media and Theatre at the University in Tampere, Finland. Photo of Viktor Kossakovsky, director of “Belovs”, documentary film favourite of Vehkalahti.

Doug Aubrey writes: Hi Tue, here are some personal comments that I would like to share with you…

I’m glad to see that some of the more – shall we call them – mature protagonists are addressing the issue of the ‘State of the Docs’ across the generation gap at last.

However I have to say that what’s happened is also as a result of the old pitching forum system being hijacked to become a ‘Dragon’s Den’ or ‘Apprentice’ style reality TV show where it’s simply all about money, greed and exploitation – rather than a rigorous platform for a filmmaker’s creative, cultural and political issues to be tested. Indeed one Doc-maker I spoke with compared pitching at IDFA now to being like a performer in a pole dancing bar full of businessmen – only without the dignity!

Still perhaps the worse example of this, is what’s happening at the SIDF (Sheffield, ed.) with its speed pitching, its 1 minute trailer et al culture that favours celebrity filmmakers, shallow ideas and geek/nerd film-making; More to the point it – like many festivals – is rapidly ceasing to be the place where you see difficult, challenging and even experimental works. Instead you can witness 100’s of new film students/ emerging filmmakers (some with a lot of talent) sidling up to TV executives, who mostly are interested in hanging around bars – understandably, far from the maddening crowd – with their pals from the ‘travelling circus’, or hiding in the toilets. They have 12-50 strands to fill a year – with est 2000 films on offer – so somehow sympathise…

SIDF’s trade event calls itself the Meet market for a very ironic reason that’s probably lost in translation (and which the Americans will never understand anyway! – it being a Canadian invention and aw).

Another example of what’s happening, is the evident demise of EIFF (Edinburgh,

ed.)  this year from a through-bred film fest into a delegate/trades event with a few films attached. That the doc programme was curated by/ co-programmed with SIDF should say it all. Anyone ever heard of travelling ‘best of’ programmes?

I’m sorry if I may sound bitter and angry – but it’s because I am.

I have spent the best part of nearly 2 decades working on my current project ‘Minefield’, and instead of smoothing along in the fast lane, am now told instead of a simple: ‘I like/don’t like your film’, ‘it’s not for our marketing mix’, ‘never mind our season’, ‘your content is  not frontline enough for our edgy ‘Diversity’ strand’ etc etc, by privileged young TV execs with very little life – or filmmaking experience!

Sadly the Documentary scene has allowed itself to be hijacked (in the UK at least) by both an economic and cultural elite – who represent a privileged, orthodox and conservative gaze – rather than an auteur, angry or impassioned view on the world.

They make films that deal – mainly with eco issues – that subscribe to a mono-cultural format (the ‘monoform’ as Peter Watkins might say).

Dox are increasingly  both made and commissioned by an elite who – although some do have talent –  for the most part have no financial woes in these hard times, so can in many cases work for very little…. Some even go on to become commissioners after making very few films, in some cases they are “trained” on fast-track schemes to become TV Executives. Weird that, how they can’t understand why we aren’t all like them, but maybe a reason, I think, why many documentaries are now little better than social/war/celebrity porn.

The makers and commissioners have not empathy with and in some case hate their subjects (the worst recent example of this was BBC Scotland’s ‘The Scheme’).

For the most part TV Commissioning and many festivals  are now in the hands of brand managers not filmmakers or Doc lovers even.

Let’s reclaim the territory we’ve lost and find new spaces by all means necessary!

Rise like Lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number  –

Shake your chains to earth like dew

Which in sleep had fallen on you –

Ye are many – they are few

(Percy B Shelley)

Doug Aubrey is a filmmaker from Scotland with an impressive filmography, many times awarded for his work. About his “Minefield” project – http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/875948233/minefield