SFFS Film Arts Forum: Pitch Perfect December 5, 2011

You know you've got it: that million-dollar idea, that gripping storyline, that perfect character for the next indie hit. But, as you buttonhole your dream producer/investor/studio head/angel investor in the elevator or film festival lounge, will you dazzle them with your eloquence or will you bumble it and blow your big chance? There is an art and craft to the pitch—tried-and-true strategies that can determine whether your film resonates with industry decision makers or falls on deaf ears.

The next Film Arts Forum lays bare the mechanics of effective pitching for documentaries and narrative features. Four industry experts will draw on real life experiences, ranging from insider tips to amusing anecdotes. A live session with local filmmakers pitching their projects will be followed by critiques offered by the panel with audience input and response.

Panelists: Carlton Evans, Jennie Frankel Frisbie, Bingham Ray, Michele Turnure-Salleo, David Winton.

Carlton Evans is a San Francisco–based independent film producer and screenwriter whose productions have screened at top festivals worldwide including Sundance, Tribeca and Rotterdam. He is also the cofounder and director of the Disposable Film Festival, currently in its fourth season, which celebrates achievements in new-media filmmaking internationally. Evans produced and cowrote the documentary feature Connected and the short Yelp and was a creative consultant on the narrative feature The Woods, all of which premiered at Sundance 2011. He was the associate producer and director of distribution of The Tribe (Sundance 2006), which was singled out by the New York Times, Variety and the Sundance Institute for its groundbreaking distribution strategy. Evans has taught film theory, art history and architecture at Stanford, SF State University and SF Art Institute and lectures worldwide about film and new media. He holds a PhD in Art History and Film Theory from Stanford University.

Jennie Frankel Frisbie is a founder of Magnet Management, “a passionate advocate for screenwriters.” Founded six years ago as a literary boutique with a handful of select clients, Magnet has since grown into one of the most well-respected management companies in the entertainment industry, with over fifty clients thriving in film and television careers. Magnet is fueled by its founders’ relentless drive to attract the best writers in entertainment and help their clients realize—even exceed—their personal goals. The company maintains its relevance by balancing passion with pragmatism, always encouraging clients to write what they love while remaining fiercely practical about each writer’s best career options.

Bingham Ray is the Film Society's newly appointed Executive Director. Prior to coming to San Francisco, Ray served as the first run programming consultant to the Film Society of Lincoln Center, executive consultant to the digital distribution company SnagFilms and adjunct professor at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Before that Ray held two posts during his three-year tenure at the Los Angeles-based production company Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, president of Kimmel Distribution and president of creative affairs; served as president of United Artists during a period when the company acquired and/or produced many highly acclaimed films such as No Man’s Land, Bowling for Columbine and Hotel Rwanda; and founded October Films and served as its copresident until its sale to USA Networks in 1999. Some of October Films’ credits include Secrets & Lies, The Apostle, The Celebration, Lost Highway and Breaking the Waves.

Michele Turnure-Salleo heads the Film Society’s Filmmaker Services department and oversees grants, residencies and project development programs. She is a producer and director with over 17 years experience in the United State, Australia, France and Canada. As an independent producer, and later as a staff producer for the Banff Center for the Arts, Associate Director of Film Arts Foundation, and in her current position as Director of Filmmaker Services, she has helped guide hundreds of independent film projects through development, production and distribution. Turnure-Salleo was associate producer on the Oscar Nominated Regret to Inform. She has also taught extensively in the US and abroad and has served on funding and award panels nationally. Michele Turnure-Salleo holds a BFA in Film from the University of New South Wales and a MFA in Film from the University of British Columbia.

David Winton is a co-founder of Winton/duPont Films, a New York and San Francisco-based company that produces television documentaries, commercials, and short-form films. He was the executive producer and producer/director of Big Thinkers, a television documentary series about the world’s great scientists and technologists, for TechTV. Other producing and directing credits include PBS’s Code Rush, a one-hour documentary about Silicon Valley; The Crash, a two hour primetime special about the crash of 1929 for the History Channel and Learning the Hard Way, about California’s public education crisis for the Discovery Network.

Moderator
Michael A. Behrens

Official Website: http://www.sffs.org/content.aspx?catid=22&pageid=2564&TitleId=