Yesterday the shortlist with the 15 selected short films competing for Oscar nominations was finally published. Among them is Distancias by Susan Béjar, which we are distributing from Selected Films Distribution.
This is great news for the short film. Distancias reaches the shortlist after a year and a half on the festival circuit, with 126 selections and no less than 69 awards.
Moreover, we’ve done this journey in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. We started the distribution strategy before lockdown, but the premiere didn’t happen until July at the Elche Independent Film Festival, although it should have been at the Madrid Community Short Film Week, which was postponed until November.
In this regard, one of the keys in the distribution of Distancias has been adaptability, working in a scenario of great uncertainty and being very well organized for online work.
Keep in mind that each project is different and requires an analysis of both internal and external factors. In these last two years, external factors have been especially decisive.
When we started designing the distribution strategy, we had to consider that the national premiere was already committed (internal factor) and that festivals were starting to change dates, postpone, and even cancel (external factors).
Therefore, we decided to start with an intensive national strategy with two main objectives: take advantage of festivals that were happening, whether online or in-person, and try to reach the Goyas that same year.
This strategy worked very well.
In 2020, the short film achieved no less than 35 national selections (9 qualifying for the Goyas), coming on very strong in September, October, and November, taking advantage of the first in-person festivals after some very tough months.
We managed to submit it for the Goyas and it reached the shortlist.
Internationally, we had to make very difficult decisions, since if we only bet on a strong premiere at a Class A festival or one with an international premiere requirement, we could be delayed for a long time and it could harm the short film. Some festivals like Cannes or Locarno had to cancel their editions or significantly reduce their programming.
In this regard, we bet on important festivals but without an international premiere requirement, in such a way that allowed us to try several options at the same time. Many of these festivals are Oscar qualifiers, so from the beginning this was also one of our objectives.
In this type of strategy, you have to carefully evaluate these festivals, since most charge fees and you have to control spending very carefully.
Along these lines, we managed to participate in two qualifying festivals: the Edmonton Festival in Canada, which took place in September and also allowed qualification for the Goyas, and Cleveland, where it won the award for Best International Short Film, which qualifies for the Oscars.
In the case of Cleveland, keep in mind that we submitted in the early deadline in July 2020, but the festival didn’t take place until April of this year.
In addition to these festivals, we also participated in other very interesting ones like Cabbagetown, Cordillera, Weiterstadt Open Air, Pittsburgh, Figari, or Lenola, but they are not qualifiers.
Don’t limit yourself only to this type of festival.
Keep this very much in mind when you work on distributing your short film. Distancias has “only” participated in two Oscar-qualifying festivals and has been rejected by many others (and a third, Tehran, which was added this year).
In these two graphs you can see the evolution of selections since we started in 2020 and throughout 2021:
In 2020 you can clearly see the effect of the strategy on selections, with unstoppable growth from August onward, with 11 selections in September, 10 in October, and no less than 15 in November.
During 2021 they remained very stable, with a very good second half despite being the second year.
You can see the complete list of selected festivals and awards on the distribution page at selectedfilms.com.
Susan’s involvement throughout the entire process has been fundamental to these results, attending all the festivals she could, as well as Inés and Aitana from the Selected Films team and collaborators like Toño and Mario from Tomahawk Digital Cinema Services.