Over these months of April and May, we have completed the festival distribution process for some short films I had been working on for just over a year.
Several directors have also written to me, asking what the best strategies are to continue distributing a film after a year on the festival circuit.
It is a very common question, and it does not have a single answer. There are many considerations you can take into account, depending on the type of project and the situation you are in.
How many festival submissions have you made for your film?
How many selections have you secured? What kind of festivals?
What budget have you allocated to distribution?
What are your goals? Have you achieved them?
This last question is one of the most important you can ask yourself, and one that very few directors consider.
Before starting distribution, you should set clear goals that allow you to assess whether the final result has met your expectations or not. This result allows you to set your next steps in a more coherent way.
Here are some examples of goals you can set before starting distribution:
- Get to know the festival circuit.
- Secure many festival selections.
- Recoup your investment and make some money from your film.
- Start moving your next project, whether short films or a feature film.
- Raise awareness of your new production company.
- Learn how a film is distributed.
- Meet people and travel to festivals.
- Get a Goya nomination.
- Compete for the Oscars.
- Etc.
It is about creating clear, well-defined goals. Keep in mind that festival distribution is a means to achieve something, but not an end in itself.
For example, avoid setting goals such as getting many selections or making money from festival distribution; instead, consider whether it is the best path to gain traction in the market, secure sales, and get a theatrical release.
If you are making short films, festivals can help you get known, connect with your audience, build an audience, and network to meet future collaborators, festival programmers, producers, and distributors. These relationships can lead to new projects in the future.
With these goals, it is much easier to decide what the best option is to continue with distribution.
These are three possibilities you could consider:
#1 Keep submitting to festivals for up to two years
It is one of the most common options, but before making this decision, review the number and type of festivals you have submitted to.
With intensive distribution, over the course of a year you can submit a short film to around 400 festivals. If you have done half that number in a year, or in a year and a half (bearing in mind that in the first months you submit to few festivals), then you could consider continuing with distribution a bit longer.
Above all, it may be interesting to continue if you still have festivals left in a specific genre, or internationally. In other words, if your initial goals have not yet been met and you still have room to manoeuvre.
You can also consider continuing with some festivals if it has gone very well and you have made some money. If you now have a budget, you can target interesting festivals that charge submission fees and where you could not submit in the first year.
In any case, it is not about accumulating selections without a clear goal, just for the sake of having an impressive number.
#2 Start with sales and VOD platforms
After a year on the festival circuit and having achieved some success, it is possible that you may have purchase options from sales agents. You can also start pitching the short film to TV channels and VOD platforms.
Depending on that success, you can start before the year is up. But it is always advisable to wait a little before closing a deal with a sales agent, at least until after six months.
You also need to consider whether it is worth having the short film in sales exclusively and not being able to release it online for years.
On this topic, you can read this post about how to negotiate the sales of a short film.
#3 Release the short film online
This is the option I have been considering most lately. If you have distributed your short film for just over a year, combining selective and intensive distribution and it has worked well, you can consider an online release.
You can do it on platforms such as Vimeo, YouTube, or Facebook.
A good example of how well this strategy can work is the case of the animated short Sidewalk, by Celia Bullwinkel.
This release allows you to give the short film a second life, reach a different and broader audience, and also leverage its festival success as a way to increase visibility.
This strategy would have limitations, especially if you can qualify for the Oscars, in which case you should wait. It is also interesting to combine several options; for example, you could continue with some festivals for a second year while also having the short film online.
What is your experience?
As I said at the beginning, it depends a lot on each project. For that reason, I would love to know what you usually do in these cases and which strategies have worked best for you.
How long do you usually keep a film on the festival circuit?
What has the result been? Have you achieved your goals?