big sky documentary film festival

Panel Discusses the Business of Documentary Filmmaking

By Dillon Tabish, 2-18-08

Today’s documentary filmmakers are heading into uncharted territory and faced with trying to make a living as the landscape of the industry continues to change, according to a panel of filmmakers.

Monday afternoon, the Crystal Theatre featured “The Business of Documentary,” a panel of four filmmakers moderated by Danielle DiGiacomo as part of the annual Big Sky Documentary Film Festival. David Fassio, Mike Steinberg, Simon Kilmurry and Gita Saedi discussed the new features of filmmaking that continue to emerge and the old ones that endure.

“There’s no real scientific way to do this,” said Kilmurry, the executive director of American Documentary | P.O.V.

Saedi, a Chicago native who now lives in Missoula, started working in film in 1991 when it was “absolutely a different world for documentary filmmakers.”

“Today, documentary films have become quite a business and our audiences are growing and growing every year,” said Saedi, who is currently teaching a documentary filmmaking class at the University of Montana. “There’s more projects all the time and more outlets all the time, so in a way it’s kind of a golden day to be a filmmaker.”

While this may sound hopeful for up and coming filmmakers, the panel appeared to agree that one feature of documentary filmmaking remains in tact—don’t expect to become rich from it.

Very few films that get made are released in some version that make any money, let alone big money, said Steinberg, who helps run a film house in St. Louis.

According to Kilmurry, film festivals are great places for filmmakers to meet programmers and talk about their idea or try and land a deal, even if it’s not a big one. But a lot of times, a reality check occurs.

One reason Saedi is optimistic about the future is new technology and burgeoning resources. The neo-video store Netflix, which rents movies online that are sent through the mail, recently made thousands of movies and a wide range of documentaries instantly available for download. Lesser known films that might not make the shelves at a video store now have a greater chance of being seen.

And while the new landscape is somewhat of a mystery, there remain several everlasting aspects and headaches every filmmaker will have to deal with, including getting rights for music and archival footage, finding a worthy agent and capturing the attention of the masses.

But according to Saedi, today’s filmmakers have far more options for getting their “labor of love” on the big screen.

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