Okay, this has been a long time coming: I have a beef with Fresno Filmworks. I appreciate that they exist because they give us the opportunity to see some independent films that we’d have to otherwise wait to watch on DVD. Of course the pretense being that you even wanted to watch said film in the first place. I love watching movies, but I have to say that as of late, Fresno Filmworks has been bringing in films that I could not care less to view. I don’t know how they go about choosing the films they screen, but recently they’ve been TEH SUCK! But that’s for another day. Tonight their monthly screening is the film The Country Teacher.(*yawn*). Sorry, maybe I’m just ignorant or uneducated or whatever, but I’d rather see something like Paper Heart (which opened in limited engagement last week) than this. But if this film floats your boat, you should totally attend the screening tonight going on at the Tower Theater at 5:30pm and again at 8:15pm. The tickets are $10 for general admission and $8 for student and senior citizens. And if you do attend, please let me know what you thought of the film, as I might catch it when it’s released on DVD in a few weeks (that’s the other thing… BAH!) because I’ll be at District 9 instead of the Tower District tonight. NYUP!
I'm glad someone finally said what I have been thinking. I've stopped going to the Fresno Filmworks mostly because I have no desire to see the movies they show. Last movie I saw there was Two Lovers and ask Harley, I walked out of that movie hating it, the characters, everything.
I'm all for showing independent movies, but does the majority have to be some drama where every character is despicable or after watching the movie it makes you want to run your car in the garage with the doors closed. First one I saw there was the French comedy Priceless and I loved it. After that, it's been downhill.
I understand that Fresno Filmworks has their core and they don't want to stray from that in fear of alienating them but there's a much wider audience out there and to not take them into consideration is kinda defeating the whole point of Fresno Filmworks. For everyone who wants to see "The Country Teacher" there are at least an equal amount of people (if not more) who want to see a film like "Paper Heart". A more balanced selection is all that I'd like to see with the films that they screen.
Thank you for your criticism, Roque. Picking films for both our series and festival is a thankless and mostly head-scratching task.
Some months, the board takes a risk and is blown away with both unexpected attendance and kudos — like in July with the obscure Swedish film Everlasting Moments. Some months the board takes a risk and falls flat — like with our April festival opener Skills Like This, which looked great on paper but had both below-expected attendance and so-so comments, despite it presumably playing to a younger (read: not our "core") crowd.
Re: picking films … You pose a great question. Since a big part of our goal is to show only first-run films, we have to try and predict which indies will get scooped up and which won’t. Plus, a limited number of distributors will even consider working with us because we're so small compared to the multiplex. Add to this the fact that we often book films 6-8 weeks in advance for marketing needs. All of that makes for a lot of factors to align, simply in terms of logistics. (We didn't even have a shot at Paper Heart, to use your example, because the multiplex has had it booked for weeks.)
From there, we consider the very best of what we can get, which is still a substantial pool of possible films but perhaps not the super star-power indies that you’re thinking of. In a typical month, board members nominate 8-10 films for consideration, the programming director vets the films with the distributors to see if we even have a chance, the board discusses them at length, and then we vote and try to book.
Ultimately, though, the audience votes with their attendance. I know that you’re a loyal Filmworks supporter, in general. So to hear this criticism from you is tough but necessary. All I can say is, the board will continue to grapple with its monthly task – to keep bringing good films to the big screen in Fresno – and we continue to welcome both suggestions and constructive criticism.
Thanks for the insight you have given us, Jeffresno. I understand that issues like these are never as cut and dry as ranting bloggers like myself make things seem and it’s really easy for me to come in and tell Fresno Filmworks that they’re doing it all wrong but I think an open dialogue on how the process for picking films works is helpful.
I love what FF has done so far but the whole reasoning behind this post was not to poop on what’s been created by the group (FF is still the only one of it’s kind here in town and it provides the community with a much needed exposure to the art of film) but rather to make sure that it reaches the widest possible audience as possible. Everyone has different tastes in film and I understand that trying to satisfy everyone is impossible. I just want to make sure that FF continues to do what it does and expand it’s audience at the same time by providing a variety of flavors in it’s films.
Regarding the opening film for the Fresno Film Festival “Skills Like This,” I would have to say that the film was pretty flawed and it sucks to hear that it didn’t bring in as many people as in the past. Actually, I was quite surprised that the film was chosen for the opening night and I kind of started thinking if the only reason it was given that prime spot was because of the SXSW and other awards the poster touted, banking on that to bring in the young people. A bad film is a bad film and although it had it’s redeeming values, overall I would have gone in a different direction for opening night (there were plenty of other higher quality films that played the festival that weekend that would have been a bigger draw). I just hope that the film’s tepid reception doesn’t off put FF in bringing in other “younger” films in the future.
In the past, I’ve blindly attended FF screenings regardless of the movie in sheer support of the group and I’ve always have and will continue to support FF by promoting the screenings here on Dumb Drum as well as other mediums on the internet, which I’m glad to see that FF is doing now more actively in the recent months on it’s own, but I find myself doing this less and less these days. Some movies were better than expected, others fell flat but that’s all subjective. Ultimately I will still be attending FF screenings if the movie appeals to me. There have been times in the past where I’ve been genuinely excited for Friday to come as to go catch a FF screening of a film that I would otherwise have to drive to San Francisco or L.A. to view but it’s been a while and that was my reasoning for this post. I hope that feeling of excitement for a FF screening will return with some better film selections in the future.