Search results

Can a Great Trailer Sell an Average Film? Over the years, I've seen buyers request screeners because of a trailer. I've also seen buyers lose interest within minutes after watching the actual film. That makes me wonder whether a trailer's job is really to sell a film, or simply to sell the...

I think another problem is that many decks are still built as development tools rather than financing tools. A producer may understand the world, the characters and the artistic vision perfectly, but investors are often looking for something much simpler: Can this project realistically survive...

I don’t think piracy will ever disappear completely, but the industry is already using far more advanced anti-piracy systems than most people realize. Watermarking, fingerprinting, automated takedowns, regional tracking, AI monitoring… some distributors can now trace exactly where a leak came...

Lately I keep hearing completely different numbers depending on the film, territory and overall market situation. Most partners I speak with still mention around 20% commission as the “normal” range, but I also know sales agents working closer to 10%, especially when producers already bring...

Hi Filmmakers, Technological shifts are reshaping how we shoot. Alongside the traditional green screen, virtual production is locking in its place at a fast pace. But does this shiny new tech really replace everything, or does the tried-and-true chroma key still hold its ground? As the Cinema...

Why Tax Incentives Are Quietly Deciding Where Productions Go in 2026 More producers are beginning to realize that tax incentives are no longer just “extra benefits” they are often the deciding factor behind where a film actually gets produced. In 2026, countries and regions offering faster...

Cannes Day 2 The market feels busy, but the conversations themselves seem far more cautious this year. A lot of meetings quickly shift toward: pre-sales, packaging, recognizable IP, regional partnerships and financial security. One interesting thing so far: there seems to be less “blind...

Streaming platforms and film studios are increasingly recognizing that a large part of the audience is not necessarily looking for completely new worlds but rather for the feeling that movies from the 1990s and early 2000s once created. Over the past few years, it has become clear that...

What I see most often is that people try to fix the deck instead of fixing how the idea translates. By the time you are adjusting slides, structure, or design, the real issue is usually already there. If the core idea doesn’t compress into something instantly clear, the deck will always feel...

It’s good to see the discussion moving in a more practical direction, because Cannes today is much less about discovery and much more about execution. One thing that becomes very clear in 2026 is that buyers are not looking for “good films” in a general sense, they are looking for projects that...

I think both John and norwest touched on something important, but it might be worth bringing this down to a more practical level, because at the end of the day most people are trying to answer a very simple question: where should a project actually go, and why. Right now, we’re not really...

From a Cinema Doktor perspective, this feels less like the industry becoming financial, and more like a structural shift in who actually shapes creative outcomes. Creativity hasn’t disappeared it’s just being pushed upstream, into financing and production strategy long before anything reaches...

Most indie films don’t fail at distribution. They fail because nobody was waiting for them in the first place. We still treat finishing the film as the finish line, when in reality it’s just the starting point. If you don’t have an audience before release, you’re already invisible. Festivals...

Michael, we need to stop blaming the tools and start blaming the "Committee of Fear." The $200M "cheap" look is the visual manifest of a legal disclaimer. The Death of the Frame by 1,000 Notes: Modern studios don't want a "Director’s Vision"; they want "Visual Optionality." They force DPs to...

Hi Simon, Interesting topic this is something most of us run into sooner or later. One example from my side: certain synthetic fabrics (especially deep blues and blacks) tend to shift quite noticeably under different LED sources, often picking up a green or magenta tint on camera that isn’t...

The 10-slide structure works well because it forces clarity. That said, in practice most effective pitch decks don’t always stop exactly at ten slides. Many successful decks end up somewhere between 10 and 15 slides. The core structure usually stays the same, but certain projects benefit from...

Cannes is still the one place where the global film business truly gathers. Regardless of how the market has evolved over the years, a huge concentration of decision-makers is in one city during those days, which is something no other market really replicates. One noticeable shift in recent...

Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming part of the filmmaking workflow. Today AI tools are already used for several things in production and post-production. Some filmmakers use AI for video generation, concept art, storyboards, VFX assistance, automated editing, voice cloning and even...

Drishyam is the kind of film that quietly exposes a myth many filmmakers carry for years. The myth that cinematic impact is born from scale. It isn’t. What truly drives a film like this is discipline. Narrative discipline, visual discipline, and directorial patience. Every scene is built on...

Very accurate observations. Most conflicts in film projects genuinely do not arise from bad intentions, but from what could best be described as “strategic ambiguity” in contract language. At the development stage, the core issue is often not the absence of a lawyer, but the lack of alignment...