Guth Gafa Documentary Festival 2008

Getting Your Documentary Seen - The Future of Distribution

A panel discussion, with audience debate, on the wide range of distribution models available to documentary makers today. The discussion will cover the whole spectrum from the classical distribution models (sales agents and distributors) to the self-distribution models (on-line free distribution), but will focus more specifically on alternative models, where control of distribution and rights ownership often remain with the filmmakers. This alternative arena between the sales agents and free distribution includes grass roots-style distribution (e.g. Brave New Films), parallel distribution networks (e.g. CinemaNet Europe), video-on-demand and streaming (e.g. Universcine), independent online dstribution and download (e.g. indiepix and onlinefilm.org).

Panelists
Jan Röfekamp, President, Films Transit International inc., Canada. (Chair)
Danielle Di Giacomo, Director Documentary Aquisitions, indiepix, USA.
Jim Gilliam, Producer, Robert Greenwald Pictures/Brave New Films, USA.
Arto Halonen, Producer & Director (GG08: Shadow of the Holy Book), Art Films, Finland.
C. Cay Wesnigk, Chairman of the Board, OnlineFilm AG, Germany.

Panelists’ Profiles:

Jan Röfekamp
Jan Röfekamp is President and owner of Films Transit International, one of the longest running, renowned and respected international sales agencies of quality documentaries with offices in Montreal, Amsterdam and New York. They distribute 'high profile' theatrical feature documentaries such as: The Corporation, Metallica: Some Kind of Monster, War Photographer, Crumb, Molly and Mobarak, Family, Lost in la Mancha, Searching for the Wrong Eyed Jesus, Paragraph 175 and many more. After studying film production at the Dutch Film Academy from 1968-1972, Jan Röfekamp co-founded and co-operated film distribution company Fugitive Cinema Holland from 1972 till 1982. He founded Films Transit International 25 years ago. Many of their films are selected for the major film festivals, such as IDFA, Sundance, Berlin and Toronto and win prestigious prizes. He has produced and executive produced dozens of films throughout his career, and participated in numerous seminars and panels.

Danielle di Giacomo
In her position she has signed films including Cocaine Angel, Johnny Berlin, Hole Story, City Unplugged, Sentenced Home, Red Without Blue. DiGiacomo also served as Associate Producer on the documentary, Billy The Kid (Grand Jury Award Winner, South by Southwest, 2007). She has programmed film series in conjunction with the Woodstock Film Festival, Brooklyn Independent Cinema Series, and the Culture Project. She is completing her first feature documentary, Island to Island: Returning Home from Rikers, and is also co-producing the narrative feature, The Promiscuous Materials Project. Danielle represents Indiepix at more than twenty film festivals a year, including Cannes, Sundance, South by Southwest, IFF Boston, Full Frame, the Hamptons, and Woodstock. In addition, Danielle has presented on panels about film distribution at Woodstock Film Festival, Newport Film Festival, Hunter College, Ruff Cutz, IFF Boston, and NewFest. She has also presented academic papers at conferences at Florida State University, the New School, and Central Connecticut College.

Jim Gilliam
Former dot com executive turned activist filmmaker. In the wake of 9/11, Gilliam left his position as chief technology officer of high-profile startup Business.com and devoted his time to more pressing matters. Through MoveOn.org, in 2003, he hooked up with veteran filmmaker Robert Greenwald to research and help produce the groundbreaking documentary, Uncovered: The War on Iraq about the faulty intelligence that led the U.S. to war. Bringing together the world of film, politics, and the internet, "Uncovered" defined a new generation of films -- the grassroots political documentary. Gilliam then co-produced Greenwald's next film, Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism, an unprecedented look at the propaganda techniques employed by FOX News, and produced Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price and Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers. He is also the creator of Brave New Theaters.

Arto Halonen
Arto Halonen has produced and directed numerous films, including the documentary films Shadow of the Holy Book (Guth Gafa 2008) Pavlov's Dogs, Conquistadors of Cuba, The Tank Man, The Star's Caravan, A Dreamer And The Dreamtribe and Karmapa – Two Ways of Divinity. In 2005 the Minister of Culture in Finland awarded Arto Halonen the Finland Prize, the highest annual prize in the arts given by the Ministry of Culture and the state. Among other important prizes, he has received the Humanitarian Award of the European Union in 1998. Halonen is also the founder and the first festival director of the DocPoint - Helsinki Documentary Film Festival.

C. Cay Wesnigk
Chairman of the OnlineFilm AG, a distribution platform for the low-cost distribution and marketing of German and European films via the internet in Europe and the whole world. Author, director and producer of numerous movies, advertising features and documentaries; recipient of the Grimme-Preis 2005 for “Hitler’s Hitparade“; associate director of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Dokumentarfilm (AG DOK), Germany’s largest alliance of independent film producers; a member of the administrative board of VG Bild-Kunst, the collecting society of film makers and independent film producers; specialist of the MEDIA Plus Technical Advisory Group for the MEDIA Pilot Projects Programme.