Finding a Sales Agent or Producer Representative & What it Means to Your Film

By John Forrest

Once your film is complete, you have to decide how it is going to be seen. Are you going to send it to festivals in hopes that your film stands out from the hundreds of others? Are you planning to self-distribute? Understanding the cost and time it can take to market your film may become overwhelming and do you realise that cost can be far more than the budget put aside for the actual filming process? Are you going to attend one of the many markets (AFM, MIPCOM, etc.), in the hopes that some distributor will look at your film and decide that yours is the one that will increase their company revenue? While all, or some of these may be your choice, you still must understand the politics of these particular roads. As a first time filmmaker, I found that the best path to success for my film was to find a Producer Representative/Sales Agent.

I believe that having a Producer Representative/Sales Agent for your film accomplishes two very important keys to a film’s success:

1) The agent knows the latest tastes, and has an inside track to what each distributor is looking for. This makes it easier for filmmakers, like myself, who live in the middle of the country, to access companies that might not otherwise ever take a look at a small indie film.