Is the cart ahead of the horse if the horse is backing up?

Not high on our list of priorities right now, but something to keep in mind come March:

From So You Wanna ... Web site.

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Once you have some type of finished product (even if it's just video) you'll need to start hitting the festival circuit. Film festivals are essentially singles bars: studios and distributors who are looking for content mingle with aspiring artists who have made films, and everyone wants to go home with someone.To enter a festival, you will need to get your hands on a list of many of the festivals held across the country, when their deadlines for entry are, and how to obtain an entry form. The best place for all this information is on the web at www.marklitwak.com/filmfes.htm. Some of the most famous independent festivals are:

• Sundance (Park City, Utah)
• Slamdance (Park City, Utah)
• IFFM - Independent Feature Film Market (New York, NY)
• SXSW - South by Southwest (Austin, Texas)

Festivals can cost as little as $10 or as much as $100 to enter, so you may have to be frugal. Typically, you send off a video copy of your film, plus the entry form and fee, and if you have been able to generate any publicity about your project, throw that in too. Convincing your local artsy newspaper to drop by the set one day will be a good way to get press coverage, and the people reviewing festival applications would rather read those than have to sit through another hour of home video footage. Sell yourself.

If you start getting into festivals, you will want to up the stock of your project by holding distributor screenings. Filmmakers typically hold one of these in LA and NYC. The idea is that you rent out a nice small theater or screening room, invite distributors and studios to send someone to attend your screening, and then have them appraise your project and bid against one another to purchase the rights from you. If you think you've never heard of a distributor, you're wrong. All the major movie studios -- Sony, Warner Brothers, MGM/UA, Disney, Fox, etc. -- do a lot of distribution. A good way to find one would be to see who distributed a movie that you really liked or thought was like yours. Check out http://www.imdb.com/ to find the credits on almost any movie ever made.

To find a place to screen your movie, just call a local art house theater and ask them if and when they have space free. You may have to rent it, but then again, they may be interested in hyping their Indie feel by giving it to you gratis. To find the addresses and phones of a bunch of theatres near you, you can use the yellow pages, or you can go to http://www.moviefone.com/ and type in your zip code and nearby zip codes.

Remember, the ultimate goals of a filmmaker are to have the project distributed to theatres around the country, and to be recognized as a talent and offered financing for future projects. Festivals and distributor screenings will be your prom and if all goes well, you'll be well on your way to living a cushy lifestyle amongst fabulous celebrities.

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Perhaps, however, we should focus on getting this thing made first.