Fighting Fire with Fire
The Newport Beach Film Festival rejected my film, “The Broken Hearts Club.” No problem, it’s all a part of the process we independent filmmakers go through when we decide to submit our films to film festivals. It’s not like I haven’t had films rejected by film festivals in the past. And it’s not like I haven’t had film accepted into film festivals in the past. In 2007 I had four short fils accepted into the LA Shorts Fest at the same time. Later in 2007 a film for which I was consulting producer and editor won a Best in Fest award and later a Silver Award for Excellence in the use of music in a short film. I’ve been on both sides of the coin.
But when the Newport Beach Film Festival decided that I wasn’t fit to be a volunteer at their festival because I wrote sarcastic comments about the festival on my blog–well, that changed things. How dare they. There is such a thing as the First Amendment.
To wit, I have since blogged incessantly on various platforms and social media about this event. Earlier today I sent a press release to the LA Times, the Daily Pilot, to the Orange County Press Telegram and the Long Beach Press Telegram. I’ve also issued a formal press release on PRLog. Later today I plan to submit another release to Moviemaker Magazine and Filmmaker Magazine.
Here are some links.
http://www.prlog.org/10205425-cerritos-filmmaker-banned-from-newport-beach-film-festival.html
http://dailypilot.com/dailyblogger/bbailey/
http://www.comstockfilms.com/blog/tony/2009/03/24/are-film-festivals-reading-filmmakers-blogs/
Keep us posted Angelo!