Toronto Festival Challenges Indie Film to Evolve

After a year in which independent film has taken a beating, this year’s Toronto Film Festival -- opening on Thursday evening with “Creation,” a film about Darwin -- will be a litmus test on the evolving state of serious cinema and its prospects for survival.

A quick 2009 recap may be in order: Sundance led to a few purchases, all small. Cannes was great; almost no one bought anything and those who did paid for marketing budgets rather than film rights.

The distribution landscape has been reduced to a wasteland of failed companies (Picturehouse, Senator). Those mainstays that survive (Fox Searchlight, Focus) have their familiar niches and defined tastes.

Understood: independent film is in crisis. Now the question is: What will follow? Have filmmakers learned to adapt? Are new forms of distribution proving viable? Are the green shoots of renewal ready to appear?

“This is uncharted territory for me,” said producer Dean Zanuck, who is bringing his first independent feature, “Get Low,” a Southern Gothic tale starring Robert Duvall and Bill Murray, to the festival and seeking distribution. (Click to see what else is up for grabs in Toronto.)

Realism is the byword for Zanuck, despite his own Hollywood ties (he is son of producer Richard, grandson of mogul Darryl F.)

“Companies are dropping like flies,” he acknowledged, referring to his search for financing. “But if you want it badly enough, and you search long and hard for it, you can find it. It took us a while but there’s money to be had. “

“I’m finding the mood is now changing,” said Mark Urman, who left the cash-strapped Senator to start Paladin just a few months ago. “Filmmakers are picking themselves up by their bootstraps and finding new formulas and a new realism.”

What many see as a correction to the crazed bidding wars of the 1990s has claimed untold numbers of films that have gone without distributors in the past few years, and seen the demise of indie divisions and companies.

That brutal adjustment is guiding strategies going into Toronto.

Cynthia Swartz, a longtime publicist and festival veteran, observed: “People aren’t looking for big numbers in advances anymore. They’re looking for big numbers in prints and advertising. They’ve gotten past the question of big advances.”

“I think the sellers are going to have to rethink the way they put their movies out there,” said Tom Bernard, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Classics. “They’re going to have to be more selective. They have to change their tactics. It won’t be the bidding wars of years past. No more moneybags -- getting burned in overpaying situation.”

Some new players have emerged in recent months: Bob Berney with his new company Apparition; Summit and Overture are still buying independent films, though Overture has moved its strategy away from arthouse films.

Still -- “these are all sorts of cautious people,” warned Bernard.

 

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