New York Times

And the Film Deal Goes to…an Outsider

By Sharon Waxman (excerpted)

A new crop of movie entrepreneurs tested their wares at the Toronto International Film Festival over the last week, and several had cause to be pleased with the results.

First, “Thank You for Smoking” a political satire financed by David O. Sacks, a founder of the Internet payment company PayPal, was wooed by two suitors, Fox Searchlight and paramount Classics (with Paramount standing by its claims to have a deal as of yesterday, though Mr. Sacks declared he had sold the project to Fox).

Fox Searchlight also spent $6.5 million for “Trust the Man,” a romantic comedy by the director Bart Freundlich, financed by Sidney Kimmel, the founder of Jones Apparel Group. A concert film, “Dave Chappelle’s Block Party,” financed by the real estate entrepreneur Bob Yari, sold to Focus Features’ Rogues division for $6.5 million.

And “ Brokeback Mountain,” about a 20-year romance between cowboys, financed by Bill Phlad, whose family owns the Minnesota Twins, emerged as one of the most talked about films at the festival. It already has a distributor, Focus Features.

Except for the last film, all of these are “independent” in the most basis sense: paid for by these individuals and a few other investors who believed in the material. And if Hollywood has expressed skepticism about the affluent neophytes who have entered the business in the past few years – mainly Internet, retail and trust-fund tycoons – this, their first real crop of movies entering the marketplace, may indicate that they have a future in the industry.

“I’m impressed,” said Mark Gill, president of Warner Independent Pictures, who bid on a couple of movies at Toronto. “This wave of investors is far more savvy than the folks we saw five or 10 years ago. They really understand that a lot more of this determined by ‘how good is the movie,’ rather than ‘what does the spread sheet look like.’”

Mr. Gill has several movies on his slate from outside financiers, and one was screened at the festival: “Everything Is Illuminated,” based on Jonathan Safran Foer’s best seller about an American Jew searching for his roots in Ukraine. It was financed by Marc Turtletaub, a recent arrival to the film industry, whose family founded the Money Store, the lending company.

“ North Country,” a drama staring Charlize Theron that was also shown at the festival, was financed by Jeff Skoll, a co-founder of eBay, will be distributed by Warner Brothers.

Not all the independent financed movies at the festival attracted interest from buyers, however. Mr. Kimmel’s company has not yet found a distributor for “Neverwas,” a psychological drama starring Aaron Eckhart and Sir Ian McKellen.

“Winter Passing,” an abstract film about an actress seeking to understand her family’s past, did not sell either. Mr. Yari, who financed it, decided to distribute it himself.

Still, “even I was surprised,” he said, that so many of the festival’s films had sold. Mr. Yari, who has been financing his own movies for a few years, is beginning a distribution arm. “I shouldn’t be,” he added about his reaction. “But some of the guys who came in came with the same agendas as guys with capital in the past. But they are doing good, quality films and being smart about it.”

At the 2004 festival, Mr. Yari showed his movie “Crash,” which sold to Lions Gate and has gone on to become a sleeper hit.

Another new arrival made a splash at this year’s festival, on the distribution side. Philippe Martinez, a partner in the new company Bauer Martinez Distribution, bought the hotly sought drama “Harsh Times,” by the writer and director David Ayer. The film stars Christian Bale as a violent, disturbed ex-military man who teeters between finding employment on the Los Angeles police force and falling into drugs and mayhem in the city’s slums.

Both Lions Gate and Warner Independent were outbid by Mr. Martinez, a virtual unknown on the art-house scene. He said he would Move to Los Angeles from London next week to lead the new company, which he said had a 200 million annual budget to finance and distribute movies. It is backed by a British company, Templar Films. He aims to release 12 films next year, he said.

Mr. Ayer, a successful screenwriter who was impoverished until recent years, financed most of “Harsh Times” with his own money after Hollywood studios declined to back the film. Mr. Martinez said he understood that passion, and shared it.

“A director has to feel you love his movie, and you’re passionate about it, and going to go to war for it,” he said. “One thing we have, aside from money, is passion.” Mr. Martinez said he was financing other independent productions, including “I Could Never Be Your Woman,” staring Michelle Pfeiffer, and “The Flock,” starring Richard Gere, which begins shooting next month.

New producers like Mr. Martinez, Mr. Yari and Mr. Sacks seem to be infusing the art-house industry with excitement, bringing with them a newcomer’s fervor for cinema.

“It’s exciting for me as a producer, because they’re a potential money source,” said Andrea Sperling, a producer of “Harsh Times” and “The Quiet,” which was also at the festival. “Any time you can come up with money outside the studio system, you’re going to make a movie you couldn’t make within it. It’s always that: people don’t want to take the risk, like on ‘Harsh Times,’ which everyone recognized was an amazing script, but it read too dark.”

But the festival, Mr Yari cautioned, had the best independent financed projects. “You’re seeing the filtered of that game, of people putting their heart and soul into the movies,” he said. “That’s a difficult game, and a high-risk one.”

Bill Horberg, a Hollywood veteran who in August joined Sidney Kimmel Entertainment as the president of production, also sounded a note of caution. “ Hollywood is littered with the corpses of people who came to town, spent their own money and were subject to ridicule,” he said. “We’re hoping we are actually in the process of creating a business that can be a long-term, successful enterprise, that can be a place that is filmmaker-driven, talent-driven, where people want to be.”