Frequently Asked Questions
When does MIFF 37ºSouth Market occur?
How can I participate in MIFF 37ºSouth Market?
Is the information I provide confidential?
How long until I find out if my application has been successful?
Is it feature film projects only?
Can I return to the market with the same project?
What sort of financiers come to MIFF 37ºSouth Market?
What’s the best preparation for the meetings?
How can I get tickets to MIFF films, including Opening and/or Closing night?
When does MIFF 37ºSouth Market occur?
MIFF 37ºSouth Market occurs 02 – 05 August 2012 - around the opening weekend of MIFF.
How can I participate in MIFF 37ºSouth Market?
If you are a producer based in Australia or New Zealand and you have a feature film project (or, better still, a slate of projects) ready to show to distributors and sales agents, then go the CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS section of the MIFF 37ºSouth Market division of this MIFF website and complete the relevant application form. If you want to pitch scripts, then apply for MIFF 37ºSouth: Bridging the Gap; if you have a completed movie that is seeking distribution or a foreign sales agent, then apply to MIFF 37ºSouth: Breakthru Screenings. Alternatively, if you are a producer who is seeking new material to develop and/or finance, then you may wish to attend MIFF 37ºSouth PostScript&Direct (to meet with writers/directors) and/or 37ºSouth’s Books at MIFF (to find the latest books ripe for screen adaptation) – you will find an application form for this in the CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS section as well. As MIFF 37ºSouth Market is purely designed for producers and sales agents/distributors to meet each other in a jam-packed schedule on a closed-access market floor, if you work for another agency or festival, MIFF 37ºSouth Market is not for you – your best interface is with the MIFF 37ºSouth Market & Accelerator public & industry partnership events, ticket purchases for which are open to all, as well as with main MIFF and its hundreds of films, Q&A sessions, panels and other special events.
Is the information I provide confidential?
The MIFF 37ºSouth Market application process asks for very specific financing information on your projects to assist the invited distributors and sales agents to make their decisions on whether or not your project is something they are interested in meeting you about. We are aware that this information is both confidential and sensitive and we assure you that it is ONLY shared with the invited buyers (sales agents and distributors) and is not circulated any wider than those invited companies that are taking diarized meetings at the market with the registered producers.
How long until I find out if my application has been successful?
Applications close in April. Generally, MIFF 37ºSouth Market will contact you in May to let you know if you have been successful or not. For some producers, at this stage, we will seek further information and place your application in reserve and contact you again in June based on the new information you provide.
Is it feature film projects only?
Yes. MIFF 37ºSouth Market exists to connect Australian feature film producers with the local and international marketplace on their home soil – far away from the rest of the world’s producers (and buyers) competing for sales agents attentions at a major international market. If you have a feature-length documentary that is a genuine theatrical proposition (think AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, MAD HOT BALLROOM, THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE, etc.), then MIFF 37ºSouth Market will have co-financiers in attendance of relevance to your project. If your documentary project is aimed more at international TV co-financiers, then there are other Australian events (such as AIDC) to connect you to those TV buyers/financiers.
Can I return to the market with the same project?
If you have attended a previous edition of the market and you wish to return with the same project, that is not a problem - after all, feature film financing is a gradual business! Each year, the mix of financing guests is different with some returning companies and always several new companies. However, in this circumstance, it is advisable to apply with a slate.
What sort of financiers come to MIFF 37ºSouth Market?
Each year, the market brings together a careful selection of sales agents and distributors with a range of interests. Most years, this spread of companies will range from studio level (such as Paramount in previous years), through to major independents (for example, HanWay, Pathe), frequent partners in Australian projects (like Bankside, The Works, Fortissimo, ArcLight) and companies comfortable with lower budget work (HighPoint, MovieHouse). Every year, MIFF 37ºSouth Market strives to bring to Melbourne a mixture of companies with a long history of working with Australians along with companies new to Australia (such as, in previous years, Bavaria, Match Factory, National Geographic Films). Each year, the MIFF 37ºSouth Market guest financier list is distributed to the invited producers a few days before the market along with the individually prepared meeting diary for the producer. For biographies of the 2011 guests, click here ( pdf file, 324kb) and 2010 guests click here (pdf file, 324kb) for a brochure giving an overview of MIFF 37ºSouth Market, click here ( pdf file, 1MB).
What’s the best preparation for the meetings?
Each of the meetings goes for 20-minutes, replicating the typical meeting time at a major market. The best thing to do is to use the few days between getting your diary and the guest sales agents/distributor profile document (generally three or four days prior to the start of the market – manually scheduling more than 1,000 meetings takes a long time!) and the start of the market to visit the links of each of the companies that are meeting with you to get a feel for their recent slate. Generally, it is advisable to have a general pitch on your lead project ready to take up no more than 10 minutes of your meeting time, leaving time for questions and also to quickly pitch the rest of your slate if the buyer is interested. It is also advisable be ready to switch quickly to another of your slate projects should the buyer not bite at your main project pitch. The key objective for most meetings if for the buyer (sales agent/distributor) to be induced to ask to be sent a copy of your script – after all, a requested script generally gets read a lot sooner than an unsolicited one! For other producers, the key outcome is just having met the buyer and having made that contact which might be useful in the future. For the for foreign sales agents, especially, MIFF 37ºSouth Market works as a “feeder and filter” market – in that they meet a very large number of producers over the four days and tend to pick a handful of projects that they would like to read the script for (Feeder element) and then take follow-up meetings with at a future international markets (Filter). MIFF 37ºSouth Market meetings are determined mainly by the preferences of the invited sales agents / distributors – so the benefit here is that if you have a meeting scheduled, odds-on it has been at the request of the buyer! Don’t forget, that in addition to your scheduled meetings, there will also be roundtables with a selection of the sales agents/distributors as well as several more informal networking events – so if you don’t have a meeting with a buyer that you were really hoping for, there are plenty of other chances over the four days to make yourself known to them!
Where should I stay?
If you are attending the market and are from outside Melbourne, our preferred hotel partner is the Accor Group and bookings can be made by going to accorhotels.com
The Accor Hotels closest to MIFF 37ºSouth Market venues are the mid-range Novotel on Collins, the mid-range Grand Mercure on Swanston Street and more economy Victoria Hotel.
How can I get tickets to MIFF films, including Opening and/or Closing night?
Tickets can be purchased by going to http://tickets2.miff.com.au/
Tickets can be booked at discounted rates by becoming a MIFF member - and, as a 37South producer, you can take a MIFF membership at a discounted rate! Go to http://miff.com.au/membership/join for more details.