The Film Club of America has finalized its plans to bring something new and exciting to the world of independent filmmaking.
This has been a long time coming, and a much needed asset for the narrative filmmaker.
Executive Director, FCA, Eugene Batiste III
What Can Independent Filmmakers Expect?
The premise is quite simple. Imagine a marketplace where you can upload “shelved” screenplays and offer them to content creators to produce. That’s what is being offered. And guess what, it’s totally free to sign up.
The Film Club of America has done this as a part of their non-profit mission to assist filmmakers in completing their projects.
We noticed a gap between accessing scripted material, which doesn’t exist in the Hollywood system, and the content creator. We want to attempt to close this gap.
Executive Director, FCA, Eugene Batiste III
How does this all work?
Filmmakers will have to register and then they act as vendors posting products, screenplays, and copies of their movies as virtual products. The marketplace is called ScreenExchange.
Now, once users have products in the marketplace they will be able to make and track sales like any other multi-vendor website (eBay, Amazon, Etsy, etc.) Commission will be earned as a donation to the Film Club of America at 5% to keep the marketplace healthy and running.
However, the ultimate goal is to facilitate the safe usage of scripted material, via a non-exclusive license to the customers visiting the site.
Does this offer copyright protections to the Independent Filmmakers?
The license that blankets the work uploaded on the site is to protect the rights holder, but rights are extended to the customer (Director/Producers) so that they can comfortably create projects. The Film Club expects this document to grow and evolve as years come. But it is one heck of a starting point.
Vendors will also have the ability to draft their own policies for customers purchasing their material, if they deemed the terms are not comprehensive enough.
Ultimately, no one is going get taken advantage of. Credits will have to be included in the title cards of all projects completed. The products must be paid for in full to access the content, and in the case of zealous producers- royalties will have to be paid up to certain minimums dictated by current industry regulators.
When will the marketplace be open and active?
The predictions for a release date are as early as Spring 2021. “Beta testing and functionality are being debugged at the moment. As soon as we can ensure that vendors can securely receive payment and the legal aspects of their copyrights are protected, we will open it to the public.” Eugene Batiste III stated. “We have passed payments through to our staff internally, we will have to open it up to see how the exchange operates for our first users.”
“Overall, this is here to assist the independent filmmaker in getting more movies made. Hopefully, the industry as a whole will buy in, but we are targeting the micro-budget and small budget guys first.”
You can find more information about this project (ScreenExchange) by following the Film Club of America on social media.
