What if I told you that one of the definitive keys for funding your film came from within your mind? In my personal experience raising money, I would say that having a film funding mindset is essential. What do I mean by that? Well, we're talking about convincing yourself that you can raise enough money to cover the budget of your film…
In other words, you need to first fully believe that you can raise the money for your movie. This needs to be embedded in your mind. If you don't believe you can do it, it won't happen. On the flip side of the coin, if you firmly believe you'll be successful, and you continually work towards your goal, eventually you might surprise yourself.
Developing Your Film Funding Mindset
I'm going to tell you a story about student I had. At the time, I was teaching a class on filmmaking. And she had an idea for a film. This would be the first film she directed. And she wanted to raise about $2 million. Unfortunately, I think intrinsically or subconsciously, she did not have the right film funding mindset. She did not think that she could raise that money for the movie.
And she's not alone. A lot of people feel this way. If you don't subconsciously believe you can raise money, you're in trouble. There may be a little voice inside you that's telling you it won't happen. In the case of my student, I knew that her film funding mindset needed to be re-wired. So I started by discussing her goals, and the scope of the movie.
She wanted to make an LGBT drama that had a message. And I realized that it might be possible to produce a film like this for much less than she thought. So I suggested that she find a screenplay that could be done on a tighter budget. As a result, and to her credit, she found a fantastic script. Then she convinced herself she could make the film for only a couple hundred thousand dollars.
First Convince Yourself It's Possible
To change her film funding mindset, she said (internally and externally), “I can get the money.” And soon, she began to believe this was possible. And, guess what? She did it. For her, that goal was achievable. I ended up jumping on board as a Producer of the film. We made the film and sold it to Showtime. The film is called FAIR HAVEN, and it's a beautiful film.
When you get to a point where you say, “I can do this,” and you truly believe you can… That's when some magical stuff starts to happen. I'm not saying that the answer is always to just lower the budget, because that may not be possible in all circumstances. You might run in circles where $200,000 is too small to consider… And in those situations, you might actually need to raise the budget!
The key to a film funding mindset begins with convincing of yourself is it possible. To test this theory, if someone gave you a million dollars right now, would you truly say to yourself, “I know exactly to do with this.” If there's even a little uncertainty, you need to work on your film funding mindset. One helpful strategy is to continually expand your knowledge and meet more people. And one place to check out is Filmmaking Stuff HQ.
