About this project

dear friend,

we are so excited! right before thanksgiving, our film, BASS ACKWARDS, was accepted into sundance.

it was the dream of a lifetime's worth of work at filmmaking. we'd all respectively had our little breaks here and there, but this was the Golden Ticket that every aspiring filmmaker hopes for.

in order to make the most of this crazy opportunity, we are embarking on an ambitious and unprecedented distribution strategy whereby, rather than taking BASS ACKWARDS to sundance and hoping to sell it, we have entered into strategic partnerships with new video and zipline entertainment, in order to release the film nationwide on february 1. overall, this initiative is inspired by the high-value/low-cost filmmaking approach of exec producer mark duplass.

this is intended not only as a strategy to help BASS ACKWARDS gain attention and find its audience, but also as an open experiment in alternative distribution. in approaching sundance as a platform rather than a marketplace (a gesture never before made by a non-hollywood filmmaker at sundance), we are trying to pave the way, insofar as we are able, for a new era of filmmaker empowerment.

SO WHAT EXACTLY IS HAPPENING?

we are not waiting around for someone else to tell us they want to distribute our movie. we know the movie's good. we're being proactive.

for more on this distribution strategy, you can check out three key resources at this point:

•my original viral video, wherein i explain the rationale for the strategy

•the indiewire article, where editor-in-chief eugene hernandez puts it all in context

•our new viral video, hosted by makingof.com, where introduce the various players (linas phillips, davie-blue, mark duplass) and talk more about the "bass ackwards" way the film was made.

WHAT CAN I DO?
well, we need your support. most importantly, we need you to put february 1 on your calendars. and we need you to suggest to friends that they do the same. and THEN, we need you actually to go see it, download it, rent it. buy it! the success of our experiment depends on your willingness to jump in. the beauty of it is, you'll be able to do it at pretty much any price point, pretty much any way you want.

but to get there, we also need financial support, if you're able to help. the ask right now is $2,500.00 by january 1 to help cover finishing costs and hard costs of getting us to the festival. we're asking for a $5 minimum contribution, but there ain't no max! we still need a total of $25K to make it there (i've got multiple lines in the water, so do what you can here and i'll do the rest).

in exchange for this, we are offering a few different levels of participation. see the information below for more.

thanks for your time and attention and we'll see you first at sundance and then on february 1 "at the movies"!

yours,

tw