Director Mennan Yapo couldn't be more pleased -- or more nervous.
His new German-language thriller, "Soundless," from the producers of "Run Lola Run," will screen at the ArcLight Cinemas in Hollywood on Tuesday as part of the 18th annual AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival. But behind the scenes, another drama will be playing out in Santa Monica, where the filmmakers will be entertaining offers on U.S. distribution rights to the suspense-filled story about a professional hit man who makes the mistake of falling in love.
Mixing art and business -- that unusual combination of red carpet premieres set against the screening of serious films and the sale of both highbrow and lowbrow fare alike -- has long permeated major festivals such as Cannes, Venice and Berlin.
It's finally coming to Los Angeles.
The Independent Film & Television Alliance is aligning its American Film Market with AFI's festival -- for the first time bringing together the wine-and-brie cineastes who annually flock to AFI Fest for its eclectic assortment of art house and international fare, and the tough-fisted film buyers who trek to Santa Monica's Loews Hotel each year from as far away as Russia, Turkey, Iceland and South Korea with checkbooks at the ready.
The festival begins today and runs through Nov. 14, while the market, which began Wednesday, runs through Nov. 10.
Christian Gaines, the Belgium-born, British-prep-school-educated director of AFI Fest, has seen a steady growth in the festival since he took the helm a little more than four years ago.
"We've created the first festival with a market structure in North America," Gaines said. "For exhibitors and buyers, there are a lot of advantages to this. There are 38 feature film titles playing at both the film festival and the film market. This allows sellers to invite possible buyers to consumer screenings to gauge audience reactions."
Every filmmaker, he noted, can roam the film market in Santa Monica by day and make connections with potential buyers, then take a festival-provided shuttle to Hollywood that evening to attend the festival screenings.
"It's resulted in an enormous response to coming to the film festival," he said, noting that 7,000 buyers will be in town for AFM. The decision by the Independent Film & Television Alliance was a strategic one. They were previously planning to hold their market in late February/early March -- but realized it was too close to the Cannes Film Festival, which is held each May. In addition, the market was held during Academy Award season, a time of the year when Hollywood is largely focused on Oscar campaigns.
