There were about 500 people trying to get into the building, and each one needs to present either a market badge or a ticket to be allowed in... needless to say the security guards were being real sticklers again and wouldn’t let me slip in ahead of the queues to try and track down my meeting. So there I was in the scorching heat of the late morning sun trying to track down the email that had my meeting’s phone number on it... Bit of a struggle with screen glare, but I finally got through and we arranged to meet at the side entrance of the Marche near the pavilions - in theory, just around the corner - in practice about 10 minutes through the crowds, past the red carpet stairs and through two lots of security.
Next was a series of VERY brief phone calls (roaming charges are a killer out here) while we proceeded to walk past each other about six times! Eventually we met, shook hands and wandered over to Ireland - for a nice meeting on the sun terrace. This distributor was my prime prospect (as we used to say at Sports & Leisure) and so I was really hoping he would respond in a positive manner to the concept of Pissheads. We had a great chat about the film (and a couple of others that he is distributing) and overall he seemed interested. He’s requested the script and an email of the presentation pack and seemed genuinely impressed with our approach to the project, and our plan on how to market and release it. All in all I was thrilled with the meeting and can’t help but thinking his would be the best company to handle it in the UK.
Next off to a seminar at the American Pavilion on marketing films in 2010 and was happy to see that our approach seems to be becoming fairly mainstream at least in the field American Independent Film. After the seminar I had a chance to talk to the worldwide brand managers of a well-known beer brand about the possibility of some kind of commercial hook up/ brand sponsoring. Getting a ton of “free” booze and brand approval including logos etc would be hugely beneficial to Pissheads - assuming we can get over their uneasiness at the title!
The culmination of the evening was a splendid dinner courtesy of Vincent and Kirsty from Tall Tree Pictures. The meal was amazing, but the company and crack was even better - Anne (an old friend of Kirsty’s) thought Janos and I were a married couple and this obviously caused much hilarity as we did our best to keep the gag going. The piece de resistance though was that Janos ended up with not one, but two bottles of wine in his lap! Cannes is of course the pinnacle of French chic during the festival - but that didn’t stop the whole gang of us cackling like a bunch of Geordie fish-wives!
Quick pitstop to the Grand Hotel and Le Petit Majestic and then the LONG hobble back up the Suquet to our apartment.