Owning Your Film’s Future: Lessons in Independence from Mike Camoin

From PBS broadcasts to grassroots theatrical screenings, Mike has built a career defined by independence, impact, and a deep belief in cinema as a communal experience. He has worked across productions that have been screened at major festivals including Sundance, Tribeca, Cannes, and Toronto, and has been a driving force behind the independent film movement in upstate New York.

What makes Mike’s journey so powerful is not just what he’s created—but how he’s done it: with courage, clarity, and a commitment to bringing audiences together.

Learn More:

www.brownwhitestory.com  

www.videosforchange.com 

Transcript

What if the key to funding your film comes down to how boldly you take control of your own story?

Speaker: 00:12

Glad you could join us on the Art of Film Funding podcast, where we explore the strategies, mindset, and real-world experiences that empower filmmakers to get their films funded and seen. I'm your co-host, Claire Papan, and today Carole Dean interviews a filmmaker who doesn't just make films, he champions them. Mike Camoin is an award-winning director, producer, and advocate for independent cinema, best known for his documentary, Sallie May Not, Exposing America's Student Loan Scam, which won the Audience Choice Award at the Whistleblowers Summit and Film Festival. From PBS broadcast to grassroots theatrical screenings, Mike has built a career defined by independence, impact, and a deep belief in cinema as a communal experience. He's worked across productions that have been screened at major film festivals, including Sundance, Tribeca, Cannes, and Toronto, and he's been a driving force behind the independent film movement in upstate New York. He's currently in post-production on the docuseries Brown and White, The Heart of Bono's Basketball, and developing narrative and faith-based projects through his company, Videos for Change. What makes Mike's journey so powerful is not just what he's created, but how he's done it. With courage, clarity, and a commitment to bringing audiences together. Today we'll explore what filmmakers can learn from his path about storytelling, self-distribution, resilience, and sustaining both your creative work and your personal well-being.

Speaker 2: 02:23

Thank you, Claire. And Mike, we're so happy to have you with us today. We have tons of questions.

Speaker 1: 02:32

Carole, thank you. Happy to be here.

Speaker 2: 02:34

Good. Well, let's get started with  the origin and the purpose. And we'll start with your documentary, Sallie May Not, because this tackled a major systemic issues. So, really, what compelled you to tell that story and how did you know that it was worth all the years of commitment that it took to do it?

Speaker 1: 02:59

Well, the subtitle of Sallie May Not is Exposing America's Student Loan Scam. And those are pretty uh powerful words. And what I discovered was when the United States government removed consumer protections from student loans in 1998 for public loans, then 2005 on private loans. And then I met the borrowers that were harmed by this measure. I realized that there was such a harm done to their lives. Their lives were over. I mean, these are people who took out a $70,000 loan for a four-year degree, paid back $75,000, and they still had $70 more thousand dollars to pay. Now, why would that be even possible? That wasn't just one person, that was multiple borrower after borrower after borrower. And and then so when you start to experience the injustice that others are experiencing, that's what gets you hooked onto a subject and it keeps you at it for years and years. And I studied with Jennifer Fox early on in New York City, who said that documentaries take on the average seven years. And uh, my first documentary took me six years. So I was like, oh, I beat the seven-year mark. Um, but I knew you're in for a long haul on any of these documentaries, uh, whether it's my first one or whether it's this one, uh, Sallie May Not. And you know, there's a sequel to Sallie May Not, because one of the subjects, John Oberg, who uncovered uh one of the aspects of the scam of student loans, um won a court case over 12 lenders, and it was called Oberg versus Nelnet in 2010. And those documents were sealed and redacted, and it was part of the settlement. And I said, Well, what's in them? I want to know. So in 2023, we started to knock on the door of the federal court system and said, We'd like to see what's in them because we understand that they weren't protected or filed properly, they weren't sealed forever. Now, I was denied access, but then partnered with public citizens, which is a group um out of Washington, DC. And they're like, We've been looking for someone like you to represent. So when Judge Anderson at the federal courts in Alexandria, Virginia said, you know, no, I said, Well, can we appeal? And they said yes.

Speaker 2: 05:53

Wow.

Speaker 1: 05:55

So that's when we filed an appeal, and by January of 2024, we had a court date which got bumped to June 2024, and it was Camoin versus Nelnet. And I won at the US Court of Appeals. Had to go down to Richmond. And and obviously NellNet was a billion-dollar company, said, hey, no, we're gonna we're gonna protest or whatever. And and um the unique thing about that court case was we didn't file under the technicality of they that they had wrongly sealed and redacted these documents and they should be released, but we filed under the first amendment, which meant that not only the does someone like me have access as a third party who has nothing to do with this, but now that allows all any third party to have access and request court documents.

Speaker 2: 06:55

Wow.

Speaker 1: 06:56

So the court case set a precedent in uh by November 2024, Judge Anderson released all the documents, hundreds of pages of the wrongdoing that Oberg knew uh was the reason for the settlement, but he couldn't speak on camera for it. So the sequel we'd like to say is called Citizen Oberg and what's in those documents, and um it it was amazing because we won in a conservative court the decision, and so now Kamoine versus Nelnet has been cited the last I checked a few months ago 39 times.

Speaker 2: 07:34

Wow, this is a great achievement for a documentarian to change laws. This is marvelous, or open up important documents so you could go back and make another documentary film.

Speaker 1: 07:49

Oh, yeah. This one is juicier than the first one. Well, the first one was just scratching the surface. This is like this is actually why it's a scam. Um, because they're it just shows as as the uh judge at in the U.S. Court of Appeals said, Oh, all these shenanigans. And these are not just small shenanigans, these are $300 million shenanigans per lender uh in a year. Uh so so the borrowers have no rights, uh, they're ignored, and and what's happening now to the Department of Education, it's just they're just burying all of this stuff and it's being moved. It's gonna be here here's the thing: the um the whole lending process is gonna be moved back to those um lenders who were wrong in the beginning. So it's uh so when something like that gets under your skin, you just can't let it go. And so this is perhaps what Jennifer Fox was talking about when something takes you know seven years.

Speaker 2: 08:58

Yes. Well, that what an achievement, though. So, but then how the question I want to know is how do you know when you hear something or read about something, what makes you decide to give six, seven years of your life to a project? Tell me what feelings do you get? Do you feel like it just belongs to you? It's something you cannot pass up.

Speaker 1: 09:24

Well, you never know what you're really going to discover. You have a hypothesis about well, what this story could be about. And so, like my current project, Brown and White, the heart of Bon is basketball. I I went back to my 30-year reunion at St. Bonaventure, and the school had survived a scandal. My church, the Catholic Church, had to survive the scandal. Both of them took place in 2003. And I go back to my 30-year reunion in 2018, and I was like, how did we turn this around? And so that was the primary question. And then it became well, how does the smallest NCAA Division I college basketball program rise back to national relevance? And the answer to that question wasn't in that time period between 2003 and 2018. The answer was going back to 1956, when it had its first black varsity player and an integrated team that brought the next black player and then the next black player, and they rose to number two in the nation. So by 1960, you got St. Bonaventure, one of the smallest schools going up against Ohio, the number one school, but that was number one versus number two in Madison Square Garden. And so when you fall down the allow yourself to fall down the rabbit hole of a story, and then you start to uh learn and discover, and this is what the audience is gonna discover, and it's gonna be like, aha, uh-huh. So you you do get hooked. Um, and then from then end, it's like, okay, we gotta we gotta finish this. Uh so you don't let go. Uh, and you keep learning this different skills you need to to uh to get there.

Speaker 2: 11:16

Yes, yes. Oh, you have to keep learning new skills in our in our world on a daily basis. So um, so let's talk about career strategy. So you've been involved in projects that were screened at Sundance, Tribeca, Cannes, Toronto. What did you learn from being inside those ecosystems that independent filmmakers often misunderstand?

Speaker 1: 11:43

You know, that's a great question. Um, I think as someone like myself who's self-taught, I didn't go to grad school to study filmmaking. Um, you have these doubts about yourself, and do I have any business being there? And um the evidence says you do, and people want you there. And I think part of the message and part of what I told myself is act like you've been there before, um, act like you belong. And I think you know, filmmakers may not fully grasp that, but that is the key because everybody in that room, um, at one point or another was where you are. Uh so it's like going from zero to a hundred, but next thing you know, I'm at the closing party in Toronto of Derek C and France's film Place Beyond the Pines, and that stars Bradley Cooper, um, Ryan Gosley, and Eva Mendez, uh, along with the director. And so there you are, you know, you're in the same room as them. Uh that's pretty wild. Uh, so I you know, I think it's understanding that your skill set something you did got you there.

Speaker 2: 13:07

Your intentions get you there, yes.

Speaker 1: 13:10

It's what yeah, that's really powerful, isn't it? Like, oh my gosh, that really happened. That's happening.

Speaker 2: 13:17

Yes. And the attitude you have is really important. See, it's confidence. People like people that are confident, and they and when people start walking up to you and saying, where is this such and such? How do I, then you know you're in the right um energy because you're in control and people are coming to you for advice. So this is what filmmakers end up being. They become the no-alls uh because they fit and they're confident. But getting into those places starts with your own vision, doesn't it?

Speaker 1: 13:57

Uh totally. Um and and acknowledging what you did, you know, to get there. Um so uh I was on As You Are, the picture that won the special grand jury prize at Sundance in 2016. And um at the very end, my job was locations. I found all these locations. They came to me August 10th, 2015, and said, We need to find 26 locations. I said, Well, when do you need them by? And they said September 12th, and I said, give me your top five. And by September 12th, we had found most of the locations. And by October 9th, we wrapped filmmaking. Now they had such a great team, they were moonlighting, they were um, they were editing as we were going. And so Sundance said, send us uh send us a rough cut, and so they sent it off mid-November. By December 3rd, we we um entered the festival, we were we were accepted, and by January 28th, we left with the special grand jury prize. You know, that's just unheard of in just a six-month time frame, and so I've witnessed what a really good crew, and everybody's focused and rowing in the same direction. Um, you know, and they elevated me from location manager to the unit UPM because I was just doing everything else. I was bringing in other crew, I was bringing in uh maybe a minor cast person or something, you know, just other other roles that you you just start to see what is needed, and you respond, and it might be outside your role, but I'm not someone to not speak up if I have an opportunity to contribute.

Speaker 2: 15:52

This is really good training because the UPM is the top one, that's the top job with the most responsibility.

Speaker 1: 16:01

Sure. The DP we're in the screening at Sundance, and you know the picture goes black, and then the first credit is the UPM, and it has my name, Michael Camoin and the DP next to me goes, Look, they're all clapping for you. Um, you know, it's great, and that was my first time. I mean, come on, it was just like so. Yeah, you need the support of others to kind of start to wear those achievements.

Speaker 2: 16:35

Yes, it's teamwork. Well, um, let me ask you about um your independent filmmaking movement that you created in upstate New York. Tell us about that and what experiences that you uh learned, what things you learned, and because you taught how to uh get tax incentives, and a lot of filmmakers really feel confused and worried about how to do all that paperwork. You were teaching them how to do that, right?

Speaker 1: 17:07

Well, I I I would say what my contribution in 2003 was first of all, there wasn't a film commission that responded to independent filmmakers. There was the Saratoga Film Commission, and I was working on a project, my own project called Grazy Miss Albany, and uh landed an investor through RPI, Rents Lear Polytech. My company was at the incubator there. RPI is the same university that just brought one of the the um astronauts home from Artemis II. Um so I was in their incubator and here I am, an artsy type company in a technology place, and they advise and encourage me to uh think big and think beyond my own limitations and think about what this could be. So with the help of this initial investor, we went to the county. We said, we need you to expand and we need you to service independent filmmakers. And through some pressure, and we even took we got a story done on us in the press and said, Hey, this needs to happen, and all of a sudden people start to cooperate. Oh, good, yeah, yeah. And everybody knows Albany is a is a democratic town, which is also home to now the Museum of Political Corruption. Um, so you know, things that come out of Albany is all, but there's ways to accomplish what you want to do within government, and so we expanded the film commission, number one. Then we said there's a problem, and the problem is is runaway productions, and how that got elevated to a higher level is I invited Pat Kaufman of the New York State Governor's Office uh to come up to a meeting in Albany, and she turned to me and she said, Mike, no one ever invites us up here, so we're coming. Uh and what came out of that meeting was the team that was there went down to New York and they went down to Silver Cup Studios, and out of that came the first New York legislation for the New York State tax rebate program in 2024. That occurred simultaneously with tax code 181 on the federal side. So they both came out together. So you got the federal tax incentive and you got New York State tax incentive, and then it became a battle between states over tax incentives. And um, so I don't handle the paperwork, you got to do that with the government. There are people who know that better than me, but and here's the here's how that happened is I had created a network for independent filmmakers through AIBF, the Association of Independent Video and Film, that puts out a magazine called The Independent. We created a salon. Tom Mercer and I were co-founders of this thing called Upstate Independent Filmmakers Network. In 1995, we started by 2003, 2004, we had over 300 members who came from five different states because there was no resource like this. We were film friendly, we met monthly consistently. We brought in speakers. I was meeting people like you and Bob Hawk and John Pearson and and others at the time in the in the late 90s. Um, and so at that meeting, they like, we'd like to have your database. And we were willing, and that we created the first capital Saratoga Film Commission. And 300 of our members went on to that website, and you know, and that's the power of organized independent filmmakers who you know start from scratch, scratch, and just claw their way and create what they need. And now the tax incentive is is so successful in New York, I don't think it'll ever go away.

Speaker 2: 21:32

No, of course not. I remember Mike when they put that in because I was friends with someone high up at Raleigh Studio. And so I said, What's happening? He said, Well, we just had two people cancel. They they paid the contract, left, and went to New York for the 40% tax rebate. And that was really the beginning of the exodus from California to all over the world.

Speaker 1: 21:58

But 18 television. Television shows left California and came to New York. Wow. Almost overnight. It was crazy. They didn't have enough sound stages. So that was a real economic development boon for the five boroughs, but it wasn't being experienced in upstate New York. And so the folks in Buffalo and Rochester now started to complain and said, look, if you want to keep this going, you need to give us an upstate boost. So now you can film upstate and you get an addition of five or 10% on top of uh the yep. And independents qualify, like smaller projects, you know, they still qualify. It's not like you can't meet the threshold.

Speaker 2: 22:44

Let's say a documentary for half a million would qualify.

Speaker 1: 22:48

They do not fund documentaries. It's it's all narrative, it's TV shows, it's yeah, so the little yeah, the documentaries are don't fall in under that category. Not in New York, maybe.

Speaker 2: 23:01

Okay, but uh features and uh independent low budget features. How low budget can can you?

Speaker 1: 23:09

Yeah, um I'd have to double check. Uh, but I think it's like 250,000, $250,000 or higher. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:20

Yeah. Because those are the most selling the most right now, those low, low budgets. Well, let's let's shift to distribution because I know you're fearless in creating self-distribution. You do a marvelous job. So what does it look like? Um, how do you get people into theaters uh without a traditional distributor?

Speaker 1: 23:48

Well, you you know, I studied with Barbara Zimmerman in New York on how to promote your own and distribute your own film. Uh, Doug Block and Jennifer Fox, and I go into it first of all, not relying on whether or not I'm gonna get a distribution deal for the film. Like plan B, you have to have a plan B. And when my first film, Inside the Blue Line, does not get into Sundance. I I'm like, I'm this, this I you know, people need to see this. And so having studied and understood what it takes, which is not a lot, um, I made sure that my documentary was in 50 gift shops throughout upstate New York. And you know, you you treat it at that time it was VHS, and then it became a DVD with bonus materials. And now that market's you know going away, but uh there are other opportunities to self-distribute, and you gotta you gotta be able to wear a different hat, and that's called marketing and promotion. And um but this idea of having people first come see your movie um with a you know a live audience where there's a QA where the movie means something to them, and you take the time to have a QA with them. Uh, word of mouth, I nearly a hundred percent of the time, every time I had a screening, that led to another screening because of somebody who saw it said, I want this, you know, and we were in firehouses, we were in libraries, we were sometimes in movie theaters, but it was four walls, you know. We rented the four walls, or someone wrote a grant and helped pay for that screening. I had a lot of fun at it because I remember like my first screening in a Adirondack Picture Show and Steven Spielberg's film Jurassic Park might have come out. And I worked so hard. I talked to the people at the box office. Like I had as many people per screening at my screenings as Jurassic Park in this small little town, and you know, there's fun little things like that that you do.

Speaker 2: 26:20

Um that's really good marketing.

Speaker 1: 26:23

That's the key. It was understanding that you need to go get a story, you gotta have a a still photograph. Um, you write a press release, and sometimes your press release is nearly verbatim in the newspaper because you're doing the job of the reporter who's got 10 other things to do, but you want them to, you know, write about your movie, you've got to do their job for them, make it easy for them to give you um a picture and uh and a story. So uh, you know, that gets people there, and it just, it's snowball. So you go to the next town and things like that.

Speaker 2: 27:09

Well, it all starts really with your screenings before you lock picture. So tell us about the screenings where you do audience feedback before you lock.

Speaker 1: 27:22

You know, we're in the middle of that right now with Brown ‘n White, the heart of bonus basketball. And we'll pick different groups. You know, there are people who are just fans, they might be donors. You want to show them something because you want them to keep donating to the project. Um, but then also you want to you want to pick up people who know nothing about uh the subject matter, and um and then a third time we screened it with my son and his five friends, and um you're each time you're getting a different demographic to give you response and feedback on it, and uh it's super helpful. now we're in the editing room, I'm editing Brown and White with Christopher C word and uh and my um production supervisor Tony Gracchi and the three of us were watching the latest cut, and I noticed I got tired at 40 minutes in. I'm like fighting against my own movie, and and and this is like a 70-minute episode, and everybody has the same reaction to it. Now we've tested this, and audiences were okay with it, but for us, um, we were like, Whoa this is too much. So we made a decision out of that that we really need to end the uh first episode at the 34-minute mark, and then come back because but the last half of it, we were just loading up with too much information and it needs time to breathe. And so if it's not the audience giving you feedback, it's it's from yourself, and and that helps you shape the story. Um, because you're thinking about your audience, totally right.

Speaker 2: 29:23

Well, those are key things. If you were tired, then that's exactly it. You lost uh the energy in the film.

Speaker 1: 29:31

Totally.

Speaker 2: 29:32

Well, um, this I'll tell you from interviewing uh distributors. They say that the one thing that filmmakers, independent filmmakers do not, what they make, the biggest mistake is they don't have a good enough uh, they don't have enough screenings, they don't get enough feedback, and they come to them, they closed and stop editing too fast without enough input from their audiences. So they know the material, but it's not good enough for your audience. You've got to bring it to them.

Speaker 1: 30:10

Yeah, that's true. It takes extra work and it, but it's so valuable if you want this to live on, and not just a year, like my documentaries I told you about Inside the Blue Line. Yeah, that was in 1998 when I released that. and I'm still selling copies of it.

Speaker 2: 30:32

Oh, how wonderful. Great. Well, a lot of filmmakers are told at the end of their film, just put it on a streamer. So um, why do you believe so strongly in theatrical and communal experiences? And tell us how filmmakers can realistically create those today.

Speaker 1: 30:57

Well, you know, you I've I've heard from my friends who sell their completed films, and um, you ask them, well, you know, how much are you making off of this?  you know, so a lot of filmmakers, they get their stuff on Amazon, or something like that, and it's been seen by a few thousand people, and they get 40 cents on it, you know, or something. It's like such a fraction. It's nothing to make a living on. Uh Ted Hope, who worked at Amazon, talks a lot about how the system is broken today. Um, and exactly what we're talking about is having these screenings and building a community around our projects. They, you spent all this time and they're typically focused, documentaries are around an issue, uh, whether it's environmental, social, cultural, um, that raises awareness, but it can also create change. So for filmmakers, you know, it really encourages them to look at the subject matter uh in deeper in different ways. Eventually you're gonna find two things. One is you're gonna find donors who want to see the story made, but you're also building the foundation for the audience that this is designed to go to. And you want to get, you know, you want to get that to that first base, uh, get that foundation, the low-hanging fruit and support for your story uh at that early stage.

Speaker 2: 32:43

Right. Uh, I am part of your mailing list. So when you talk to your brown and white audience, I get those emails and I love them because it's like a cheerleader. You know, you are so excited about your film, and that gets us excited about it. And even if you've already given, you want to give again. I see that. I just want to be part of it, gives you the feeling I want to be part of and do whatever I can to get help you.

Speaker 1: 33:13

You know, I think it was Orson Wells who said, you know, that filmmaking is all about the persistence of vision. And that's the one choice we get to make is to hold on to our vision for uh the work. And it doesn't matter the budget, uh, but knowing that that you know there's an audience out there and they're gonna enjoy this, uh, maybe more than enjoy it. Uh they'll you know tell somebody else about it or they want to own a copy of it, that kind of thing.

Speaker 2: 33:43

So persistence of vision, oh my gosh, that's so powerful, isn't it?

Speaker 1: 33:49

That's filmmaking, that's what it is, persistence of vision. And you, you gotta have it because it does take a long time and there are a lot of hurdles, right?

Speaker 2: 33:60

Right. Okay, so when you first look at a new project, uh, how early in the project do you start thinking about uh well who's gonna fund this and how will I distribute it?

Speaker 1: 34:14

Right at the beginning, you're thinking about both uh the the funding of it and the distribution part of it. Now, with Brown and White, um I always I I had the passion for the school and the basketball program and and the willingness to dive into the history. And I thought that um alumni would share that. And um, and for the most part they have. Uh, and that's what's um kept it going now, now it's turning into a series, a multi-part series, uh, something bigger than what we initially thought uh before I fell down the rabbit hole of the whole thing. But it's amazing. I don't know if I'm answering your question, but I I had a team meeting uh uh this past last Thursday, and there's nine people on the Zoom, and I'm like, I told them I said, I don't know how I got you guys, but here we are. And I got some of the best people in the industry, man. They're it's just like wow, and this is a low budget, but they're you know, they're drawn, I get to the vision, they're drawn to the story. You know, the themes of the story are about this smallest NCAA school that rose to national heights and go 22-0 with an integrated team in 1968 during the height of race riots and reach the final four, win the national invitational tournament in 77 in Madison Square Garden, take Kentucky to double overtime in 2000, only to fall into national scandal and then rebound into national relevance. And uh, you know, that's the story, and it's having that vision for it draws other people in, and and you know, and and again, uh back to our donors, that's also part of our distribution plan. Um, you know, we've we've put together an impact campaign of where this could go, and it's and uh as everybody sees it, it's it's got so many tentacles. Uh it's not just basketball, it's not just race. You've got players who elevate to the MBA, you got players who do other things like coaches versus cancer. Um, that that was uh grown out of Syracuse by one of the subjects in our film to become a national program. So when you see little kids in little league or basketball wearing pink socks, that coaches versus cancers is a national movement, and so you discover, you know, you just discover a lot about the subjects, and guess what? We're you know, we want um the national uh coaches association that are all behind coaches versus cancer to be part of our marketing campaign.

Speaker 2: 37:19

Of course, how wonderful, right?

Speaker 1: 37:21

Connecting the dots, yeah. Coaches, yes, of course. That's a great there's thousands, there's thousands of coaches. There's you know, yes, that's great. That's just one of the many uh marketing partners who've already said, Hey, let us know when it's done. Well, we're behind it.

Speaker 2: 37:41

So that's your strategic partner, and you got them on um uh by by talking about your film and what its message is and how it aligned with theirs, right?

Speaker 1: 37:55

And I reminded them that one of the key characters in my story is championed coaches versus cancer, not just at the college level, but at the high school level. And they just uh in a basketball tour, they put on a full court press. And these guys were all from winning programs, and they were respected by other coaches, and they sold the program, and they've raised millions of dollars for, to fight cancer.

Speaker 2: 38:24

Oh, this is fabulous. Putting those together is wonderful. So uh I'll tell you, there are a lot of filmmakers who you know. I say, How are you doing on your film? Well, I'm waiting. I applied for some grants, I'm just hoping they come in. And I tell you, this isn't the way to do it. Please tell me how you motivate yourself every day, because I talk to some filmmakers and they'll say, Oh, I applied for a few grants. So I'm just waiting around to see what happens. And I'm telling them, this isn't going to work. You have to motivate yourself on a daily basis, right, Mike?

Speaker 1: 39:06

100%. And it helps if you have you know the right information because fundraising is, you know, to me, is one of the scarier things to do in life. Um, but if you don't do it, it you know, your movie's likely not going to happen. Um so for the filmmaker who applies to four or five different grants and doesn't get anything, first of all, I join them in you know applying for funds, but I never rely on them. Um sometimes I I've gotten a few grants, you know, uh, but always having a back to having a plan B. So um I you know, I've studied with uh Joanne Butcher, and you know, her basic system, first of all, she's got seven ways of funding for a film, and so if the grants aren't working, there are other ways to go about it. Uh so you've got you know crowdfunding, you've got your uh what would they call them, major donors. And what I didn't know is that major donors like to become repeat donors, and uh they watch what you're doing and they follow, and then they may even do more, and that's that's happened. Um, I didn't know you could also go back to people who've already donated.

Speaker 2: 40:35

Oh, I see it all the time, Mike, over here taking checks. Yes, it's great.

Speaker 1: 40:42

Uh, because once you get on a roll, um you do it helps you get past that feeling of helplessness or a dead end or stuck. Um you know, make no mistake, it's not easy and it gets hard. Uh in it, and there are times when you think someone's gonna do something, or someone may even say they're gonna do something, and then they don't come through. man, those are downers. Uh, but it's not unlike anybody right now in government that's, you know, waiting for a check to come from a state or a federal government and it doesn't show up. And so filmmakers are some of the most innovative, resourceful people, uh, I think problem solvers. And so you know, what what Joanne? I'm always reminded by what Joanne Butcher would say to anyone that's stuck is like you need to pick a date as a deadline, and you have to have a purpose with it. So, you know, for example, I I want to send my film to Sundance in August of 2026, and I need to raise uh $300,000 to get there uh in time. So having that deadline, making it clear about how much money you need um and the reason for it uh that's what helps having and that's a that's like a basic fundraising skill. And a lot of times filmmakers just don't know that.

Speaker 2: 42:11

Exactly. And fundraising is a deadline, right? That's what made crowdfunding successful. You 60 days of 30 days that you have, you have a beginning, a middle, and an end, just like a film, and you have to hit that deadline. So you're so smart. See, if you have no, I I need 300,000 by September because I want into Sundance, then you can tell people who will donate to you, I have to have the money by this date. With that, I can hit Sundance application. That's what it's all about. And you have a deadline.

Speaker 1: 42:54

Yeah, it's it's it's even when you have all that stuff and you do it the right way, it sometimes doesn't always work out. So you have to move your deadline date another six months out. And um, you know, then part of that is like, well, how do I get over that feeling that I didn't accomplish what I wanted to do? Um, but you just have to keep going and you come up with a new reason uh that you know we didn't get into Sundance, but we did reach our goal uh last September. Um and now we've got a different target. Um, and we're finishing up episode one out of potentially 12 episodes. So that's incredible, good movement. You know, thank you. I mean, we have 75 interviews in the can already. Um, and we have four edit four uh episodes that are either 50 to 90 percent done. So it's it's It's amazing when you stay at it and the donors stay with you. And as far as distribution, like we're thinking about that right now uh with major partners. Um within a could be within a Catholic focus, could be within basketball focus, um and and um just um community and brotherhood, which are the major themes. And who doesn't want that right now?

Speaker 2: 44:31

Right, exactly. Well, see, you're talking about how filmmaking can be exhausting emotionally for sure, financially and physically. So, how have you maintained your health and your resilience through these long-term projects?

Speaker 1: 44:50

Well, I I am really super fortunate to be married to my wife, not in filmmaking, but supports me, and that's number one. Um, and supports the dream. Uh the other part is is partnering with the right people, and that is like folks uh from the heart and yourselves. You're you're just great um in terms of you know wanting me to succeed. And if you're hanging out with people that don't want to see that, move move to somebody else. Uh right, uh you got you you gotta look after yourself. So some of the things that I do like to maintain my health and resilience, like I I spend time alone uh every morning. Uh I wake up and I go and I have a chair out in my backyard and I'm in nature. And uh I'd start, you know, this morning. I started the first hour outside with a cup of coffee, and journaling is another thing that I do uh almost every day. Um, you know, so you you develop this process of of self-care uh to go through this battle of of facing uh rejection.

Speaker 2: 46:13

This is marvelous. Congratulations, because we are stuck inside on the computer so much. What a great way to start the day. That's very good for your health. Well, let's get into the story and impact. And I know that your work often intersects with advocacy and social impact. So, how can filmmakers balance their storytelling with a good message and and not lose the audience?

Speaker 1: 46:47

Well, for me, when I'm so close to a subject like my alma mater, I need to bring in, I'm fortunate enough, um, to land a really great editor who said to me, What I want to do is convey your enthusiasm to the audience and get it from you. That's why I need you here, um, because you get so much from me. And that's a sign of a great editor. Uh, so in order to get that message um to your audience, you've got to be thinking about the audience. And um, so in our case, we're you know, we go through this process of like, well, is this important to the home team, or is this important to the whole wider audience? It's one thing to make something for a group of people like the alumni, but really we want this film to travel beyond that. So obviously, there are things that you know. I I have an editor say, I don't care about that, I don't care about that. He's not being mean, he's telling me the rest of the audience isn't going to care about that. So, what gets to stay in the picture uh is something that makes sense. So, having that objective outsider on your project, inside your project, helping you tell that story, I think that's one of the safeguards to not losing your audience.

Speaker 2: 48:20

That's very smart. Well, if you could give one piece of advice to filmmakers who want both a meaningful career and a sustainable life, what would that be?

Speaker 1: 48:34

Well, that's a great question. I would offer two things. One, don't do it alone. Um, let other people have the spotlight in your vision, in your dream. And I'll borrow the advice I got from my dad when he realized it was like, I'm not giving up this filmmaking thing. And to understand, he was an engineer, worked for IBM at all levels, up to the uh headquarters. And here I am, a filmmaker. And he said, if you're gonna do this, don't do this with one foot. Better step in with two feet all the way.

Speaker 2: 49:21

Wow. Very good advice. Get either get fully in or get out. This is very good advice. Uh thank you so much. Uh, what you've done for all of us with this information is sincerely appreciated. Um, you know, I have to tell our audience that Mike's journey reminds us that filmmaking is not just about getting a film made, it's about taking ownership of the entire path from idea to audience. And Mike is a believer in it is for my audience. He's making it for you. And so what stands out to me is his willingness to step outside of traditional systems and build his own, whether that's through self-distribution or for creating films that truly matter. So for all of us filmmakers out there, there's a powerful lesson here. You don't have to wait for permission. You can create your own momentum, your own audience, and your own impact. So thank you, Mike, for sharing your experience, your courage, and your commitment to storytelling that really makes a difference. And to everyone listening, keep going. Your story matters, and there are more ways than ever to bring it to life. Thank you for listening to From the Heart and the Art of Filmmaking with Claire Papin and Carole Dean with From the Heart Productions.