IFH 349: Can Filmmakers Make Real Money on Filmhub or Is It a Bust? with Klaus Badelt

Alex Ferrari 0:00
I'd like to welcome to the show Klaus Badelt. How you doing, brother?

Klaus Badelt 1:43
Great, how are you?

Alex Ferrari 3:49
Good, man, thank you so much for coming on the show. And we're gonna get deep into this whole distribution and distributor thing. And I really wanted to kind of pick your brain about distribution in general self distribution and all sorts of other cool things we're going to talk about. But before we jump in, how did you get into the film business?

Klaus Badelt 4:07
Yeah, so my my quick story of 18 years, I had the first tech startup at the time, we didn't call it a tech startup yet back in Germany, it was like IBM and stuff you don't even so I sold that at 24. I realized I need to do what I always want to do. That's music and it's film. So I'm I sold my shares went on to, you know, to do film music, I came to Hollywood to say Los Angeles and of 90s I was on vacation, got stuck here and then had a career if you want as a film composer did over 100 movies I think about by now, including Pirates of the Caribbean, the Beijing Olympics closing ceremony. I did Time Machine worked on radio, so many movies. None of those which are on your wall in the back? Nope.

Alex Ferrari 5:07
No, no, those are all my movies, sir.

Klaus Badelt 5:09
Good.

Alex Ferrari 5:09
So I will tell about it's all about me, sir. I'm sorry.

Klaus Badelt 5:13
You see, I have no posters. I have to always look up myself on IMDB to realize to remember what I did. So it was just it's a big blur the last 20 years. And then just a few years ago. You know, look, obviously, I've worked on the industry a lot and worked in with the big studios here, lots of major motion pictures, but my heart really belongs in into like, independent film and a lot of films in China and France. indie films here, of course. And I realized that there was a big paradigm shift in how we watch movies, video streaming came up. That was not that long ago that, you know, we had DVDs, right? I mean, it's still done. And I saw also because of musician, too, I saw what happened in the music industry before. There was a democratization going on that you as an artist now didn't need these record companies. I was in the music industry before film industry. I know how crazy that industry is, how hostile to the Creator. And I saw in a way, the same thing I worked on movies, which never saw the light of day and never got out wide or at all. No wonder this is so great, what I'm doing what we're doing there, what others are doing, why not. And now, since everyone is released, video streaming, there should be no more. Nobody in between nobody telling you your movies, not good enough or not the audience for this are making deals and suits. And I found this whole industry, I'm a very anti corporate guy, I believe in creators should have a power. And that's how I got into like, put a team together and say, well, let's do something where we use technology. I'm I'll take as you now know, and is your technology to bypass this old system. Which is by the way, of course, that system which, you know, wrote me the checks all the time. But so. So I did this fine balance between Look, I'm still the industry player, if you want like I still work in industry, but also have the knowledge I would say to disrupt it from the inside.

Alex Ferrari 7:15
Very cool that that's I had no idea that you were so deep in the composing space, sir, I had no no idea. I thought I thought you were a tech guy that was into distribution. So the market the marketing is working, sir.

Klaus Badelt 7:32
Great, because I have it's funny when we went to Silicon Valley to do the, you know, the pictures, etc. It's hard for people to understand and believe that I do both. Yeah, but it's very common in our especially in music, you have all these, it's writing music for especially for movies. It's it's a very thorough craft. And it has to do with math is a lot of technology involved. I mean, I came here first time, I worked with Hans Zimmer at the time. And I say, Well, what are you guys doing? Why do you have all these? Let's use computers, it's so much faster to write music where they did leverage the technology and we went from I had like 50 samplers and you know, mixing these older Neve panel. stuff. Don't get me wrong, but you had to write No. Film Music means change. That's what I learned here. Right? It needs change. It's always going along with the directors with the with the writers with the editor. It's not to like defend your music and say, oh, but this is better. You should. Now you might need to make changes and for that you need computers. Otherwise it's like writing on paper. You know, we're not you know, you're not recording this on two inch tape. Right?

Alex Ferrari 8:40
So Oh, God, I remember those days as well. Geez. No, but it is it isn't a true that every composer that that lands in Los Angeles has to go to Hans Zimmer's office like it's, it's hard it is part of you have to also you just don't work in the business, you have to walk in spend time there and then you're allowed to leave it's kind of like the doorway isn't actually you're not allowed to leave. If you're lucky, you escape if you're lucky, you escape

Klaus Badelt 9:10
You pass by God and and on the way you know, I mean, that was also for a while a great place to I thought of democratizing, you know, I'm always like this, it's it, wasn't it at the time a power played was more like, you know, nurturing your talent. Of course, learn that, you know, ultimately, it's, well, I don't want to say too much, but it's ultimately about that there but I, I made it like that. For me. I learned a lot there. I wouldn't say I don't mean writing music, but everything else around it. You don't get out there with relationships. But that's always I mean, it's now maybe my advice to young filmmakers not only direct not only a film composer is there's two ways of doing things to me. Like either, you know, you intern for the big guys, and you work your way up inside that system. And until you have fit, you have some real chips and you get out. And then you do your own thing. Big plus you get in fairly quickly if you have the way, in big minuses, it's almost impossible to escape the big gorillas. On the other hand, there's this what I saw with others, and I actually said that to you find, I don't know a student director was in as a composer or as a director, find a student composer and, and grow together and create a partnership. If you trust that person. Those relationships happen to and then they're beautiful for for a long term. And that's really trusting for the creator and building.

Alex Ferrari 10:44
Yeah, like Burton and Elfman, and Spielberg and Williams like these guys. That's what they do. I think Williams I think was one I think the last one he didn't do, or there was I think he's done pretty much every Spielberg movie. But I think the the last one or one of these he didn't it was I don't know. But yeah, but Yeah, pretty much. It's always there. He's always there.

Klaus Badelt 11:05
And I tell you a little anecdote. I mean, I know how much time you have. But Steven Spielberg sat next to me and said, I cannot believe you guys. Let me listen to the music. Because here's how it works with Johnny. He sees him twice once when they watch the movie. And then on the recording stage, actually free time. Sorry. I'm like, after a few weeks, he goes, I think he's invited for dinner. Then Johnny plays on the piano. And he says, I have no idea what's going to happen. Yeah, I've totally lost control. I have everything under control on the film right but not music. So it for him especially it's a it's a big, big trust game now okay to today, we have more technology, we can play music. And I always did this as a part of filmmaking. So you, you it's it's a handful of key creatives on the film and you build this together. It's like the the quintessential multimedia project.

Alex Ferrari 12:01
Multimedia, I haven't heard that term used in quite dated yourself, sir.

Klaus Badelt 12:06
I know too much and not enough to be doing.

Alex Ferrari 12:12
I am going to have to ask you back. So we can have a whole episode just on your journeys in Hollyweird and your composing and all that stuff. Because I can feel we could just sit there and talk about Johnny and Stevie, all day. But today, the reason we brought you on is because you know, you are an expert in the distribution plot in the distribution arena, with the company that you run film hub. And you know, we were brought together by this unfortunate debacle that is distributed and whores that it's been going on in the film industry because of it. So first, what are your thoughts on this entire distributor debacle?

Klaus Badelt 12:52
Yeah, so I mean, there's a lot of companies in our industry, which, to me, even distributor counts into this old school, let's have a newer school, but old school, here's, here's the difference. So we have distribution companies, aggregators, just when it comes to me as service businesses, you pay them and then they take some, but ultimately, they want your money first, right? I mean, I've seen distribution, it's not the three server district is a lot where you pay upfront, or they withhold it's, it's it's a bit like music, recording artists,

Alex Ferrari 13:29
Or as a post production house, you're paying for service

Klaus Badelt 13:32
Paying for service. Right? And, and you have no control over how it's been spent. That's the worst to me. Right? So you accept that like a distribution company does marketing. But you know, then they talk to you, but you have no word. Lucky they talk to you. So distributor is to me, like the next generation, but like the same thing. I look what would I think is wrong with this industry that aggregators or distribution companies are very similar to me. They provide service, they don't open access, but they just vie for your money. And there's something inherently wrong with this. Now, they have very, very little value to add. That's the problem. Right

Alex Ferrari 14:25
here's a doorway. It's just basically they're just gatekeepers. That's all they are

Klaus Badelt 14:29
Gatekeepers. And now what what's better about aggregators and the distributor is that they don't say no so much, because their risk is read financial risk is relatively low compared to these distribution companies who can only take like, I don't know 10 movies a year because they have to put the human resources behind this and, and the lawyers and it's in my contracts is very complicated, and they keep me very complicated. So it's a bit more streamlined, how distributed it But still, it's service, which I think like Why what is what is in that? The the base? No, there's not not much value. Now the problem when it comes like this goes out of business. And I don't want to necessarily say like Loki I saw the writing on the wall they were not like kosher or something. I don't know. Honestly, I don't know. I mean, it could have been fine. And if you're willing to pay to play this kind of thing, right? All right, well, then you still see this look is touching so many grounds for you, but you have to re educate us filmmakers to get way of thinking of trophy thinking, like success and getting into Sundance is the trophy getting a sign deal is a trophy?

Alex Ferrari 15:45
It's I call it a lottery ticket mentality. Okay, yeah, it's very, very similar. Like you're always looking for that that lottery ticket that's going to give you everything that you've ever dreamed of, which is like I get into Sundance, I get a huge distribution deal. I'll and then Marvel Kevin's Vega, he's going to call and I'm going to do the next Marvel movie, because he saw my $5,000 independent film at Sundance, which I shot on my iPhone. Like that's the delusion that is the delusion of us filmmakers. I made a whole movie about the delusions of filmmakers, because I'm sorry, I didn't see it yet. But it hasn't come out yet. It's coming out soon. But but it's but we're crazy. We're nuts.

Klaus Badelt 16:24
It is it is so dated. And it's thinking because look music almost a slice apparently, it's only like to me it's like a seven ABS shift. Right we we in music are eight years ahead of the other guys have in film I've seen myself on the film industry is that um, you today you're right ahead on your on your Pro Tools at home or even Pro Tools right on you're able to do life, you know, he just did he did he did something really cool comes up. And you stay with it. You do not need to sign a deal because you can distribute it into the world and get to an audience. That's the idea. Today as a musician, we feel like I still think if I if I don't sign I'm a failure. Yeah. If you sign a distribution deal, it's kiss of death, you're signing away. So much. I mean, we have so many filmmakers. Look, we're on the platform, we have, like 20,000 titles right now. And there's so many stories attached to these and so much hope. And so much bad experience so much education we have to do because most filmmakers are so burned already with the first film, like, if not to have like a great, I don't I don't know any good example.

Alex Ferrari 17:37
Um, every every filmmaker pretty much and I've said this multiple times is that by the time you get to distribution, you're exhausted, you're broke, your spirit is broken, because you didn't get into Sundance, right? You didn't it didn't blow up like Reservoir Dogs, or you know, or any of these big movies from the 90s. You know, these big independent films that just exploded people's careers, when that the reality hits. That's when you get to distribution. And then that's when the predatory distributors show up and go, look, I'll take it, I can't give you any money, but it's gonna be a 15 year deal. And it's about it's we'll cap the expenses at 250,000. So like, and you just like I signed, and I feel that the scariest part about it is that there are certain companies which will remain nameless, but there's certain distribution companies who have high profile names. And because of their perceived value, and perceived author, like authority in the space, and I'm not talking like a 24 or, or you know, or neon, these guys take 510 they're like basically they're the Sundance of, of distributors. I'm talking about these other guys who are putting up 40 movies a month. They'll people will sign with them, but like, Oh, I got with this company look and and but they get no money. They get no money. We have to get away from this branding, thinking. Instead, we have to take control and call this I call this the ownership model. I have one good example for you. Verner Hertzog with the Vanna hat so gives me pronounce him. Yes,

Klaus Badelt 19:09
I know. Yeah. So look, he the first. I don't know 10 movies he did, including Fitzcarraldo, and all these beautiful classics and icons right. And they're still like when he has a show here on in Santa Monica the arrow there's two 500 super young hungry filmmakers coming not like the old guys like me, right like this. It's a new generation of totally get it. He owns all these movies. He did this for 80,000 Deutsche Mark, you know, and people died on his set and Prince plates crashed and and war started. But he did it right. He did this guerilla filmmaking. Pike's announced into big cinema epic. He owns them. He makes a living with these movies today. That's amazing. They still being you know, licensed out here and their film that was be shown and etc, etc. And all the movies he recently did, let's say let's 1020 years here once you arrive in Hollywood he he doesn't own and he tells me also look close, I wouldn't be here where I am if I wouldn't have my old catalog. That's the ownership model. So into I don't know how he asked him many times, how do you to do this at the time? What did you kick?

Alex Ferrari 20:25
Yeah, I mean, never since like, it's not like he just jumped, you know, grabbed the red, or you know, grabbed the Blackmagic camera and went off and shot a movie and that was it was film 35 it's like in the jungle. He's lifting the ship over like

Klaus Badelt 20:42
madman to date. So uh, we did. I think three movies are forced together. So he tells me the only thing difference today would be who would like a hotel close to the set?

Alex Ferrari 20:55
He's, he's, I mean, he's a madman. And I remember his stories. I heard a story of his where I think it was it his master class. I don't remember where I heard it. But it was the the story where he he forged permits or forged some sort of like paperwork? Yeah, no, it was a passport or passport or some sort of papers that the they came over. And he's like, Oh, no, hold on, hold on, I'll go get them for you. He went back to like his, you know, bathroom somewhere and like, grab some papers and forge them and brought it back to the police. And they said Yes, sir. Okay, it's fine. But he's, he's a madman. And I

Klaus Badelt 21:31
love that about him and his work. It's just no compromise. And so was like, now back to distribution, right? So was his I think his brother is managing mostly the catalog, but he owns it, they own it. So now we need to not get back to this. We need to really embrace this with today's technology. And it's a completely different A to Z like arc, right? Not story wise. But now from creation to consumer watching audience watching it. Look, today, the situation is like like this, there is unlimited shelf space. There's no more blockbuster way that fits only 40 movies in the first top room. Literally Unlimited, it's hot, a hot cloud space, whatever. Second distribution cost is nearly zero. Well, how much does it possibly cost to get a video stream to India? Nothing. I mean, so. So you might think this is great for independent filmmaking now we can actually get for go for your audience. Here's what really happens is our industry has not changed a bit. We're doing exactly the same thing as we do before. I mean, now distribution industry. Director contracts, fill markets, offline markets, you have to travel to Canada just wasn't in to Toronto to make a deal. I mean, like, so with this, I went to Silicon Valley to raise funding and we got funding in sugar Valley because it was so hard. I can say this openly to raise funds in Hollywood. Because if at all people told me I mean, I have so many contacts here. I thought it would be easy to raise. And they said well, most of them said I know you're right. But I don't want you to be right. I want

Alex Ferrari 23:18
that. They want to stay liquid they want the status quo to stay in check. Yeah,

Klaus Badelt 23:21
yeah, I don't I don't want to disrupt that at the Dinos. You can't disrupt the dinosaur, what the dinosaur? And then in Silicon Valley, look at me, like, what are you doing? I don't understand even why? why that's not that should be so easy. Right? And

Alex Ferrari 23:32
that shouldn't be the way of doing it. Yeah, yes. But it's funny when you when you approach people outside of Hollywood, and they show you show them the system, the actual inner workings of this stuff. business people will look at and go, Oh, this is this legal? Like, how is this? How is this? How does this work? Like? What do you mean, there's no escrow account? How is there no fiduciary responsibility for a filmmaker greater like, how is this not a thing? And that and I think honestly, and I've talked about, I've opened up an entire platform and wrote and releasing a new book about this specific idea of being the entrepreneurial filmmaker, owning your own property and creating multiple revenue streams from your movie, as in even the movie itself is not the major revenue stream. There's multiple people out there have built a company million that multi million dollar companies based off of one film, but that's the mentality that has to be the change in people because right now, in film, schools are taught this this crap system. everywhere you turn, all the experts are telling, you know, you got to make a movie, you got to put Eric Roberts and Tom Sizemore in the movie. Or Danny Trejo put them in the movie, it's gonna you take it to AFM or Cannes, and then you're you have to keep the budget around a million or something like that or you buy you get Nicolas Cage and then you can spend $3 million on project because it automatically sells in China. But this old kind of mentality of doing things is what is still being, you know, perpetrated on independent filmmakers and these younger generate, they have no idea because they just look at these, these, you know, whatever distribution gods or film experts, and they just look at them and go, Well, he made 50 movies or they've released 50 movies, they must know what they're talking about. I don't know what I'm talking about. So I think that's what you and I both are trying to do is educate as much as you

Klaus Badelt 25:31
possibly can. And by the way, you can't blame the filmmaker. Like I said this, the schools teach that also, it's a very opaque system by these parameters. Right? It there's no absolute transparency, what. So what we need to do is also counterweight this with transparent operations and very interested simplify it like the Emperor's New Clothes, like there's nothing to it. Right? Right. So let's get your movie out. But it's ownership, you got to work for it, you got to make sure that you do it a for you make it for an audience. You raise an audience, right? You're like, well, who are you talking to? Like, just do this? Do this come on?

Alex Ferrari 26:08
Would you agree that the niche audience is the future for filmmakers? Like if you make, you can make a broad spectrum romantic comedy at $50,000 and expect it to do anything?

Klaus Badelt 26:20
Exactly. And it's I don't call it niche anymore. I call this vertical. Because niche has this like underdog like small ish to it. Okay, so here's my, my bold and cunning theory is that so before we had to follow the broadcast model, one product for millions, it had to be out from, you know, one to many. Now, the internet is not even built for that the internet is built for many to many, many servers, many consumers, if you have a broadcast, it's actually quite difficult to do, like a live broadcast from

Alex Ferrari 26:52
the Olympics or something like that. It's,

Klaus Badelt 26:54
it's hard. It's hard, you know, and they have to distribute the technology. So it's actually not one, two. So now let's think about this and say, if you are, and it's the same thinking Also, if you are now have a narrow, but strong community, who our audience who is your potential audience, you can make now a living and you can make a month make money, you might not make the next Batman revenue, but by the way it could happen. It's like, easy, you make one for 1.5. And he makes 60. But this like this, this, this, this lottery is in there, too. But as long as you own it, you don't have to make that much in order to actually be a creator and keep being a creator. And you can find your audience, even the narrow thing when people don't have to tell you anymore. Well, you know, your your audience to to narrow segment. And you might be surprised what I mean, you live in this topic, there's this in many stories, there's a certain topic touches certain subjects. And then there's a lot of proximity to other outside the movie, thinking to other groups, other communities, we run this technology, we building this technology based on box of AI in there, where we create proximities between movies. And even the early tests, beginning of the year showed us where two movies are similar, which we as humans would have never thought there would actually have some overlap. And that's based on we use, actually, image recognition and, you know, for text search, because we have caption files, etc. So the we create, like a DNA of a film. It doesn't mean this one was good, and you like the other one necessary to but because it might be not as good. Okay, well, it's hard to say what does a good movie not? If you tell me one day, if you have a formula for what's a good movie, let me know. of 100 times myself.

Alex Ferrari 28:55
That's why we have such a crazy business. It's

Klaus Badelt 28:57
not we're not making a bottle of Coca Cola. We're not making a soda. We're not like you can determine. It's just so hard. It's creative. It's hard. It's hard. It's super hard. And it's super hard. Because you always have to be I mean, so many reasons, but you have to be so close in detail and attention to detail, then you have to step back and someone says, Well, I don't get the story here. Like, oh, shoot, yeah, there's a story we have to chew. Right. So there's a lot to this, but but I think distribution and promotion and everything is like look, it's your baby, right? So you you Why would you want to just give up on birth?

Alex Ferrari 29:35
Now, let me tell you, I mean, it just it makes me cringe because I know you're you're telling the Absolute Truth. And it's maddening to me, because I've seen filmmakers who've mortgaged their home for three $400,000 they put this movie together and then they literally hand it over to a stranger to me in what in what Business ever, that someone spent $400,000 on a product and literally just hand it over to somebody else, and hope in good faith that that person will eventually do right by your movie right by you and actually pay you and do what they say they're going to do In what world is that that even live? We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

Klaus Badelt 30:31
And now the opportunity, right, so we are in the video streaming beginning of the video, still the beginning of the streaming age. We do believe a little bit way too much I think into to Netflix and the ended three or four majors in America, well, we'll get to this, maybe hopefully, we have time, but because there's so much more opportunity, but you do not need to do everything yourself. That doesn't mean you are good, you have to be good marketer. You can, for example, work with higher ala carte, the best teams in the world, which by the way, do the same for the studios only for much more, no higher fees, which I would charge more Of course, if Warner Brothers calls you but you have because they the studios don't know themselves either. Really, they hire these talent. No, that's that's the studio. So now you can do that too. You can get a we, for example, we compiling a like a collaboration, if you want a list, how do you call this like a like partnership list of, of marketing agencies. These are usually small groups, two to eight people offices in every part of the world. So you have your team in Australia, you have your team in Pacific Asia, you know, when you should look at definitely at Europe. Of course not forget about domestic here. But so but there's so much opportunity now that there's a full access digital world out there. And we need to build and use and embrace the tools and it's it is an opportunity. It's not like it's not it's not more difficult. It's actually much easier now.

Alex Ferrari 32:13
Do I think the problem that the systemic problem for this entire conversation we're having for is that filmmakers Don't think about this as part of the creative process. They think that making the product is the beginning and the end of their of the because that's the sexy part. That's the fun part. That's the front no one no one ever woke up in the morning, I guess a few people, but not many people wake up in the morning going in Facebook ads? Yes. Like it has it don't just where I want that person who wakes up it goes Facebook ads. Yes. You know, or marketing. Yes, you know, I'm a marketer. I have been all my life. But I'm also a filmmaker. So but most filmmakers think that all I have to because it's so it's such a just moving that rock up the hill to get money to make a movie to produce a product to finish it, get it mastered, delivered and then film festivals if they want to go down that and then distributors and but that's the old model where at the beginning if they begin with like who is this movie for? What who is my audience? How can I reach that audience? What is the budget that this audience will justify huge question that needs to be answered because I I can have a niche audience I always use my vegan chef movie. I always tell people if you're going to make a romantic comedy make a romantic comedy about a vegan chef who meets a barbecue barbecue champion and all hell breaks loose right? And you could target to make this already know everybody know I have a hole in my book actually lay out the entire story. I was like I should make this but you you focus on something like that and you're like okay, so the vegans the video I'm gonna focus on vegans vegetarians, people who like plant based let's say I'm gonna focus on that audience. Is that going to justify a $20 million budget? Probably not. Will that justify $100,000 budget maybe? So you have to figure out what how much is that product budget work? Agreed Dude, I

Klaus Badelt 34:15
worked on $100 million movies which were this should have been 25 when the Harrison Ford and and you know, the marketing had to put in shots into the trailer which didn't even the Rename shot for the movie. I mean, this is complete betrayal to the honest just to justify the budgets you know, of course, it crazy crazy stuff. So no, of course and you don't need you don't need this. I look I worked for example, with every type of budget I did movies for virtually unlimited and I did projects with $1 something actually literally $1.10 to made.

Alex Ferrari 34:54
Of course, and did you go in and hand it cash or did you write a check? I think I think a cheque and then send it to them by mail and put the stamp on it that cost 32 cents. That is how our industry works. That's it sums up the efficiency of what we do, basically is an episode of Seinfeld.

Klaus Badelt 35:15
Every situation life is an episode of Seinfeld here. But so let's look now to the practicalities of this I distributed the only distribution company going out of business, unfortunately, it's was probably the hope of many new filmmakers and like the hope of like, oh, things could do differently. But they didn't do it too differently, I would think anyway. So what you can do is, I'm not a legal expert, I'm sure you you have probably much better sources for this. What we have been doing in these cases is we help with filing complaints to the channels, because usually what happens is that right, there's nothing happening, I had actually movies in production, when pre production stuck in these kind of situations. So suddenly, you lose your cast, because you can move it forward. So here at least there's a bit better, better hope. So we can help with filing complaints to these. These are more or less like copyright notices. This is

Alex Ferrari 36:17
these are just to be clarified. These are from people who are dealing with distributor that their movies are still locked up on this on the platforms through distributors. And then they can't get the movies down because distributor either can't or won't release the films or pull those things down. So now the filmmakers lost their movie lost their money and can't access their film anymore. So now this is what you're talking about helping.

Klaus Badelt 36:40
Yes, exactly. It's sorry, exactly. That's that's the situation for many now. And as I'm sure they're desperate, and many have not been paid or not being paid for a long time. So again, not to be not to give legal advice, which I'm so sorry, the wrong person. But in general, here's how it works. So your distribution company is in breach of the contract because they didn't pay you or they didn't pay in time, etc. So what we can help you with this, because we've done it so many times we have relationships there you we go to the channels and find a certain document so that there's a takedown notice if then that puts the ball into District Court again, meaning if they don't respond, which they're probably don't, because they can't have the time, yes, you actually have it signed over to you. So we can either take it down, or we can sign it and they can get it wack

Alex Ferrari 37:30
will it will if so let's say it's on Amazon, in this, you go through this process of filing that the copyright claim, if you will they take it down? Or would they just switch the rights to meaning that all the reviews and things stay up there

Klaus Badelt 37:45
99.9% they take it down and you have to get it back up on your own,

Alex Ferrari 37:50
and you lose your reviews and all that Exactly.

Klaus Badelt 37:52
That's the big problem. But we were not to pride ourselves. But we were able with, especially with Amazon, because we have 1000s of movies out there to like, talk to them, which even though for us, it's hard to talk to Amazon. In some we were able to shift over. That also means that the revenue stream was which was accumulated for a while could be switched over to Oh, and it would be from day one. And you would get revenue from day one again, if they didn't pay out yet. Amazon for example, as far as I know, I'm not into operation does pay by automatic payments. So you know if if it's not a check, which could be stale, unfortunately, meaning

Alex Ferrari 38:35
in the right now. So right now the movies that are up through distributor, the movies are still up there, people are still renting, still buying and still streaming it on. On Us VOD, that money is arguably still going to distributor,

Klaus Badelt 38:49
right so that you have about three months now to freeze it. So you have to act quickly that the money which is rather have Amazon accumulate, then paying our distributor and at this point, I would say now, I'm not aware if distributor really filed. They have

Alex Ferrari 39:09
they have not filed bankruptcy, they're you know, they hired a firm that is re they're reorganizing specialists. But if you look deeper, they're bankruptcy. They're a bankruptcy company to reorganize the company, stop the bleeding, set things up, and then pretty much prepare it for either bankruptcy or they'll try to go find money to reinvest who's going to spend money on that that brand is pretty much dead at this point. So no one's gonna infuse any cash into this business because the model is ridiculous. And there was gross mismanagement and all of this kind of stuff with the money. So there's no signs, at least from my point of view and from the people, my little birdies in the business who talked to me on the side. There is no there's no hope that I see that this is going to come they're going to come out of this like there's go digital distributor, any of these guys, the companies they're not not going to be able to come back out and start business as usual. It just, it's not going to work. And

Klaus Badelt 40:05
I, again, I'm not a legal expert, then I would recommend very, very quickly before their file, yes, I do compliance, because once they file for bankruptcy is protected, and it's much harder for you to get the assets. And then it's, it might not stuck in that.

Alex Ferrari 40:21
So let me ask you a question. How is that considered an asset? Because it's not there, just a service there. Like you said, there are high, you're hiring them for services, not a distribution company, per se, they are an aggregator. So that means that you're there just did my job. So arguably, the films that they've put up, they're not

Klaus Badelt 40:39
their assets. They're just the thing, right? That's right. They don't have the rights to them. But they're still considered like an asset, because just by having access to it, and the money flows through them. And also, I understand in the fine print of these aggregators, they always say, like, you get 100%, and you only pay up front only. But also, that's not true. There's always a yearly fee, you have to pay for your movies for other reasons, they call the non money differently.

Alex Ferrari 41:13
I saw the article by Steven follows, who actually broke down everything from from distributor, and there was because I joined them years ago, so I wasn't I didn't do any of this, I was grandfathered in. But currently, it's like, you have to spend 20 bucks to get a check. To get paid, you needed to spend $20, like a to get paid nice sound, right? It was like, What scam is this? And then on top of that a 200 or $200 a year, keep it up on the platform fee. And you could just tell that they were just it was the water was just coming and coming. Oh, God. But I want to, I want to ask you this, because you mentioned a couple things in regards to the money flowing through them. I mentioned this in one of my my live broadcasts in regards to this problem that unlike a distributor, a distributor has, you have choices of 1000s of distributors. And if you decide to go into business with a distributor, and they screw you over or do whatever they're gonna do, that's on you, because you had multiple choices around the world that you could have gone with. But with aggregators, there's arguably five, that all the platforms force you to use. And it's not just us, the major studios are forced to go through them as well. So on a liability standpoint, I know we're not attorneys, but on a liability standpoint. Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, iTunes, apple, they have to have some sort of responsibility because they force people to go through, like, if you get a Netflix deal, I could call up Netflix right now. And Netflix is like, I want to buy your movie for half a million dollars. I'm like, Great, okay, how do I send it to you, you have to go through one of these companies. And this is the company that we want you to go through. And oh, by the way, we're going to send our check to that company, and that company is then going to pay you so you see how ludicrous this situation is. So I feel that there is some sort of liability towards the platforms. Would you agree, disagree?

Klaus Badelt 43:15
That's true. Because after all, you had to use them. That's an interesting thought I it was was the the first one to actually be there. Right. And, by the way, I don't we don't feel that they're of any significance any more for quite a while, right? I mean, they have a bit. Right. Okay. Yeah, I we feel this too. We see it in our data. But so they have the only ones who are really officially putting this on the website is there's these encoding houses and these aggregators, that column, even the aggregators have to use the encoding how others because the in you have to go through an aggregator or an encoding, because these are the only ones who have a business relationship with Apple, the encoding houses. So even less, there's value for these off of what these aggregators provide. So, this is I never honestly understood this is also like, Where's the Emperor's New Clothes? Or where where, what? Why do you have to do that? I understand that Apple cannot deal with 1000s of content providers. And something like this makes sense also to to let's say, normalize the technical quality. That That makes sense in a way but from from business standpoint, it's it's it This goes back to like okay, Netflix, because you mentioned it. I want to say this too, is why at the beginning when Netflix was the first one to come up with a key is a new way of like streaming to consumers. is very development to me is it was a big hope for independent film right now. We haven't direct outlet for our stuff we create. Unfortunately, you might have noticed many might not have noticed it is the exact opposite it turned into another HBO or they want to be another one of brothers. They want to create a studio, which they completely control 52% of last year was already like, their own production. There, if you are in the business of getting a co production deal, which is also a kiss of death to me, like you, you get what you get, they don't give you any data. It's it's really it's getting much worse than whatever it is or something

Alex Ferrari 45:28
in the back end, they get no back end, very rare. Nothing All

Klaus Badelt 45:31
right. But it's not that you make a move and then you go to Netflix and they license it. I mean, there's less than less the chances are they don't even want it anymore. They they it's a very, very different still, it's the it's a very old studio like business model, which is the opposite of the whole for independent filmmakers. It's actually now less of it's even less for filmmakers now open what to do, because now this dude is two less movies before that 200 in this town, now that you like, what? 12 here,

Alex Ferrari 45:59
right? So that's Yeah, but instead of two instead of 200, that cost 20,000,020 5 million with the occasional $100 million movie. Now they do dwelve that cost 200 $200 million each, because they're not in the business of making a $25 million million to make 200 million, they're in the business of making 200 million to make a billion

Klaus Badelt 46:16
mine Exactly. And Nelson at the same time. We with digital production pipelines and no production qualities we can do today, with very little investment. I'm I'm here saying with a good idea and good execution, you can do any movie now. And it looks like a million dollars. Now it looks like 100 million. Now it looks like solid, lots solid production. But it doesn't look like a video It looks really like something where people would be fooled into believing this was done by you know, the old brain professionals, professionals. Which we are right I mean, yes, exactly. Just good talent. And again, digital production. Used right? fantastic opportunity. So this more and more content being produced I call this sorry, content as a businessman here. But video movies shows we have these would be looked down on in our industry, these YouTubers who create content, which is 100 billion times being viewed. This is the new TV shows of today, right? This is cool stuff. I mean, some crappy

Alex Ferrari 47:17
middle class with no cost that barely any cost. I've said this, I've said this, a bunch of I said this a bunch of times that an hour is an hour, regardless of that hour cost $100 million, or is just me talking, it's an hour of attention. And the more eyeballs you can get on that hour, it doesn't really matter if it costs $100 million. Or if it's just Tony Robbins talking to you for an hour about self help. It doesn't matter. And that's what scares the hell out of the industry.

Klaus Badelt 47:46
Exactly. So they don't know nobody's taking care of these what you know, these, I call them all some call them the digital first creators, they jail to YouTube at this point, that shouldn't be the case either YouTube pays like, Ah, you know, like, there's nothing that you need Patreon and others to actually make a living out of YouTube. How ridiculous is that? So this has to all change. And this is exactly what I stand for. It's like to find ways with technology to make guys we got to change our way of looking at things. And again, this is not a look, it's not, as you hopefully know, feel it's not advertisement for fame, or film or anything but is it's my it's my I despise how this whole system works. And not only that, I want to

Alex Ferrari 48:33
disrupt it re

Klaus Badelt 48:34
want to disrupt it. I want to create a, let's say it's my legacy, like, Yes, I've done a few movies, but this is I can't I can almost no longer do one movie at a time. I want to now help 1000s and hundreds of 1000s and I feel you. Yeah, right. I mean, you do what you do, right, you do your own stuff creatively. But you see the problems everyone has and like you, you don't sit still you actually help and that's exactly what I'm doing.

Alex Ferrari 49:00
Yeah, I agree. I agree. And it's it's in personally I find it addictive to to be of service to a community or to be of service to people because it on a selfish standpoint, it just feels really good to be able to help. Like I literally talked to a filmmaker yesterday. And they had their plan set up to like, oh, we're gonna go the festival route. And we're gonna do this and this and we submitted to all the big festivals. And I looked at the movie and I said, No, no, this is not a movie for for for the festivals. It's just not you're playing the lottery ticket again. You should focus on distribution. You have a marketable product, you have a good thing, boom, boom, boom, and I laid out this entire and you saw his eyes just like oh my God, thank you so much like you would have wasted a year and I and I also told him like and let's say you get into one of these film festivals for your kind of movie which is kind of like basically over like a comedy comedy like a comedy romantic comedy, something like that. How much is the Sundance Laurel really mean? Bottom line the bottom line, like on How much money extra money you're gonna get for that? Exactly.

Klaus Badelt 50:06
I was in Canvas here, listen to a lot to the panel talks with this new, you know, idea like that you can we know it's no different listen to distribution panels went in there talk to the guys and this seriously people still doing exactly this? Well here's how you get your movie what do you do okay? And ask them to don't call us don't email me, here's how you write the emails but don't email me, right? We do eight movies a year and we're talking about short films, right? In this case in that case. So it was short. And I asked him, so do you engage in marketing? Well, usually we don't. But so what's the exploitation strategy with these? Well, we put them on the festival run, well, I can do this myself. But also isn't doesn't festival mean paying money instead of making money? What where's where's the revenue? So there is absolutely no idea and including the top distributors who are on these markets on these film festivals, how to actually explore and generate revenue for

Alex Ferrari 51:13
film festivals or cultural events. You know, they're not Jonathan Wolfe, the the guy who runs AFM said that very clearly is like, a market is a business like they're about money and film festivals or cultural events. They have nothing to do with business, at least for the filmmaker. There's on their side, it's all about the business. But in the rubber in the front for the filmmakers means nothing. How about is it if you if you get into a festival, and you've filled the audience with the three four showings of like two 300 people each, you get? Nothing. Just the pleasure of being

Klaus Badelt 51:46
there. Exactly. I was exactly I always I mean, I can say on many of these events with movies, I which made it to Sundance and stuff, but I was actually sitting there in front of the audience or at dinners and events. And I felt bad that we spending this kind of money. Right? What if that, that's just to, you know,

Alex Ferrari 52:07
for us illegal trip, it's an ego trip, ego trip,

Klaus Badelt 52:10
it's an ego trip. And if you I felt really, this is again, it's very parallel to these. We have music publishers so called publishers where they will wine and dine and you know, when the band is playing the club, and no, no one involved on the dining table can do anything for the band, but the band is paying for that. So this is the same situation we have in movies still so maybe it's just we need education with Purdue for producers and for creators to tell them Do you really want this look at this with fresh new eyes? There's alternatives and I'm, I want to I am building alternatives to this not only advice, but really alternatives how we can change this.

Alex Ferrari 52:54
Do you think that this downfall of distributor is a sign of like, are they the Lehman Brothers of the distribution basic? Can they be on a much smaller obviously much more scale? Are they are they the crack in the in the armor that not only for film aggregate I think for film aggregators is specifically the question but generally in distribution, because I do feel that nobody knows what's going on. Nobody really knows how to make real money in the distribution game anywhere because things change. Weekly now, so do you think it's a sign?

Klaus Badelt 53:28
It's a bit like the.com bubble it correct. What was it? 2000 something 99 Yeah. 9999 right. So this is the first time everybody thought it's just a hype. And there's really no value. And that's was the first comment after that. is there's real value being created. And I think this is the phase we're in well almost in right now. We too early right. It's still like we have no from the hearsay We have to do something we have to have a digital strategy, but nobody knows what that really means. Also, I have to admit that this How can you because all these channels which are coming out now I mean, we are facing we're looking at 3000 something channels right now. Many of them channels, I mean video streaming platforms, niches, niche niche market, right. Some of them yeah, some are actually mainstream. For example, one of our amazing users is to be TV. I don't know if you've ever heard we are has one of the highest per title rates available. And what do they do advertisement based food isn't that bad? No, it's how networks used to work.

Alex Ferrari 54:35
still do it. And that's and I've been telling that I've been preaching it from the top of the mountain I'm like, Guys, the money is not in TV divide is dead. It is going to be a VOD, and some s VOD and a but Avon is the growth part of this model now right

Klaus Badelt 54:51
without question. I and I liked it. You saying this and you seeing this and I even go further and say well, you know what, I don't even know where it's gonna be. That might be combination because that's Man, it's so early because T word was just what two years ago, everything

Alex Ferrari 55:05
people were making. I mean, I have, I've had people on the show that have made millions of dollars on T VOD, but that was three years ago. Right. And they also had massive audiences and they knew what they were doing. And it was a whole thing.

Klaus Badelt 55:18
And this is now my please. Also, we need to create a sustainable model. If you think when you if you make your movie, as I say, remake it for 5 million, that's a big deal. Right? And you sell it for seven that the to Amazon Studios, not amazon prime, but Amazon Studios. Do you really think this is a sustainable model? Don't you think like, well, somebody's got to pay for it. At the end, if you deliver a shit film, they won't make seven. So somebody's got to pay for it at the end of the day. So now if you think if you believe you have a hit or a solid product in your hand, why would you give it away? and say, Well, I'd rather take like something and I'm out, then Shouldn't you own it and have it for long term and build your actually, well, affiliate portfolio or two, but also like a revenue stream? Instead of? So I know you don't believe in it, then yeah, then you shouldn't be selling it overpriced, because it's not sustainable. If you do believe in it, you shouldn't sell it either. Because, you know, you should participate and have a portfolio and have a catalog. So this this whole system of like, Look, I sold my movie for too many more than I made it. Unless it makes us money, it's just you contributing to the depth of our industry.

Alex Ferrari 56:37
Wow, that's, that's amazing statement. I love that statement. It's it's absolutely true, there is no model right now laid out. Generally speaking as a sustainable model. You know, I'm putting out the the, the thesis of being a film shoprunner, which is being an entrepreneur filmmaker, which is creating multiple revenue streams from your movies, and doing it not once, but multiple times, where you can create a portfolio which has a ton of and all of a sudden, after two, three years of doing something like that, all of a sudden, you've got enough money to pay the mortgage, to do what you love to do, right? I mean, it's the bottom line is that and I want everyone listening right now and watching this right now, I want you to understand this, the dream of being a filmmaker or being a creator is not to be a multimillionaire living up in the Hollywood Hills. That's fantastic. I would love to to walk down the path that Robert Rodriguez did, or Kevin Smith did, or any of these, you know, icons of the 90 independent film movement. But isn't the goal to be sustainable to have food on your plate to put food on the table, a roof over your head? And to do what you love to do for a living? Isn't that the dream? It doesn't matter what the scale is. Exactly.

Klaus Badelt 57:53
And there's only an upside to this. It's and you can say honestly, you never ripped off someone if your goal is not to be ripped off by a ripping off, I mean, that's just the linear part of it. Don't Don't complain it go back, you know, repeat but if you want to write and now is the opportunity also, like part of his sec, that is the I call it's the multitrack distribution strategy is you you said very rightly it's like the 360 idea of like, there's all kinds of revenue streams. I'm doing the same thing i'm i'm educating so much about Look, there is a world outside Amazon, Hulu and Netflix. And it's a grand world and that's your opportunity world these are actually not your opportunity. It's a system which is not built for you. The system which is built for you is the one we're building right now everyone is building right now not only film hub is the system of where the eyeballs go go for the eyeballs I mean by the way we have there was a time and still is the case where production companies thought they could create their own channels so not even one or was able to do this right it's it's that's not where the eyeballs are. Netflix at the eyeballs we got the DVD business Amazon sneaked in the prime business by promising you free shipping. I mean come on base Hulu was owned by a TV company so they did the reruns so that the eyeballs were there

Alex Ferrari 59:22
you're right and now but now Apple Disney Disney plus I'm interested in but they also have a lot of content.

Klaus Badelt 59:29
Right? Right I read them I'm but you know, you cannot watch them. They just pulled the movies under you know, like a rug on your feet always and put it back on the market and for 10 years you cannot watch that but that's

Alex Ferrari 59:40
gone now that they they're stopping that model with Disney plus they're putting up their their classics. Yeah, that whole model is it's gone dead right? Yeah, I was so angry. Oh, I know. You know, and it was it was always smart. Because back in the day when I was still hustling hard. In the DVD market, I would win one of those would hit I would buy 20 of them, I would literally stack them, I would stack them up, put them in a closet and wait about a year and a half or two years after they release, and then I would just put them up on eBay. So I would easily double, if not sometimes triple my money on it. And it was just a nice little extra little extra side hustle. But I like that idea. And I did it with VHS is still I started when I was in the video store doing VHS. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

Klaus Badelt 1:00:35
Sorry that the business model is now invalidated by Disney. Plus, for example, is it still their own comic? Yeah, I mean, Disney has been great in acquiring other brands. And very cool how they expanded. But to me, this means not. I know and we have enough data about this, not everyone wants to watch the same big shoot all over all the time. There is 72%. Last year, of all subscribers of the big subscription services said 72% said there's not enough variety, they want to see more variety of of movies and shows. And that's what you call niche or like a vertical or just there's various interests in it's no longer the case that there is we do not have to cater to the masses only. It's a bit of this long tail theory, or you might be familiar as much for this a lot under under the lower end of the curve. And only like the you know, I call this the top 1%. But on the left side, the percent what it likes to call premium content. I call everything premium content, everything is premium. If you just reach an audience of 60,000, do you have a premium content, if you are able to monetize

Alex Ferrari 1:01:53
it, so it basically premium and I use this example all the time and I say to filmmakers, if the only thing that's going to be able to break through all this noise is going to be niche programming, which is let's say, you know, are you a surfer? If you're a surfer, and there's a movie about a surfer up there, it will cut through all the noise. Because you this really interested me if I'm a skateboarder, if I'm a vegan, if I'm a filmmaker, and I want to watch a movie about filmmakers at Sundance, which is my movie, then that's a movie that that will cut through all of the other noise because it really talks to me, as opposed to Avengers, which is great. And it's fun, and I loved it. But, you know, there's only so many of those out there. And at certain point, you got to cut through

Klaus Badelt 1:02:41
it, right. And there's a certain fatigue in the audience too, because they now know there's more stuff. And it's been withheld from them. Because I've heard about that. It's got all these, you know, online communities in general, like Facebook groups and stuff. The top are, here's my top 20 List of horror movies last week. And then there's these notes Oh, no longer on Netflix, or you can get it there. And then there's a link of like an illegal download because you there's no longer available, right? This is the bullshit we've been doing withholding content from from the audience who actually knows much better now. Yeah, and that's just the beginning of it. There's no big billboards needed on Santa Monica Boulevard. It works. I'm sorry, it does work for certain type. And I'm not saying what the studios are doing is wrong. There is an audience for this too fantastic. But it's no longer the only way.

Alex Ferrari 1:03:33
But it's a different business model. And then that's another thing that we as independent filmmakers, so often we're trying to follow the model set by the studios, which you can't do, you can't make a romantic comedy, with no stars in it, and expect anybody to show up because you don't have the margin that the studios can make a romantic comedy with maybe an unknown and put it out there because they have $100 billion, that they're gonna pump into the marketing. So everybody knows about it, whether it makes money or not, it's, you know, relevant that that's the day. Right. I wanted to ask you really quickly a couple questions in regards to traditional distribution. What advice do you have for filmmakers dealing with traditional distributors? Because I do think there are places for traditional distribution and distribution companies if they're the right partner, and it matches or is aligned with the goals of your film? You know, like, you know, you and I both have film. You know, we're both friends with Linda and Michael from indie rights, which is, quote unquote, a traditional distributor, but I don't really consider them a traditional distributor. Yeah, they're there. But but there are certain distributors that are out there that actually do that are honest, that are straightforward that really care about them, but they're rare. And I do know a handful of them, but they're not many of them out there. So what do you What's your advice?

Klaus Badelt 1:04:49
Yeah, no, they're more like consultants or how would you I would call it like the packaging, they package distribution so they help you create the full on package and that services this definitely a value That's why what rebuilding the film is this machine where they can use that to. And actually, indeed, Linda does, you know the, the using this to get your stuff out in the world. But this certainly added value to get a marketing package or get a promotion, get social media package going, you can't just put it up, then hope for the best I mean, then you might as well not do it. But it's what that's what these great companies do. It's a bit like a good music supervisor, you know, who listens to new music? There's, there's others who just are agents, in best idea, there's agents will look out for you. And there's most of them, don't they just call and say hi, what did you do last week? What can I charge you? So this is exactly the same. So general advice of how to watch out that they if you have the right partner, it's hard to say,

Alex Ferrari 1:05:54
well, so regards to the right partner, let's say you, you you're going into business with the wrong partner, let's say we're gonna, we're gonna go into a predatory deal because you're exhausted, you have no other outsource, you've spent $300,000 of your mom's retirement account on this black and white movie that has no stars in it. And you know, and you get one predatory distributor that says, you know, what, here's the deal. What are those points that and I can go off of, I want to hear what yours are, as well. But what a few of those points that you should go, this is a red flag, you'd be better off just going through, you know, a company like indie rights or a company like yours, and doing the self distribution model. At least you own it, whether you'll be able to make that 300,000 that you've made mistakes way behind before you get to this point. But or do you want to just I always call it a non tax deductible donation to these companies. That's what it is, is a non tax deductible donation to the company basically the distributor?

Klaus Badelt 1:06:57
Yes, yes. All right. And unfortunate. So very little value. But so if you go for the contract of a regular distribution contract, your standard competency, we should contract is not a single thing in there, which I would recommend doing. So you're asking the wrong guy, I'm sorry, you use

Alex Ferrari 1:07:13
nothing. There's just nothing, there's no

Klaus Badelt 1:07:16
nothing is there everything in there is if they tell you something, it's probably the opposite of what they're right in there is that you lose control about spending, you lose control about what to do with your title with the movie. Now I look, I don't want to make Linda look tighter. You know what I mean? Like there are values. But usually, if you go to contract, like how would you prevent this from happening? It's very hard, because these contracts are what, you know, they tell you all that everybody signs it, it's already a red flag that you have to pay anything is a red flag. I think it's all about transparency, these companies today have to count to you on a monthly basis, not on a yearly OS six month basis. And I would absolutely ask for approval rights, which you probably won't get. There is Look, I mean, I work with like, top directors, like, there's only like, what, a handful of directors have Final Cut in this town. No. Yeah. So right. And but no one of these guys makes use of it. So if you have a distributed certain around who says, Well, we have the right and you don't have the right to approve it. But if they give you in, in practice the opportunity to say no or to to work with you on it. Now, then that's great. But the only thing is, how would you know that up front? So now I actually want to hear from you. What do you think is a good feature set to look out?

Alex Ferrari 1:08:47
I mean, a few I could I could talk to you about warnings that I've I've experienced the concept of cross cross collaborate collaboration, which is a longer conversation and we can talk about that later. It's a deep, deep, deep, deep ridiculousness. Alright, just so everybody cuz everyone's gonna go Alex, what is cross collaboration, I can't see the damn word. Collaboration, cross collateralization, whatever that word is, is when they basically have there's two ways of doing it. But I'll talk about the first one is you have one movie and say your movie, you go to a buyer, and that buyer wants to buy that movie for $10,000 and in the territory of Germany for let's say, and then the distributor goes, Oh, wait a minute, I'm going to package 10 and nine other movies in with this movie. You still only have to pay me $10,000 but I'm gonna throw in nine other movies for you. So now you would have gotten whatever 70% 60% 80% whatever that did have that $10,000 but now you get it $1,000 and that is cross collaboration. And they do the same thing with expenses as well. Length Oh, no, no, no, they're they're charged tend not like, Oh, no, yeah, yeah, they buy Yeah, if you buy let's, if you if you spend money on DVDs, if you spend, let's say you spent $5,000 on on DVDs, and they don't sell, and it still cost you $5,000. And then you make $5,000 off of a streaming deal. They'll throw it all in the pot and you got zero, as opposed to like I didn't approve that 5000 you spent Oh, but you made 5000 over here. So I'm not going to take a hit on the distributor. So why should I take a hit? There's that there's length of agreement, which is I mean, I literally, I literally saw this with a filmmaker who's probably watching this, and I won't say the name of the movie, but it was a deal from one of these big reputable companies who have a nice logo. And the deal was 15 years, 15 years. And it was 100 or $150,000, market cap marketing cap, fifth teen years. And I told him he's like Alex, I think I know what you're gonna tell me. I'm like, yeah, run the hell away. Run me was. So the length of agreement. There's there's so many different things. So one of the

Klaus Badelt 1:11:15
reasons what I I'm sorry to interrupt, but I don't even know if there are I don't know of any contracts, which are vastly different.

Alex Ferrari 1:11:23
I mean, Linda, Linda years, 15 years. I mean, Linda Indy writes, is probably the only one of the few companies out there that does like you know, a three year deal. And they're completely transparent with all their filmmakers. So there's no, there's no hiding behind anything. They're really upfront with you, they tell you exactly what they're going to do and what they're not going to do. And that's basically a good I mean, that's a that's one of the reasons why I went with them for my for my films, because they also make sense for my budget, my budget range and things like that. So that's a problem. It's probably one of the best deals in town, she's a unicorn, there's no question about it. And he writes is a unicorn, there are not many of them flying around. You are a unicorn, that's not many of you flying around. So they're they're just different models, different opportunities. But is there a place for them? Possibly, because I have also heard of filmmakers who has signed those deals, that maybe it was like a five year or seven year deal. And they got a Showtime deal out of it, they got a Redbox deal out of it. You know, they got a family video, deal out of it, where there's like still selling DVDs to family video, which is the only living video store chain left in the middle of the country somewhere. But they but they go out and they make these. You can't do that on a self distribution model. You can't do that, you know, doing those kinds of it's more difficult, if not impossible. So are there potentials? Yes, but I do believe that they are outliers, they are not the usual. They're just like, oh, by the way, we submitted to Redbox and Redbox kind of liked what you had. So they're going to give you a 2000 DVD order. And these are all dying models anyway. Agreed. I don't think this is everything I just laid out. Are you're grasping to the final, final bit of money that's flying around. And and I also wanted to say it right now we're in arguably a good economic environment. As soon as the next bubble bursts, or the next downturn comes, which you know, is coming any day now. It's going to happen within the next year, if not shorter, year or two. We're way overdue. something's going to happen. And I think it's going to be probably worse than 2008. And if that does, I'm not being a conspiracy, but it's just like, it's just history. I mean, we see it. How do you think our industry is going to survive like it barely, it barely took the hit of 2008. I remember 2008 and it was just like people were just companies were folding movies were being lost. It was just in we're getting we're having trouble in a good situation is economically. Can you imagine once the pressure of the world comes crashing down our little business?

Klaus Badelt 1:14:00
Yeah, but but I totally agree. But I see this as an opportunity again, because I think who would get hit the most? All those old industry types? Because these deals and dealing deal making and their family? Gosh, they're fat fats. Yeah. Because there's a high margin for all these guys. Just not the creator and not the consumer. Right. I mean, this is where that's where it gets skimmed off. It's, it's crazy. But that means that you with your low budget, medium budget, you financed it in an alternative way. Look, I talked to high profile producers, including New York. They tell me in the last three years they haven't done a traditional financing on any movie. It's been all Netflix and Amazon. That is to me super red alert. This is like the highest dependency ever. I personally know Okay, well we own an error or something but I don't I see the bubble. Also with Netflix I see this as a high dependency which is at high risk by financing is not secure. Their model to me is high risk they have a lot of debt

Alex Ferrari 1:15:09
they have a tremendous amount of debt tremendous amount of debt

Klaus Badelt 1:15:13
and all they do is that the difference is they don't sell tickets but subscriptions but that can change as the tickets can change though I wouldn't I and then you have nothing left as a as a as a producer. I've worked with so many even high profile producers I'm not saying I don't really dollar movies but like solid movies $20 million dollar award they haven't after the initially I didn't see any any money. I get a short time deal. Yeah, but that's they supposed to represent it and then and then there's nobody for them anymore. But nothing gets reported is late. It's you know of the infamous Harry Potter Warner Brothers. No, no, I hear that when Oh, I'll send you can repost it the the report that there was no there's no no profit

Alex Ferrari 1:16:04
on which on which Harry Potter on all it No,

Klaus Badelt 1:16:07
no, no that I sent you this this thing which went around this is a copy of a profit report of royalty report where the whoever is sipping was so nothing because it was all in the revenue was talking about like a half a billion dollars or something. So there's all kinds of interesting accounting ways.

Alex Ferrari 1:16:27
So it was like Forrest Gump. Remember Forrest Gump, they came out publicly and said, Oh, no, Forrest Gump. We it's we're in that we're still in the red on Forrest Gump. And then like it made $683 million. Are you that incompetent? Are you that incompetent of a company that you cannot make a profit on a movie that costs you X dollars and like,

Klaus Badelt 1:16:49
yeah, and again, I compare this over always with the music industry, who we see is it is ahead of us. And we can see what the solutions are. When you had a platinum record, you would be still paying your record company or when you're a record company. But if you sell 60,000 records or 30,000 on your own touring all the time, you can make a fantastic living ratio make more than no t shirts, don't

Alex Ferrari 1:17:11
forget t shirts, hats, photo opportunities. Oh, yeah, that bands are starting to sell photo ops in the back. So good to go backstage, you'll charge you 150 bucks, you can come back, we'll take a picture. We'll talk about it. Why not? It's a it's an another revenue stream, you know, and

Klaus Badelt 1:17:27
we have to come up with more revenue stream for filmmakers to musicians have have this life channel, right. So now but what we would for example, film up does is we say, and there's a lot of education about I still go get you is you have to go as many multi channel strategy. Look last year, if you bank on Mr. to Amazon, my own and I don't trust any other guys. Do you get a payment rate hit from 74%. And you don't even know how much they pay. Now they're taking all these titles offline? And they don't tell you why in which ones and why they did this. There's no way this is like a it's a complete. It's an authoritarian state of video streaming and film streaming. So you must not rely on on a handful or even less of these domestic channels, you have to go super wide.

Alex Ferrari 1:18:22
Would you agree? I don't mean to interrupt you. But do you agree that you need to look at your film as a investment in a portfolio, you can't invest in one stock, you need to have a diverse stock if that diverse revenue streams coming in. And if it's $5 here, $10 there $100 here $2,000 there every month that that those revenue streams come up because if one goes down, you've got other revenue streams that could pick up and cover it. But if you put all your eggs in that one basket this is what they do. And it's like doing that with a traditional distributor sometimes it cannot be a good thing especially the predatory ones like you're putting everything in this one this is the only channel The only way I can make money with my movie is the old the old way which is which is

Klaus Badelt 1:19:07
bs no no it's Bs and dangerous these areas issue dangerous and high it's high risk suddenly to a to a product you have no so you need to go wide and I mean the most obscure things off map we had this thing where suddenly China ordered hundreds of independent indie indian films like Bollywood you would call but they're not Bollywood really. Suddenly this word who knows and and this this multilateral well flow Pun intended for streaming write it today it's much it's getting much much easier for example to get you English speak English material out maybe might not even need captions when captions and needed by some channels. But technically but do you have a good chance of having your English language title out in many countries of the world Like 10 years or five years ago, it was harder they wanted like their local only and harder to get in. And then your distributors telling you Oh, it's not the demand is not big enough to get in there. Big enough these days it's that doesn't count any

Alex Ferrari 1:20:12
look at Brad Pitt just got beat at the box office buy down, Abby. I'm just throwing that out there. Okay, like Brad Pitt, arguably one of the biggest movie stars in the world got bitten beaten by a by a niche film, that it's bitch. I'm not gonna watch that. Now. Maybe that's not my crowd. I don't want to watch that. But to its audience, they came out with gangbusters. And not any of those stars in that movie could open any movie ever. But in Downton Abbey, they could. Yeah, exactly.

Klaus Badelt 1:20:46
Right. It's beautiful. It's a great story, I think. Yeah. And it's it started out as Okay, it was a relatively high budget TV show, but still, you know, it's it's coming out of nowhere. Right. Right. Right.

Alex Ferrari 1:20:57
I mean, you're talking about a space like 100 million plus dollar Brad Pitt vehicle. Like, I mean, your chances of and then it's like, oh, it's also about that drama about, you know, you know, like, British drama or British driver. Yeah, it's a BB. It's a DCC BBC episode out there an hour and a half episode that's beating Brad Pitt. $100 million. Dude.

Klaus Badelt 1:21:21
It's a beautiful world. And we had his Look, I have, like I said, we have so many titles on the platform. So many that I cannot watch them anymore. All of them definitely. Look in there. And some of them I have to admit, look, we don't curate right. So what I what I say is, it's it's a principle and major feature is, there is no one can no one can tell you if a movie is good, or will make money that's different to By the way, right? Very different. So who am I to say that even though our industry is full of these people who to know on markets that tell you all we know is Oh, have you heard? No, I don't know. I haven't. Nobody told me that. It's good. I have to hear from others too. First of all this BS. So we have all these titles. And some of them I thought, Oh my God, that's not good. Oh, embarrassing. Okay, well, we get all that too. Okay. Well, since we don't curate, we get everything right. So this, but the system works differently with with a platform like this. So and there were titles in there, which made the first weekend so much money when they came out on Amazon, all these streaming services, were like, I would have never thought myself and I pride myself in like knowing a little bit about the movie industry. But who am I say, nobody knows anything. I worked on Brad Pitt movies, which completely tanked. I worked for directors who did the Brad Pitt movie before mine which computer to work, he worked with me and it was a big hit. So Ed, just you never know. You never know he cannot. Nothing is 100% or even 90%. You and that's why on the positive side as an independent filmmaker, you know, Downton Abbey is not that indie right, but, but still, it's the direction where it comes from

Alex Ferrari 1:23:02
compared compared to a Brad Pitt vehicle. It is it's pretty indie. But it's not the I know that you've made

Klaus Badelt 1:23:07
and there is lots of, there's lots of butter out there for your bread. That's that's the point and quote, I like that, get that get a little bit of that in and get it in chunks, little chunks. And

Alex Ferrari 1:23:21
now, really quickly, I want to I want to give you an opportunity to talk specifically about film hub, because you've been so gracious with your time talking about the business in general, I do want to give, you know a little bit of time to just please tell everybody the business model and what you do at film hub.

Klaus Badelt 1:23:35
So you might have now heard through this great friend like this, I don't believe in the old system of distribution and aggregation. So what I build film about is, it's not an aggregate, I can tell you what it's not it's not an aggregate is not a distribution company. It is a platform or a in systematically the marketplace. It's more like Airbnb, then a 24. So it's what you do is you have a movie or you have a show, you upload it, and you're one of the users, there's no cost involved whatsoever for you. You enter, it's very, hopefully very professionally done. Hope you guys again, where we upload all the data you wish we would give as a deliverable to a distribution company. And then on the other side, we have these buyers, we have of hundreds of channels, video streaming platforms, buyers, who this, these titles get marketed to. So they can browse the catalog in the traditional way. But they're also we using more and more AI tools and deep learning tools to match what they like. So these are buyers, these are buyers Exactly. So then they order the titles from the platform, you know, it's also free for them as well. Then the whole deliver process of like, you know what You get charged for a distributor cetera, this is all included. And you don't have to pay anything because we put this into into the cloud. And it costs us almost nothing on it just development. So that we take the whole distribution process online. And then when someone watches it on, let's say, I don't know China Mobile, because they bought your title. But in this case, license means usually, nine 9% means they get the title for free, you have a performance model, when someone is watching him, or you get a share of the subscription fees. They come through us. We also consolidate it in nice looking dashboard so you can see what country your revenues coming from etc. And then with our latest upgrade, you can actually withdraw it so far, we've been still like paying quarterly.

Alex Ferrari 1:25:47
Do you only do features or do shorts as well?

Klaus Badelt 1:25:50
shorts, if you have a lot of shorts, we have some special deals with some cable channel, sometimes we put out like short festivals on I mean, the cable festivals, short form, Facebook watch is still not out what's actually that gonna be but it's all about short form. I think short form is the future. By the way, there's so much short form demand. Because that's how users behave. You know, I mean, my 16 year old now sorry, 18 year old daughter cannot listen to a song for more than a minute. So you know, I mean, like, there used to be eight minutes long when we had vital albums, geez. And now the

Alex Ferrari 1:26:26
Queen I mean Queen alone

Klaus Badelt 1:26:30
in theaters do. So look at the demand for this, but like skip after a minute. So the attention span is very low. So fraud form is actually great. I'm not promising you will be a millionaire with this. But it's a very fair system where you get what comes in, we take a small share, we take 20% of what comes in at this point, we still thinking about the business model how to adjust it, but that's just to keep the lights on.

Alex Ferrari 1:26:56
But there's no cover, there's no cost upfront,

Klaus Badelt 1:26:58
there's no cost No, and it's only found money. So you have a movie, there's nothing to lose, and you can take it off any, you just put a notice in for us, you want to take it off. Or you can even say hey, I made a deal in Italy,

Alex Ferrari 1:27:12
off of Italy,

Klaus Badelt 1:27:12
I love Italy. Because we have like this rights management thing built in, you click Italy away. And that's it. So you can manage your digital catalog and make money.

Alex Ferrari 1:27:21
And there's a lot of films, a lot of filmmakers out there who do have short films, maybe some award winning short films that possibly could even if it's $20 a month, would you pick it up, if it was on the floor, that's what I always tell people like you don't need to be making 10 2050 100,000 a month. If it's 20 extra dollars, it takes you a minute to do it. And over the course of the next three to four years that might grow, it might go down, it might stay the same. It's $20 that you didn't have to work for. Except,

Klaus Badelt 1:27:50
you know, we have even, like smaller production companies who have like 2025 titles, you know, they produce themselves and, and it's all we you know, some of them are domestic, some of them are from all around the world. And we have New Zealand everywhere. And they say well, we didn't have access to this market before. And it wasn't cost effective to go to AFM. After eight years of this title being around or three years, only old titles we have all over 50% of our types or three years in younger, which is I was surprised to I thought first people will try out but the old cola. But notice, this is hope after I mean you can still do a festival run. You can still do whatever you like it's just augmenting and helping out basically and creating found revenue you didn't have before. That's amazing. And we have lots of tire filmmakers, lots of filmmakers who actually make a living off this now we just shot me very proud. Stop it, Klaus stop. And it's like, it's like you don't need no deals. You just this is where now you could of course say well, as you said earlier, you need to you know, keep doing Yes, you need to market and promote your title if you just put it up now, right? But if you do marketing, if you get into the social media, for example, Facebook, you know, it's still you might hate it or love it. It's still effective to work the social media. And you can recreate an audience or reactivate no one's even on the title, which is two years old, which is not all it's just brand new. Nobody's ever for most of them. It's brand new. So you you tried your festival run didn't work or you have titles even falling back to you after 15 years. Oh my god, but or three or something. You know if if this is like, we I pride myself in like we take everything, and only the good stuff makes money. Well, everybody thinks they have good stuff, but not everyone will make money with it because it's maybe not as good as they think. But who am I to say so these are the features, right? We don't curate you can upload. You don't have to pay. You keep all your rights. You can get Anytime and in our channels, they they love the system because we create like, it's because it's technology. So they are, it makes it so easy for them. And so little mistakes. And it's very fast. I mean, it used to be many months until your title went live somewhere, including making deals even longer. And now, after the initial upload is done, and it's on the marketplace, it can be a few days until it's out and live.

Alex Ferrari 1:30:29
That's amazing. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show. That's amazing. Well, close. I have a few questions I have to ask. I asked all of my guests if you have if you have a minute I know we've gotten I'm so sorry. No, it's not your fault. I I will stop it if it's bad, sir. We have this is really good. Really good, really good information. And I hope everyone out there is appreciative of it. Now what advice would you give a filmmaker trying to get into the business today?

Klaus Badelt 1:31:06
There's no better time than now. And become an entrepreneur filmmaker.

Alex Ferrari 1:31:12
Don't feel a filmtrepreneur if you will.

Klaus Badelt 1:31:14
Excellent. Did you come up with that?

Alex Ferrari 1:31:16
Yes, I have a whole website podcast and a new book coming out.

Klaus Badelt 1:31:20
Wait a minute who's promoting now?

Alex Ferrari 1:31:22
Do you not see? Do you not see the hat sir? Do you not see? You know, don't hate the player? Hate the game? Sir. Let's move on.

Klaus Badelt 1:31:30
Like, yeah, when the good news is, look, what we also do is it's a business I'm not this is not a non for profit. It is a business and I hope it's going to be a big business because if it's a big business, we can show this industry that it that the new mainstream is the independent and is the verticals and is the the lower medium budget becoming hits. And that's what the audience wants if we can prove it with so far it's it's doing very well it's we have can give you all the metrics like growth a percent a month in in all these things. But there is an audience who wants to see this, even the most, you know what others would call obscure and not exploitable titles. So So now is a good moment to create film become the intrapreneur. raise enough not raising funding but but include in your budget or in your time schedule A to Z including distribution and promotion, even if it means you hire someone to do it. But don't stop by making it in turn, you know, your head to your baby and you're back to your baby and move on to the next one.

Alex Ferrari 1:32:43
What is the lesson that took you the longest to learn whether in the film business or in life?

Klaus Badelt 1:32:49
Out of the million lessons? Wow. That's a that's a deep question. I mean, I learned so many lessons.

Alex Ferrari 1:33:02
The longest one that took you the longest to learn.

Klaus Badelt 1:33:06
Um, actually sounds a bit corny, but to never give up. I'm still not 100% clear. And to say no. These are the longest things a beginning I said yes to everything because I was so afraid they would never ask me again. And now I still do it a lot. And I still think up because it's for the relationship right? And for this if it's nothing you own meaning you know, be creative. Don't do it. And that is super hard to learn because we all so under pressure.

Alex Ferrari 1:33:43
Now what is the biggest fear you had to overcome to get into this business? Or what you do?

Klaus Badelt 1:33:49
Look I we all creatives and the worst The hardest thing is to create from scratch. A writer once told me what it is is you pull pour gasoline all over you and you have to light the match. And yeah, I I'm one who when I ride I have to suffer. And to get this out and it's terrifying. So Wow, it is so hard for me to write us. You have to find a good balance between liking what you do and hating what you do. Both is possible to do too much.

Alex Ferrari 1:34:24
Okay, fair enough. Now, the toughest question of all three of your favorite films of all time.

Klaus Badelt 1:34:31
Why? My goodness. Here's the first thing when I started writing major motion pictures like when it came here about 20 years ago. I virtually stopped watching movies. Because I could no you have to you do not know you don't understand. I was not alive. I was slaving in darkroom for 1816 hours a day.

Alex Ferrari 1:34:54
I come from post production sir I know exactly what

Klaus Badelt 1:34:58
you sow. To watch your movie on the weekend, no way. Besides, you know, I cannot listen to music influenced me what I mean I, I wrote themes, which I had written six years before that, and I reuse them and I didn't know that. And nobody told me because everyone was just tired. Only years later and also, why do you mean this exact same what I wrote before? Okay, so all this thing all this stuff happens so my movies will not sound like but what I Okay, okay, I have well first like, one of my favorite things when I grew up was Lawrence of Arabia Believe it or not,

Alex Ferrari 1:35:35
Spielberg still says one of his best movies of all time, I did not know that I just Spielberg watches it every time he watched he before he directs the movie, he always watches Lawrence of Arabia.

Klaus Badelt 1:35:45
It is like almost inspiring. You just want to be a different person. And that's the movies which, you know, affect me the most if we would change your life a bit. Then my 15 year old son turned me on to a film which was done in the 90s called long for the child. The dad and brothers didn't but then brothers sorry. If you don't know it must watch it. Okay, that's a movie where? I don't know it was made for $2.50 and gets the impact of a $200 million movie on you. And I don't have a third one I can just we think about it. But see this my range between I'm a sucker for the mainstream stuff I have to admit right. I love this stuff when it's done right. I love itI Come on. Really? I can see it pretty much almost

Alex Ferrari 1:36:37
I mean a lot of things to silver does you know he's not he doesn't hit it out of the park every time. But even his even his foul balls are pretty nice.

Klaus Badelt 1:36:45
Yeah, and I liked it. You know, commercial I you know, the early Eddie Murphy. Like the stories in there, right? We don't do this anymore. These days

Alex Ferrari 1:36:53
Coming to America,

Klaus Badelt 1:36:54
Coming to America. I mean, if you want the third one, I know it's not like I wouldn't take this to an island. And that's the only movie I would watch. But I adore these titles. Because again, these are stories. Always like small personal stories with the big backdrop and but I've done also, I even love movies I did myself which is rare. I love this movie called Little nickel pettine Cola, which was one of my favorite story books done in the 50s. And not because I did the music Trust me. I'm usually like, I understand. But that was well done the most great and and it's totally independently done. And it's something nothing we would really watch in America. But there's a chance that one day we might get a bit more international stuff here so we can actually watch.

Alex Ferrari 1:37:46
I think we're getting to that point. There's so much more stuff around the world that's coming in. I mean, even on on Netflix, you're getting shows from, from Latin America, from Europe, from India, that are you know, I've been I was watching a telenovela the other day on Netflix amazing. Because it was, you know, it was it was about selia cruise and I love I'm Cuban. So I love I love her music. I was like, Oh yeah, this is a great lol and I my wife, my wife is just sitting there like I'm I can't believe I'm watching a little Bella. But this is fantastic.

Klaus Badelt 1:38:18
I know you need to move on and we need to finish this. But when I was in Airbnb, the guy from before had still logged into his Netflix. So I got the recommendations of him. Right, totally random guy. And that's also a sign for how bad recommendations I've had Netflix. I love them. It was amazing. And he had prime did you know it was completely different than me? So I have watched this and now I have to get you the title and in Bollywood action film.

Alex Ferrari 1:38:45
Well that you could just stop right there Bollywood action film out you've had me at hello. I mean, amazing.

Klaus Badelt 1:38:51
Oh, he was everything was blowing up. Oh, I've seen some boats race car. We met a Formula One car somewhere in South Africa.

Alex Ferrari 1:39:01
Did you see that little India he's become a world famous actually to the documentary about him is this little Indian dude. Like he's like a you know, he's a little person. But he's like this action star. He's kicking the heck out of everybody. He's got all the women and it was just so 80s over the top. They actually did a documentary searching for where he is in the world. I never saw it but I heard about I was like, This is brilliant. This is brilliant.

Klaus Badelt 1:39:25
Love. And I love that too. And again, that's some indie film right when they do this for what $12 million is a high budget there right? US dollars right? So amazing what you can actually pull off with good ideas and if you like have integrity and you must love what you do and some hate what do you do your thing is complete board. But you know, that's the problem. I loved it. I loved it. I would have never watched it and I gave it to my my 1819 year old only for 16 at the time and said Hey you, you girl she was with a girlfriend's there. You have to watch this end. I love the tube. So Isn't this great house. You can stuff you would have never watched never. Nobody would show you here in the theaters or you know, on TV in the old, old school.

Alex Ferrari 1:40:07
I mean, this is why I love the room so much. I mean, Tommy was those the room? I mean, I can watch that. I can't watch it alone, because that's just sad. You have to watch it with a group of people, and preferably if you watch it with filmmakers. Oh, it's brilliant. It's so bad. It's brilliant. Yeah, I know what you mean. Right? Yeah. classmen Thank you. And where can people find you? Where can people find out more about film house and everything?

Klaus Badelt 1:40:31
So filmhub.com is the website. There's some information on there. Feel free to hit us. There's a messenger and I know a little box you can click on. We are on Twitter with film hub HQ. On Facebook. We're film hub HQ. Oops, I think so look for film hub. Yeah, and again, it's a what we do is I want to make sure that you understand that we are just like you on the same side. We're on the we're create a first grade A friendly, we don't charge you. It we are I'm a filmmaker, right so I have nothing else in mind. But helping those to create and keep creating.

Alex Ferrari 1:41:13
And making money is a good way to keep that that that brush painting on that Canvas.

Klaus Badelt 1:41:19
I'm after all, I didn't stay in Kirkland, Germany, I came to Hollywood it's it's about making money. And and you can I think today is is better than ever, and it's getting better. And don't let this distributor screw up, like, take you the wrong way. Things like this will always happen. I think it's a big opportunity now that you know, the it we cleaning up here the industry is cleaning up right now.

Alex Ferrari 1:41:44
Absolutely. Klaus man, it has been an absolute pleasure. We will have to schedule your composing episodes soon because I dying to hear all your stories.

Klaus Badelt 1:41:54
And I'm sorry for the overtime I was.

Alex Ferrari 1:41:56
No, it's fantastic. So with that, thanks again Klaus for being on the show. I want to thank Klaus for this epic conversation about the state of self distribution, the state of distribution in general and the business model of how filmmakers make money. This is a very, very important topic. And I need to ask you, please, if you enjoyed this episode, share it with five filmmaker friends of yours, send it out to as many if you can, but at least share this episode with five of your friends. Because man, this information really needs to get out there. I don't want to see any more filmmakers lose their shirts, lose their dreams get their hearts crushed by this business, especially if they've gotten the energy. And they were able to do the unachievable which is to make a feature film and finish it and get it out and master it only to fall. And as cloud says turn your back on your baby to move on to something else and give it over to a stranger. So you really need to take complete control and responsibility for your creation for your film for your product out there. And this episode really lays out a lot of great nuggets of information a lot, a lot of knowledge bombs, helping you do that. So if you want to get links to anything we discussed in this episode, please head over to indiefilmhustle.com/349 for the show notes, and I'm going to have a special episode tomorrow. Episode 350 is insane that I've gotten up to 350 episodes of this podcast. But there's going to be a special episode we're going to talk a little bit about the show and what we've been able to do over the course of the last four years. But also i'm going to be announcing in detail my live boot camp that will be held in Los Angeles, specifically in Burbank, California. But I'll break down everything about that boot camp and what I hope to achieve with it and what I will be doing in the future with the bootcamp moving forward. So thank you guys for listening. It's been a pretty long episode, so I'm going to cut it a little short. You can even call this cutting it short. But thank you for listening. Thank you for your support. I truly truly appreciate it. And as always, keep that hustle going. Keep that dream alive and I'll talk to you soon.