Screenwriting Competition, our Coverage Service, and Film Submissions Now Open!

From The Desk Of A Submissions Manager . . .

Screenwriting Competition, our Coverage Service, and Film Submissions Now Open!

Hello Slamdancers!

It’s been busy times around here lately with our recent deadline for the Screenwriting Competition and Film Submissions opening last week. We still have one more deadline for Screenwriting, July 30th is the Final Deadline date. And, we’ll of course be accepting films until the end of October. Tomorrow, film submissions will have been open for about a week, and so far we already have about 200 entries. Last year, we received a little over 5,000 submissions, so we’re gearing up around here for a busy summer/early fall and processing thousands of films.

For the Screenwriting Competition, we’ve been getting a lot of questions lately about title pages. I’ve been hearing that it’s not uncommon for competitions to disqualify entrants for including a title page, or not including one, or including one with improper information according to their guidelines. To clarify here, we do not have any such restrictions. Our preference is for a title page that includes your title, name, registry number, and contact info, but this is not required. We also accepts scripts with no cover page at all. Put as much or as little information here as you wish, it’s literally completely up to you. So, that makes that pretty easy.

Another question I’ve been hearing a lot of lately is regarding our coverage service. Every entrant to Slamdance receives a few lines of feedback within about 60 days of the submission date. Sometimes, writers are so intrigued by this feedback, that I’ll receive an email asking if full coverage can be purchased at that time. The answer to that is YES. We will simply ask that you pay the coverage fee, but you don’t have to pay another submission fee. The coverage fee is $75 to get it back in 60 days. This can be paid by check after your script has been entered for competition through withoutabox.com. Email me at my address below for more information on this.

Speaking of coverage, I received a very nice email this week about how much it helped out a writer and I thought I’d share that here with everyone. For the sake of competition, I’ll keep the identity anonymous.

“Hello, Slamdance. I received the coverage for my screenplay recently, and I appreciate the speed and thoroughness with which it was delivered. As a solitary writer in Georgia, I found the criticisms extremely helpful.”

This was so great for me to receive, it pretty much made my whole week better. When you’re in the business of offering harsh yet constructive criticism to writers, as we are, you can receive a lot of emails expressing hurt feelings and frustration. Perhaps not surprisingly, I suspect people are often much quicker to provide feedback when hurt or angry than when they’re happy. It is so good to get emails such as this though and know that the service we offer does in fact help writers to hone their craft. That is truly what it’s all about around here. That and watching thousands of films to find the best new emerging filmmaking talent, of course.

Until next time, signing off...

Summre Gaston

submissions@slamdance.com