Video Age International November-December 2015

20 December 2015 V I D E O A G E AFM Changed Over The Years (Continued on Page 22) According to VideoAge ’s reports, in 1985, 60 percent of all foreign film sales done at the AFM were for home video rights. By 1990, theatrical sales resurged with 41.5 percent of sales, while video decreased to 32 percent. Four years later, free-TV sales accounted for 27 percent of the total, while theatrical was down to 30 percent. In a 1994 AFM VideoAge Daily interview, Alex Massis of Angelika Films reported that, “Television today represents 90 percent of our business.” By 2008, AFM became “primarily a DVD market” ( VideoAge , Nov./Dec. 2008 Issue), but two years later went back to “television sales (especially for the digital channels) and the VoD window, followed by DVD sales” ( VideoAge , Nov./ Dec. 2010 Issue). Then, in 2013, “AFM declared the DVD business basically dead, replaced by streaming.” In the same December 2013 Issue, VideoAge reported that “on [AFM] opening day, Blockbuster Video announced the closing of its remaining 300 home video stores in the U.S., to be replaced by streaming service.” Holender remembered that the idea of a Los Angeles-based market came about in the summer of 1980, when a group of American content distributors, including Lorimar, began inviting foreign buyers to La Costa in Carlsbad, CA. The resort near San Diego was then owned by Merv Adelson, the boss of Lorimar. The actual idea of AFM was first articulated that summer during a luncheon attended by five Los Angeles-based independent film distribution executives. They were meeting at the Il Giardino restaurant to “discuss the high costs, the bribes and corruption at the Cannes Film Festival,” recalled Bobby Meyers, who was then heading up international film sales at Lorimar and was the “instigator” for a locally-organized international film market. At the restaurant, the group (which included Bill Moraskie of Carolco and Herb Fletcher of Crown International), found itself siting next to Rocco Vigliotti and Budapest-born Andy Vajna, both with Carolco, who decided to join them. Subsequently, as remembered by Lou George (then with Arista Films), he joined an extended group that met in the boardroom of a Bank of Monica. Old-timers recall that in the beginning, actual sales of pornographic films were not officially allowed at the AFM, but since many sellers of the triple-X films were also producing and distributing mainstream movies, they could not be prevented from exhibiting. In addition to changing its location five times since its inception, the AFM had to sustain multiple date switches andmanagement changes, the most taxing coming in 1997. At that time, Mike Frischkorn Jr., a Washington D.C. lawyer with no film business experience, was appointed president. He resigned three years later and was replaced with current president Jean Prewitt, another Washington D.C. insider. Despite surviving the prolonged and bitter fight with the more established (and now defunct) MIFED film market in Milan, AFM got stuck with unpopular November dates after the demise of the Italian market. However, the fall dates were later dictated by costs, since February is Oscars season and all hotels around L.A. increase their rates at that time. In order to keep costs at bay, in mid-2011, AFM organizers considered moving the market to downtown L.A., a move disliked by all participants, but avoided that with help from the city of Santa Monica, which put some pressure on the Loews Hotel. While at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, in order to provide screening rooms for exhibitors, the market rented movie theaters in nearby Westwood Village and Beverly Hills. By 1990, the AFM relied on 20 screens in various scattered cinemas, which had to compete with the multiple screening rooms at MIFED that were conveniently housed on the same exhibition floors. Today, in its Santa Monica location, the AFM can rent exhibitors some 26 screens across three nearby multiplex cinemas and four hotels. Despite the initial acceptance of the AFM, particularly among L.A.-based film companies, MIFED still dominated the international film market early on. Indeed, it was only in its November/December 1987 Issue that VideoAge America in Beverly Hills. The American Film Market Association (AFMA) was formed the following October with a $5,000 contribution fromMerv Adelson (for legal fees) andwithBobby Meyers as its first president. The larger group also included Ed Carlin (Concord/New Horizon), Mark Damon (PSO), Robbie Little (Overseas Pictures) and Michael Goldman (Manson). In 2004, AFMA changed its name to the more appropriate Independent Film and Television Alliance (IFTA), since by then many of its members were from outside the U.S. The AFMbegan as aMarch 24-31market in 1981, a few months before the creation of VideoAge , and from the start, the destiny of the two were intertwined. The first AFM was held at the Westwood Marquis Hotel (now the W) in West Los Angeles. It housed 26 selling companies and registered a total of 1,000 participants. The following year, it moved to the nearby Holiday Inn on Wilshire Blvd, and in 1983, it was held at Continental Hyatt Hotel (which has since become The Andaz), where it remained for three years before heading to the Beverly Hilton, the hotel that had originally rejected it, in 1986. In 1991, AFM moved to its current location at the Loews Hotel in Santa (Continued From Cover) The Loews atrium at AFM 2007 Despite the initial acceptance of the AFM, particularly among L.A.-based film companies, MIFED still dominated the international film market early on. AFMA’s Mike Frischkorn (president 1977-2000), Troma Films’ Lloyd Kaufman, AFMA’s Jonas Rosenfield (president 1985-1997) with one of Troma’s characters at AFM 1998