Making Media Matter when the World is on Fire

While docs are selling for big bucks at major festivals and public broadcasters remain essential to the documentary ecosystem, private philanthropic funding plays an increasingly important role in ensuring a free and open space for creating non-fiction films, and ensuring they reach diverse audiences. How are philanthropic funders supporting the field, and how can individual filmmakers access those funds?

The advantage of equity funding is it tends to be more nimble and flexible, hurray! What does that mean for filmmakers approaching them with new projects? Are one-off’s less interesting than series? And for those interested in a double bottom line of revenue and impact, what does impact mean to them?

Doc Society is addressing the climate crisis with an agile new model, the Climate Story Labs and Fund, and their Mothers of Invention podcast highlights feminist solutions to climate. What are the new models for making media suited to the urgency of the climate crisis?

GRETA, in just two short years she has become a household name far beyond her native Sweden. How has the film team making an upcoming documentary about her navigated the rising tide of her celebrity, and how will they deploy the film to reach deep and inspire real action?

The seismic shift to streaming is changing how, when and where audiences access non-fiction content. When viewers can now watch docs on multiple platforms at any time of day, the times of the windowed film release are in the rear view mirror. How does that affect impact? Executives who commission and buy for major platforms share their take on what’s connecting with audiences and how they are engaging on issues they care about.