Dark side of the sun

So, it seems I was mostly right about IMDb after all.

Rather faster than the promised 2-4 weeks, we have very politely been given the e-finger. I quote: 'we are not considering development titles for listing at this time if they are not set up at a production company with a production history of theatrically-released feature-length films'.

So, translating that into Phelp-speak: 'go out and make a movie, and the IMDb doorman will take the finished DVD as your ticket to go inside'.

This does potentially throw Charmed’s Cannes-plans into some disarray, though. We don’t lose anything by sending all the late-accreditation paperwork off to the festival organisers, and a simple Googling will certainly work in our favour (God bless ya, Mr Hawkins). But there is a wider debate raging within the offices as to whether a two-day tanning in the South of France is going to be in the best interests of the film or not.

The argument for goes something along the lines of 'don’t be a newbie when you actually have something to sell. Get all the wide-eyed fascination out of the way now, so that you can do a better impression of an adult in 2012 when you go there with Resurrection'. Makes perfect sense – if someone finds Jake lying in a pile of his own over-excitement, at least he won’t have a bunch of incriminating flyers on him.

The argument against is simpler. There is one pot of cash – anything spent on going to Cannes ain’t going up on the screen.

Personally, I find myself drawn to the argument against, even though a weekend spent topping up the Vitamin D levels would be a whole lot of fun. Like all independent UK cinema, it is highly likely that we are going to be chasing the last bits of finance down all the way through to the end of post-production. And until we know what that final tally is, we won’t know what the Cannes experience would actually cost us.

That said, if we have to call off the Resurrection shoot at the eleventh hour because of a company outbreak of rickets I will hold my brittle, misshapen hand up to that one. Triste.