Adira

Viewing Adira, a film by Bradley Lincoln (who is a Full Sail graduate) and Irene Delmonte, was significant for a few reasons. First, I believe that it is important to support our own and to appreciate what graduates of Full Sail are able to accomplish. Adira proves that through an education at Full Sail and hard work, successful results can follow. I also believe that the independent film industry needs to be supported. Mostly, though, it was significant to me because of how it was funded, and the sheer amount of important decisions that the duo had to make in order to finish the film.

Last year, Lincoln and Delmonte started an IndieGogo campaign to raise money so they could make the film – the goal was $3,500, and they raised $4,501, not to mention a few sizable donations after the fact. Crowdfunding campaigns have been very popular for a few years, and it appears that they are going to continue to rise in importance in the future. For one, it allows the artists, whether in music or film or really just about anything, to cut out most of the middlemen and market themselves directly to their audience. It also allows the audience to feel that they are a “part” of what’s being funded, as their money allows for the project to be made. Also, there are perks to giving certain amounts of money, with donators being given actual rewards other than just seeing the project be realized. Plenty of records are being released this way, and I believe that labels would be wise to incorporate elements of the crowdfunding system into their promotional methods. Lincoln and Delmonte, despite the IndieGogo campaign going better than expected, still had a very limited amount of money and resources with which to make a movie. Their decision-making ensured that the film would be able to be released – they changed the story to fit the budget and personnel, such as making Adira the daughter of English parents to allow for limited use of German, of which they didn’t have many speakers. They realized that since costuming, especially for a period piece, is essential, they made sure that they would spare no expense in terms of getting the look of the characters right. They also chose to spend lots of money on cameras, as they knew that how important it was to make sure that their low-budget film still looked impressive on the big screen. It worked; at no point did I think that the film was “cheap”. Luckily, they had locations in mind already, actually writing the script around the locations that they knew they wanted to use. It might seem like a backwards way of writing a script, but with such a low budget, they didn’t have the luxury of being able to easily choose where they wanted to go. All in all, Adira is a success.