Earlier this week at the New York Film Festival, IndieWire’s “Screen Talk” podcast hosted Film at Lincoln Center president Daniel Battsek to talk about our favorite films at the festival and the state of the industry today. Battsek joined Film at Lincoln Center in May after a history as a producer and acquisitions executive. His past credits include Palace Pictures, Miramax, Cohen Media Group, National Geographic Films, and, most recently, as chairman of Film4 in the U.K.
While the live conversation of course gave us the chance to catch up on NYFF, we also just had to ask about Battsek’s former days working alongside the likes of Charles Cohen and Harvey Weinstein. That included acquiring both the Coens’ “No Country for Old Men” and Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood” for Miramax — and they were scripts he received over the same weekend, and greenlit by Monday.
Battsek also walks through how the festival chased and landed certain titles — including world premieres like “Gavagai,” “Anemone,” and “Is This Thing On?”
We also polled him for his thoughts as a producer and festival director on the compressed landscape for festival acquisitions overall — increasingly out of festivals, films are sitting in limbo awaiting distribution, especially documentaries. As far as the financing and distribution landscape for indies, is there reason for hope? For despair?
Listen to the episode in the audio below.