ARTICLE: The Power of NO

If you are an indie filmmaker, you hear the word no a lot. Like, a hell of a lot, even if it doesn't always come in the form of the word no. Truth be told, there are many forms of no, although there's maybe only one or two forms of yes. That second one you hear a lot less often, believe me.

Probably the absolute best no that you can get is the straight-up rejection. Yeah, that one stings like a bitch, but at least it gets things out in the open fast and you can move on with your life. Less pleasant is the silent no, when you never get a response at all. We've all been there, and it does suck mightily, but at least it's mostly inoffensive. As the late, great, George Hickenlooper once said, "In showbiz, no news is bad news." But yeah, getting ghosted sucks, but it is what it is.

The worst kind on no is what I like to call the "elongated rejection" or in other words, the maybe. Maybe is actually the worst form of no, because regardless of all other considerations, it always ends up being a no (except in maybe .00000001 percent of cases) except you gotta wait for it, and get your hopes up. Hope is poison to a filmmaker. Hope, as everyone knows, was the last thing to escape from Pandora's box. Hope is shit.

No, on the other hand, is great, especially if it's of the straight-up rejection variety. No let's you get down to the business of doing things yourself, letting you do things your way, and not having obligations to anyone. If you don't get a yes, embrace the no! That's what we're doing here at IFS. We've heard a boatload of NO from all across the spectrum of film, so we're building our own vision of what we think indie film ought to be. And if at some point someone approaches us for something, and we end up giving them a straight-up no (and it'll happen at some point) to hell with us, then!

They can take that no and turn it into their own private yes.