What is the current status of The Oath? How will the project move forward into production, from both creative and strategic perspectives.

Since originating the project, we’ve conceptualized the story, fashioned creative pitch material, written multiple versions of the script, and begun fundraising to a degree of success. What helped in our development was the AFM pitch competition, and bringing the film to the conference along with our completed feature. When distributors and agents asked us what else we had with us after assessing the quality of our completed film, we transitioned the conversation to The Oath. This helped us realize what we had, the gravitas of the project and how to best pitch it effectively. From AFM, we had follow up meetings with distributors and production companies to co-produce the film. Personally speaking I also was able to get my foot in the door with a couple general meetings, one with Netflix and another with an independent producer who is becoming a mentor.

The current status is that we have $60,000 raised for the development phase of the film as an angel investment from our production company, with another $20,000 available later in the year. That’s a total of $80,000 currently, which we’ve begun to allocate towards legal and have earmarked casting, PR and sales agent fees. We’re about to enter a new phase of fundraising for equity financing with our previous project’s investors, which will align with the timing of a distribution deal for our complete film being finalized in the coming weeks. The current team consists of myself as the lead producer, Adam Bussell as an additional producer, Bret Miller as writer/director, and we’re considering E.P. attachments for additional fundraising and casting attachments, as well as co-production partnerships. 

Moving forward into production from a creative perspective, we want to maintain audience appeal as a commercial genre film, while retaining our independent social message. We had to make some difficult decisions to turn down offers to co-produce with production companies that would finance the film, but wanted to take away our creative control. Creatively, we have been revising the script to keep the story contained by slimming down characters, locations, to focus our budget on the assets that will really drive the film’s value; Acting talent, cinematography, and strong story development. On the talent front, we’re solidifying character arcs to bolster the appeal to top tier talent. 

Moving forward into production from a strategic perspective, we want to align ourselves for patronage from cause driven, social impact investors. This has our sights set on drawing in an E.P. from the journalism industry as well as potentially partnering with a non-profit. We’re also planning to produce the film in Georgia to utilize the tax credit incentive, and  considering other similarly advantageous locations as pre-production begins. We want to keep our head up and look forward to distribution, which has us aiming at a release date during an election cycle year for cultural appeal. Fall 2024 would be the first window of opportunity, but 2026 midterm cycle is a fallback plan.