One need only look at the past year's Oscar nominations (George Clooney's, "Syriana," Phillip Seymour Hoffman's "Capote" and Matt Dillon's "Crash") to see that this emerging trend in Hollywood is driven by the worldwide audience's desire to support independent films and non-formula stories.
Redwood Palms invests in such films. These Independent films can be produced for a fraction of the budget of a studio feature with studio contracted actors. Part of the model for success is the passion shared between the talent attached and the production staff, along with their commercial profit potential.
Redwood Palms Pictures was developed with the sole mission of achieving profitability on each and every film project we select for investment. We take a very institutional approach to film investing by only choosing projects that meet our stringent criteria and fit into the following formula:
Total Budgets for a project are in the range of 2 to 8 million dollars. This helps to ensure that even one distribution deal will secure an exit strategy for each film and will, at a minimum, result in the return of our initial investment. Films produced in this budget range offer less risk as a project has the potential to recover its initial investment from the DVD and TV sales alone.
We only back "Passion Projects", where Bankable Stars are attached and working for well below their normal fees to support the making of a film they believe in.
Foreign and/or Domestic Distribution is in place. Our projects include support/investment from a foreign distributor guarantying global interest and revenue, which is rolled into the return for all. Worldwide demand has resulted in foreign distribution revenues typically exceeding domestic distribution by a 4:1 margin.
In addition to investments in the film that have been made by the distributors we secure further investment support from our production partners, along with, Government Tax Credits and incentives. These additional funding factors limit the amount of equity investment needed to make the film without diluting our ownership position.
Each film is structured so that Redwood Palms receives the initial return in first position, along with, a preferred return of 15% prior to any profits being split with the producers of the film. Thereafter profits are typically split between the hard equity investors and those who make and produce the films.
Projects selected, are ready to start principle photography ensuring that the film will be made quickly, resulting in a shorter ROI.
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