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Delegates complaining about a market location isn’t exactly new. Even the French Riviera will receive complaints from regular customers.
However, the American film market in particular has been in the spotlight in recent years. Organizers IFTA (Independent Film & Television Alliance) opted for a radical rethink for the 2024 edition, moving the event from the historic LA house, with easy access to Hollywood, to the Palms Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. The event ends tomorrow, but the initial returns are not promising.
More than a dozen attendees Deadline spoke to were chock full of complaints: long lines at the elevators that take buyers up and down the hotel tower where sellers have suites; limited dining options; noise and smoke at the Palms, a walk from the vibrant Las Vegas Strip; costs etc.
“I had to wait twenty minutes several times before I could get into the elevator. We’re missing meetings left and right. The food at the Palms is terrible and we cannot reserve spots for breakfast meetings here or at nearby casinos. The food is double the price of LA and the general mood is very low,” noted one seasoned shopper.
A leading US salesperson said: ‘Most people seem to hate the hotel and the lobby. The elevators are a disaster and the only breakfast option is McDonalds. There is hardly any outdoor space where buyers can gather and talk. It’s a bad scene.”
Some were harsh about their experiences so far, with one calling the setting ‘soulless’ and an experienced buyer describing the location as ‘a disaster’ and a ‘big mistake’.
A leading international director told us: “The atmosphere is bad, no one seems happy, and a number of people have said they won’t return here next year.”
An international director praised the proximity of the cinemas: “It is great and convenient to have screenings, presentations and meetings so close together again. The cinemas are modern and comfortable. That is a big plus.”
But they added: “It’s surreal having to walk through a noisy casino to get to meetings. The elevators can’t handle the numbers and being off the strip doesn’t help in terms of options. In short, if you are here you are confronted with too much soulless consumerism and waste. It’s not pleasant.” One CEO agreed, calling the location “crushing.”
One international buyer described the rooms at the Palms as “fine” and noted that they were pleased to be able to visit the city’s acclaimed Sphere location.
A US market veteran said the experience was “rough and smooth”: “The lobby is a disaster: crowded, loud, windowless, long lines at the elevators and impossible to get tables for lunch. But the offices are nice, wide corridors and beautiful views. It’s always nice to see a lot of people you know in the same room.”
Defending the choice & looking to the future
IFTA board chairman Clay Epstein and its president and CEO Jean Prewitt defended the choice to Deadline, saying the Palms emerged from an extensive search in a handful of cities, checking boxes on accessibility, price and screening rooms. It had the dates for November and was prepared to convert hundreds of bedrooms into offices, which has apparently become a big demand.
Asked if AFM is locked up in Vegas, Epstein said he could not discuss confidential contract points but indicated a change could be possible.
“The goal… is certainly to do what’s best for the community and the industry,” he told Deadline. “And if that means staying in Vegas, we’re going to do everything we can to make that work. And if that means… that there has to be an alternative… we would look at whatever that alternative is. And I think that’s the most important thing.”
“The negativity is interesting,” he added. “For every person who stopped me from saying something negative about the smoke or the elevators, two people would stop me from telling me something positive.”
“I also have my own economic goals and budgets that I have to fall within. I need to have a market and be in a market that also makes sense for my business (Film Mode Entertainment). So I look at it from both positions.”
Organizing the event is a huge undertaking. “It’s not a car show. It’s a finite number of people and we all have different needs, and we don’t have support or subsidies from a government or a city or anything like that, like Berlin and Canada. And that creates challenges and obstacles. That said, in less than 12 months, (AFM) saw that something wasn’t working in Santa Monica, and we pivoted in a very short period of time.”
He continued: “Then we’ll have to look back in a few weeks and ask ourselves, ‘Did it work?’ Didn’t it work? Did it work for some of us but not for others? How many people did it not work for?’ It’s too early to tell… But you want to make sure you get as much feedback as possible.”
Visitors have repeatedly questioned the Palms as a location. Clay replied, “You really need a hotel. Everyone is together. You have offices of different sizes. You need a hotel that is willing to take out the beds so you can set up an office. Then it must be a nice space. It must be in an area with food choices. And it has to be near cinemas where you can take over the screens for a week. It must be close to an international airport. It has to be at a price that everyone can swallow, everyone’s budget is different and things don’t come cheap anywhere. It must be these dates. There is really no other time to have AFM.”
“We looked at a lot of cities and Vegas came back with some options, but it was really the Palms that could make it work, because of the cinemas, because of the hotel, big, but not too big. The rooms are beautiful. You can take out the beds. So it checked a lot of boxes, it made sense.
Those in attendance, and there are thousands at the AFM, had mixed reviews of the dining options at the Palms, which included a nice bar, an upscale Italian restaurant, a steakhouse, a Chinese, a dim sum and a food court with A Panda Express and McDonald’s . The vibrant Strip can be reached with an Uber ride or a harrowing 40-minute walk. Why not on the Strip if it has to be in Vegas, many wondered.
Epstein said the hotels there were huge, with huge floors in convention centers. “It wasn’t what we needed, it wasn’t really what our show is. Or they didn’t want to remove the beds. Or just the environment that wasn’t really suitable for our industry. And then there were no screens. So everyone would have to walk through a huge casino to get out, get on a shuttle, go to a movie theater and then come back. And it just didn’t seem like we would want to do that to our visitors.”
Los Angeles back on the table or more Vegas?
The biggest question many attendees had: Was LA really not an option?
“We are fortunate to be in this industry and should stop complaining, but was there really not one suitable hotel in LA?” one salesperson wondered.
No, Epstein and Prewitt said, not this year.
LA “is not a conference town. Sure, the Delfina didn’t work last year,” Prewitt said. “We went to a lot of different hotels, and they either didn’t have dates or they wouldn’t turn their beds out. It was… too expensive. There were no screens around. She noted that a number of potentially suitable hotels are undergoing or will undergo renovations in advance of the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, although that seems far away and she did not want to commit to that.
“What you could find was a hotel that was interested, but it was in a remote area, and for a lot of obvious reasons we said ‘no’. We really can’t go to Pasadena, can we? And no one wants to hear about Long Beach. So yes, there were places. But if you actually looked at what they had to offer in total, it made little sense.”
In an effort to sweeten the pill, Prewitt noted that the 45-minute flight to LA is shorter than a cross-town flight in the City of Angels.
She believes it’s a learning curve, routine, familiarity, and says she found the negativity less strident as the week went on. If the AFM stays in Vegas, the IFTA will be more ready, maybe tours, maybe shuttles, more logistical help and advice.
“If you’re here to do business, you don’t want to spend a lot of time figuring out where to go to buy a Diet Coke. It doesn’t have to take half an hour. So in that sense there will always be a learning curve, no matter where. I think we need to get over that a little bit.”
“In the end, the real test is: Were people able to do the things they needed to do?”
Did they do that? Some say the location hasn’t helped matters. Many delegates were also subdued due to Tuesday’s US presidential elections and were hesitant to attend at all. The distraction has not helped focus the mind. A number of projects have been set up, but few big-canvas titles have been announced and so far deal-making has taken a back seat, at least in the press.
Others found it lively. For example, AGC Studios founder and CEO Stuart Ford said during a question-and-answer session at an AFM session that his company has “done great business.”
That said, “Do I think Vegas is the right environment for AFM in the long run? Absolutely not,” he continued to cheer and clap from the crowd, a crowd that filled the ballroom.
“I think LA is a more natural home for the market,” agreed Sebastien Raybaud, founder and CEO of Anton, who was also greeted with cheers at the same event.