According to research from miralot.com, if you've got a project selected for Berlinale, then 77% of them go on to screen at one of the 25 film festivals mapped in the attached image.
Data has always been important, but the trajectory is exponentially that we will use data for decisions that didn't always fall into data-driven category.
How much do you consult data for your own creative and producer decisions?
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Sebastian Tudores It depends what you mean by 'creative' decisions. I don't write "to market" so to speak. However, I do look at historical data and current trends when identifying a market and distribution plan. For example, here you cite data relating to Berlinale and follow up festivals. That means little to me without analysis. So I looked: historically Berlinale has selected an average of ~380 films across all categories each year, of which roughly 35% are shorts. As of 2025, Berlinale has scaled that back to a total of 199 selections, and intends to keep it that way. My sense is that this raw stat - 77% of selected films go on to one of more of those other festivals - implies more about the status of Berlinale and the interconnection between selection committees than it does about market or audience per se. Selection there is a top down process rather than an audience driven process, though it is the largest publicly attended festival in the world. But selects are necessarily limited to a miniscule number of films (considering the number entering the marketplace). Those things in turn imply that the usefulness of Berlinale is in active promotion and profile of serious and accomplished films (art films or not). It's not for productions that are not clearly superior - and industry rep bears this out. While "competition" films there are often considered uncommercial, it is a place where many commercial films which never even screen there get distribution deals. All of which boils down, for me, to: Don't bother submitting to Berlinale without knowing someone on the selection committee and securing some interest in advance, and then only for a film that they justifiably be happy to display, and only if I have a similar campaign in the works for follow up festivals. (This is how prominent festivals work behind-the-scenes, in order to keep their status as important festivals).
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I never have even thought to do that, honestly.
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Hey Shadow Dragu-Mihai - "Selection there is a top down process rather than an audience driven process" - that' defines everything else in the analysis, you're so correct to point that out. and I appreciate your insight on on how the 'A-list' festivals maintain their status.
Also I believe a bit to your point is that people are getting even more data-crazy (as if that was still possible) simply because it's more accessible and/or fun to graph lol BUT not sure data analysis and interpretation skill is keeping pace. Which leaves us with the old adage... "there's lies, damn lies, and...statistics!" :)
hope all's well with you. cheers
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Interesting fact thanks for posting. Never for creative, certainly for finance, market placement and alignment, which should always be considered.
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appreciate the distinction Jack Binder - hope you're having a good weekend!