IFH 285: Community Indie Filmmaking with Josh Doke

If you ever wanted to learn how to get your local town, group or community behind your indie film this is the show for you. Today's guest did just that, writer/director Josh Doke got his entire town of Goodland, Kansas to support his film through crowdfunding, production resources and finally distribution.

Goodland was filmed in his hometown of about 4,000 people in Western Kansas and he included as many locals as he could in order to help bring the project to life. We used all practical locations, had vehicles, tractors, props, and costumes donated. He was able to buy a 1990 Crown Vic for $1 from a local car dealership who wanted to help out, and then he repainted it to be a cop car - complete with a donated light bar from the local sheriff's office. The City of Goodland shut down streets, turned electricity on in abandoned buildings, and pretty much gave him free rein over the town while he was in production.

Off-screen, people donated meals, lodged cast, and crew, and in return, everyone was welcome to come on set and watch the filmmaking process if they wanted to.

Then, when it came time to screen the film, he screened in the local, one-screen theater for two weeks and became the best-attended feature of 2017. Because of that Goodland was held over for an additional week - doing more business locally in our third week than Thor Ragnarok did in its entire run.

These are just a few examples of how this film was able to come to life and eventually get distribution, have a small theatrical run, be released on Amazon, Spectrum, Xfinity, etc., get a streaming deal with a premium cable network, and have the DVD released in Walmart.

This is an extremely inspiring story. Enjoy my conversation with Josh Doke!

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