Hot Docs’ new online sales venture, dubbed The Doc Shop, launches with the festival, but will be available 24/7.

Industry will now be able to access the massive Hot Docs screening catalog year round on the Internet as of the end of the festival. In fact, anyone with a film can submit it to The Doc Shop.

‘The challenge for buyers is seeing everything during the festival and zeroing in on the content they want,’ says Brett Hendrie, managing director of the festival, who is watching over the project. He says the traditional hard-copy catalog has rivaled the heft of the Yellow Pages, thanks to the various categorizations. ‘It was a daunting thing for a buyer using pen and paper.’

As always, buyers pressed for time to line up at a screening can scan for cinematic gold at the festival’s returning on-site screening facility.

Gone will be the racks of DVDs, not to mention the waiting list for hot titles; each of the 40 viewing stations will have access to every title simultaneously. But this year, hypothetically, attendance is optional – accredited buyers need not be here. They will receive free access to streaming video on the website throughout the festival and for three subsequent months. After that trial run, a subscription will be required.

Producers and sales agents have the option of ticking a box on their festival submission and having their film – in its entirety – digitized for inclusion on the server. As with the filmmaking medium itself, the barrier to entry is low – $60 plus GST. (Films submitted before an earlier deadline only paid $35.)

Foreign sales veteran Jan Rofekamp is slightly skeptical, however. The chief of Montreal-based Films Transit wonders if the catalog’s shift from analog to digital might undermine the human factor of the festival, not to mention its international flavor.

If you don’t have to be in Toronto to see the movies, why spend all the money to fly and stay here?

‘If [sales agents’] bosses find out that they can do their work from their desks, there goes their travel budgets,’ says Rofekamp.

As to that low barrier to entry, Rofekamp wishes someone would start raising the bar.

‘I’m all in favor of a stronger curatorial role for film festivals. There are way too many films and way too many markets. Festivals need to help clear the clutter. They have to say in a nice way, ‘Find another job.”

Hendrie says the Hot Docs team has wrestled with both of Rofekamp’s qualms. They’re confident that attendance carries enough added value to persuade people from behind their desks, while the glut of titles can be winnowed through the online search. The user can choose among the typical criteria (topic, running time, origin), as well as whether the film was selected for the festival.

The Doc Shop will include virtually every title submitted to the fest. ‘It will have 1,500 titles – two groups of docs,’ Hendrie explains. ‘It includes all the films submitted for consideration, minus those who opted out of Doc Shop, and also films that didn’t submit to the festival because they were ineligible [for the festival], but wanted to be included [in The Doc Shop]. They are all made within the last two years.’

The curatorial aspect is open to debate. Mindful that the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam has a curated market, organizers of The Doc Shop conducted a survey asking if it should follow suit. According to Hendrie, two-thirds of respondents voted no.

The upshot being that if buyers can search and view quickly and efficiently, they will opt for the larger catalog. Should the online version gain traction, says Hendrie, ‘we may introduce programmer’s picks’ – films that didn’t make the festival selection for whatever reason but caught a programmer’s eye.

Producer Maureen Judge’s enthusiasm is unqualified. ‘Anything that can get people looking at your movie is a good thing,’ she says. Judge coproduced Nik Sheehan’s feature documentary FLicKeR, a Hot Docs world premiere, through her Toronto prodco Makin’ Movies alongside the National Film Board.

Judge points to this year’s Genie Award nomination process. Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television members could watch streaming video copies of the nominated films via a special Genie site on the online rental service Zip.ca.

‘It’s the way things are going in all areas of film viewing and acquisitions,’ says Judge. ‘Digital download rights are already part of a producer’s contract. It’s all about watching a computer.’ *

The Doc Shop quick points

• Approximately 1,500 titles.

• Fully DRM protected.

• Producers have access to on-demand viewing reports of film.

• Site will rank top 25 most-viewed titles.

• Site will include TDF Rough Cuts titles – unfinished titles seeking completion funds.