19 September, 2019 - 11:36
Dearest South African filmmakers, this is a goodbye. Its been 14 years that I created filmcontact, my reason was after I came back from Hollywood for 8 years (with over 20 years filmmaking worldwide), the crews in SA on set was still the same.
I built the site and social networks so everyone could be on the same page, what the industry was doing, but most of all the reason was to educate young filmmakers how the system worked, everybody to have access which did not exist before.
Building the marketing of our film industry brought in massive awareness of us a filmmaking destination and no doubt a huge income to our country. I never received government support, or got involved with film industry associations, totally independent and conveyed the truth. Hardly more than R3000 per month and had to do many other jobs to keep it going all these years.
After being mugged 6 times in the past year, once you can call it attempted murder, I have decided to leave SA.
My heart belongs to our Continent, and thank you to #AMAA Africa Movie Academy Awards in Nigeria for traveling me across Africa every year to so many countries the past 10 years to meet African filmmakers, what a beautiful experience. We even started film schools in Johannesburg, Lagos, Lilongwe Malawi and in Kigali Rwanda.
Im going to keep the website running, its one of the 3 top film directories in the world, but I dont think I will be that much invested in continuing our SA industry anymore. Just letting you know what is on my mind, dont know how its going to pan out, maybe re-configure the site to an international database, you will always be the base, part of it and growing from the exposure.
Unfortunately the Monday newsletter will be no more, but you will still receive funding opportunities and marketing tips.
The very few in SA that paid just R99 per month for membership, you have permanent top listings on the international database, thank you. There is no doubt you will continue getting value and as always, just login to add your press releases and job offers for distribution.
By the way, anyone that wants to buy the 33,000+ African filmmakers email database, contact me, but will never sell to anyone without our best interests in mind. We have over 60,000 followers on social media.
We deeply need to thank Joel Diamond (an award winning film composer) from New York who has been moderating our Facebook group for over 10 years so we were available on the group 24 hours per day to see you never got spammed and validated filmmakers. This has been a total labor of Love to Africa and our film industry.
You always thought I was a company of many workers, nope it was just me, one African woman working 18 hours every day for 14 years that built and sustained the website, newsletters, personal advice to anyone that contacted me and care.
I love you with all my heart.
My intention is now to concentrate on building an Audience for films with the aim of self distribution on Hulu, Amazon Prime and Netflix.
PS. Im moving to Cannes so if you at the Cannes Film Festival, I will do my best to get you the most exposure. Will always be available for you.
Lilian
Africa South Africa
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19 September, 2019 - 11:36 
