Cara Mertes of Ford Foundation's JustFilms Talks about Impact
Cara Mertes, newly appointed Head of Ford Foundation's JustFilms (she was formerly the Director of the Sundance Institute's Doc Film Program and Fund) talks to Indiewire about how thinking about impact will make for better documentary films.
i know docs can affect change in the world (to what degree, i'm not sure), but it can be frustrating applying for foundational grants knowing that they want filmmakers to think about impact and social change when there are few resources available to filmmakers in this area. i find that filmmakers are being asked to take on more roles (ie, impact producer, marketing and outreach specialist, entrepreneur, distributor, etc) when it's already difficult enough just trying to finish a film.
but i do appreciate her flexible definition of impact and hope other funders follow her lead.
We want to define our terms when we talk about impact. It's a measurement piece -- what are the quantifiable? What are we measuring? Who are we talking about? It's multiplicities of audiences. There are many different ways to impact those audiences. You're talking about an extremely dynamic process. We don't have language for and we don't have tools for talking about it. that's an incredibly interesting realm that we're working in. How culture makes change -- what we're trying to do at Ford. The kind of work that we're looking for, the work that Ford supports -- of course we need ways of understanding what the numbers are and striving for the appropriate impact. We need more leadership and skill-building in terms of the question of impact. People that understand the mix of numbers with dynamics. Film impact is not predictable -- how do we make room for that when we're granting?
