Written by Kianna Best on Nov 11, 2024. Posted in Awards and Festivals

AFM concludes 2024 Vegas event

The American Film Market settled into its new Las Vegas home for the 2024 edition. From 5-10 November hundreds of exhibitors set up at the Palms Casino Resort for 6 days of conferences, panels, as well as the chance to connect with decision makers in the independent film community. Amongst the activity of film acquisition, development and networking, notable projects at the forefront included Barry Levinson’s Assassination, Jim Jarmusch’s Father, Mother, Sister, Brother, Brian Cox’s Glenrotha, and many more.

At the beginning of the year we spoke with Kim Spurgeon, Nevada Film Office director on what this move to Las Vegas would mean for the local community and visitors alike. With a 14-screen theatre complex on location, accessing all facets of the markets has proven more convenient than pas years, as well as giving new space for approaching the indie film environment away the high stakes of Hollywood.

However, the move to Las Vegas has not been as smooth a transition, with cause for concern over increased costs of exhibiting at the new location and accommodation. Alongside all the activity of the event, the looming US Presidential elections cast a shadow, especially with Nevada being a swing state and such attention raising concerns amongst attendees. However, with experience dealing with such conflicts before, the team were well equipped with security measures.

With over 285 companies and organisations from 80 countries such as China, France and Thailand, this year’s AFM saw a gravitation towards genre films, a surety amongst the hit and miss indie filmscape. Following the success of Longlegs and Terrifier 3, the horror genre has been a top performer amongst Indies, but this year, notable project make an action packed return with projects such as Black Bear’s Hammer Down starring Idris Elba, The Last Druid starring Russel Crowe and Ke Huy Quan starrer Fairytale in New York.

Despite significant successes from top performing production company’s such as A24, Blumhouse and Neon, the independent filmmaking market is still a turbulent place. Following the pandemic and last year’s strike action, production has been situated in a state of instability. For this year’s AFM, this was the landscape being entered into for the 2024 edition of the market. With the location change from Santa Monica to Las Vegas, the gathering seemed to persevere.

Image courtesy of AFM