blog

2013 at Boulder Creek

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 08:00:00 -0400

Pre-Miptv 2013. It was all coughs and sniffles round the office. Always a flurry of activity, new catalogues and new programmes inbound, and of course when your website provider upgrades your system without telling you, the whole site goes down in flames, whilst trying to make meetings. Urgh.

We are back online now, and a very bright and sunny outlook for 2013, post Miptv. Our production capabilities have expanded in the past 12 months, to unrecognisable heights. From this point, we are also trying to be as cutting edge as possible when producing in-house, from a technological perspective, to a narrative perspective.

Our Social Media, is properly up and running. I must admit, I have been a bit of a luddite regarding managing this, but we have a great new fella onboard called Matt Walden, who is managing all of this tweeting, facebook, websites etc for us, so we can focus on sales and producing. He will be organising our thoughts, communications, banter and yes, even the occasional image of a squirrel on a skateboard.

Watch this space, we hope to serve you well, and hopefully entertain you from time to time.

The Last Best Band

Wed, 27 Jun 2012 15:00:00 -0400

So, at the risk of sounding self aggrandising about one of our programmes, one of the things I love about this business is the fact that you sometimes get to work with subjects which greatly interest you! We at BCI, are privileged to be working with Gorman from What Were We Thinking Films, and his lovingly crafted documentary on one of our favourite bands, The Replacements. The film is, COLOR ME OBSESSED, which funnily enough we are.

I first discovered this Minnesota band when I was at university in Colorado. A buddy of mine gave me a cassette of PLEASED TO MEET ME, their 1987 album, and I played it until I think one of my friends hid it, as I was playing it constantly. Joke was on him...I went and bought the CD!

They were one of only a handful of bands to ever be banned for life from Saturday Night Live (really? Saturday Night Live?), they were backstage getting drunk with Harry Dean Stanton, and on what was meant to be their unveiling to mainstream America, they kinda blew it. In their own inimitable, drunken way. Some say they would have been bigger than REM, but these guys were your drinking buddies. The never really felt as if they had to answer to anyone but themselves.

Two lines from their songs, “Well a person can work up, a mean, mean thirst, after a hard day of nothing much at all....” and “God what a mess, on the ladder of success, when you take one step and miss the whole first rung...” pretty much sum up these guys, the “best band you never heard.”

Check em out if you can. And if you want, I can send you a mix tape. :)

March 2012

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 07:53:40 -0400

I can’t believe the amount of time I DON’T spend blogging. Especially with the knowledge that it’s a useful tool to reach out to visitors to our website. One reason is because we have added a new member to the BCI family in January, in the shape of a 7lb baby boy, which has kept us busy, plus producing two shows in-house and a third on the way, and keeping up with all of our sale opportunities and deals the sales team have been closing, haven’t left time for much blogging.

Thankfully, Yelena who edits and produces our new cycling show, Better Than 4 is Tweeting regularly, and already has a million followers...hang on a sec...no, sorry, I believe its closer to the 300 mark, but still impressive for a new Tweeter. We are getting ready for MipTV and for the first time, Mipdoc in 2 weeks, so everyone is busily polishing up their meeting diaries and getting all of our catalogues and materials together (one day, we’ll have that catalogue ready in January, but I suppose there would be as always, 10 last-minute additions).

Being a reggae fan and a general fan of Jamaica and her people, we are over the moon to be bringing The Jolly Boys with us (if only in the form of a new TV series). Fear not, this is not my soap box to do a bit of marketing); it’s rare you find such a story which hasn’t already been told, but all I can say is, the Jolly Boys, The Godfathers of Mento music, who regularly played for Errol Flynn, Liz Taylor, Richard Burton and Dean Martin, have been found again 50 years later, and are playing for the likes of Bill Clinton and Pamela Anderson. It’s a Cinderella story worthy of rubbing shoulders with the Buena Vista Social Club.

Anyway, we also have lots of great new series and documentaries on tap, drop us a line, let’s meet up in Cannes later this month, or here in London. And if you get the chance, click ‘like’ on our new Wild Spirits Facebook Page!

BCI Presents Unknown Things

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 17:00:00 -0400

All of us here at Boulder Creek are very excited about a brand new feature film that we are distributing on an exclusive basis.

'Unknown Things', a drama-thriller directed by the award-winning Bruno Coppola (Stuff That Bear! and Rules of Love), and based on a short story by the late Reginald Bretnor and is described as a tale of mystery, romance, antique mechanical objects and murder. Set in London, it tells the story an antique dealer whose obsessive infatuation with a married woman (SASKIA REEVES) leads him on a quest for increasingly bizarre contraptions in order to satisfy her collector husband (PAUL RHYS), and thus remain close by her side.

Not only does this film star Saskia Reeves (SPOOKS, BUTTERFLY KISS, CLOSE MY EYES & A CHRISTMAS CAROL) and Paul Rhys (CHAPLIN, FROM HELL & VINCENT & THEO), but is also edited by the great Tariq Anwar who has worked on other classics such as THE KINGS SPEECH, AMERICAN BEAUTY & LAW ABIDING CITIZEN.

Aside from working with Bruno and his team personally on the distribution front, BCI feels very proud and honoured to be working with a member of Hollywood's most successful family, not to mention one heck of a nice guy, as we discovered for ourselves when Bruno joined us at MIPTV 2011 down in sunny Cannes.

The film is currently available WORLDWIDE, so click HERE to view it in full, or drop us an e-mail at info@bouldercreekinternational.com for more information!

Days get shorter, the TV markets seem to come round quicker

Sat, 02 Oct 2010 18:03:00 -0400

Well, another 2 markets are upon us, Sportel and Mipcom 2010. It seems like just yesterday, we were looking at the palm trees of Cannes in our rear view mirror as we made a dash for the northern border of France, trying to beat a travel chaos-causing volcano. Nothing like a fun road trip to round off a week of life in the Palais.

The Summer saw BCI move to a brilliant new South Bank location, as well as take on some great new programmes and series. The dust is settling on our new edit suite, although we are still in hope that the overstock of Leann Rimes CDs of the previous company are moved soon, to give our suite a bit more space. Still, you wouldn’t know the inconvenience existed, considering our in-house produced extreme sports series is now seen in 54 countries and on 3 airlines.

We are pretty chuffed.

Overall, BCI has had a great year on the programme sales and sports distribution side of the business and we are looking forward to seeing old friends and business colleagues in the South of France and Monaco.

Still, we look forward to the nights closing in, all of our meeting follow-ups done and screeners sent, so that we can explore some of our new local pubs and to try out our new football table in our board room.

Fancy a game or just a natter? Give us a ring and stop by. The door is always open…

Gross Media Value

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 12:00:00 -0400

A recent press release by the World Match Racing Tour, a very important Boulder Creek International sports client, has highlighted the importance of return on investment which event organisers, governments, tourism boards and sponsors are facing in the current television landscape. Few sports brands are currently bringing in the license fees they once did even 10 years ago, which is down to the shift in advertising and sponsorship expanding into the online realm, as well as the proliferation of new television channels. So, whilst opportunities for exposure have increased, license fees for certain federations have shrunk. Creatively reacting to this new landscape, through a solid advertising and sponsorship campaign, is the best way to raise revenues for the federation, whilst providing key exposure for those investing in the event.

Boulder Creek Launches New Website!

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:30:00 -0500

After much designing and tweaking by our Kiwi web team SMP Media, we now have a Beta version of our website launched, and the video is provided by our IPTV partners, Brightcove. This means between now and MIPTV 2010, we will have a majority of our films, TV programmes and sports online, and viewable. Please mind our dust as we tweak entries and update bits and pieces. It really feels as if we have turned a corner for our marketing efforts, which will now streamline how we work. If you have any questions or suggestions, please let us know. And here's to 2010!

Matt J