Regina’s Landslide Entertainment Makes Connections in Cannes

Cannes, France is the home of a festival synonymous with the film industry, is a hub for advertisers, and, thanks to the funding from Creative Saskatchewan’s Market Travel Grant, also became part of the 2022 travel itinerary for Regina’s Landslide Entertainment. The company, which produces original content for film and television, is led by Lioz Bouganin. They chose Cannes because it is also the home base for MIPCOM and MIPCOM JR, two foundational industry gathering places.

“The market travel grant, it’s very significant in helping small companies to be able to go and have presence in those markets because otherwise, maybe we could have gone but not as frequently or maybe we have to send less people.”

Beyond the fixed costs of necessities like an industry table, grants and subsidies help companies like Landslide weather the punch to the pocketbook that is things like hotels, food, and airfare. With multiple projects in their pipeline at any one time, Bouganin and his team took the opportunity, not just to sell buyers on their work, but also to network with people from both home and abroad as part of the Canadian pavilion.

“It’s networking with Canadian people who came because we’re in the pavilion with them every day. The founders are there, the other companies are there, distribution people are there, and getting a lot of important facetime. You’re building on those connections.”

Bouganin says that, because Saskatchewan is geographically separate from larger centres like Toronto, conferences like MIPCOM and MIPCOM JR. (which is focused on content for kids) are vital. He also says it’s important to keep in mind that, even with the best support at home, national and international connections are vital to bring more investment back to Saskatchewan and to get these projects made.

“We bring significant investment [in and it] comes from outside the province, without that you can really not finance any productions. Even with the best grant program in the world like we have here, most of the money is always going to come [from] out of the province so having presence in markets…Everybody you have to meet to get your project moving forward is in Toronto, in Canada, but internationally as well.”

In total, Landslide showcased eight projects, ranging from animated to unscripted series, to participants of the event. They made connections with multiple distributors and got to embed themselves in what Bouganin calls the ecosystem of creative development. From a learning perspective, he says that its key companies who are looking to travel to MIPCOM to start with smaller events and work their way up. His message: network beforehand and be prepared for some serious overwhelm.

“When you start going, you don’t really know anybody, right? So it’s hard to schedule meetings and you come into a place, and it is a huge venue, such a huge building with four or five floors, you have over 10,000 people, it can get overwhelming, especially if you’re not used to it.”

As for networking, he says you should talk to other production companies, including him, as well as industry organisations like Creative Saskatchewan and the Saskatchewan Media Production Industry Association, which he chaired for a number of years.

“We’re all in the same area in the industry. Everybody knows everybody.”

By John Loeppky

To view Landslide Entertainment’s catalogue, works in progress, and industry success, you can touch base with them on their website.