One example of a film that Mickie became involved in early on was Ruba Nadda’s Sabah (known by its Canadian title, Coldwater). Mickie had heard about Nadda over the years but was under the impression “she was this scary girl who made very political movies. Then I met her at the Canadian Film Centre and I was amazed how delightful she was.”

She took the script – the story of a Muslim woman falling in love with a non-Muslim man – and, not long after, was contacted by Atom Egoyan who said that his wife, Arsinee Khanjian, had committed to it. “There was quite a bit of back and forth between the [Celluloid Dreams] sales team in Paris and myself, but ultimately we all felt it would work commercially.”

Working together is a creative task

Once a film has been picked up by a sales agent, it’s the agent, along with a distributor, who together are responsible for marketing and promotion. “Some sales agents and distributors don’t like it when filmmakers walk in with all sorts of marketing ideas, even if they’re good ideas,” says Mickie, “there are very strong-willed distributors who don’t want to be interfered with. I’ve always been more open. For example, Atom is very involved with the design of his posters for his movies.”

Sales agents may sometimes invest in a film themselves, but not often. “Someone might come to us and say they want us to sell their movie but they need $500,000 worth of post-production to complete it. If we absolutely loved and believed in the film, like it was the second coming of Christ, we might spend that much money. However, if we like it but we’re not that over the moon about it, we’re not going to take a huge risk. If we loved a movie but the filmmakers needed help clearing the music for the soundtrack, we might do that. I guess you could say that everything in this business is negotiable.”