Marco Perego & Zoe Saldaña: Don't Fund Indies for Money

LOCARNO, Switzerland - Marco Perego had a blunt message for the aspiring filmmakers gathered at the Locarno Pro industry program this week: if you’re getting into independent cinema to get rich, you’re in the wrong business. The Italian artist and director, joined by his wife, actress Zoe Saldaña, known worldwide for her role in Avatar, shared the advice during a panel discussion that mixed practical wisdom with a dose of creative realism.

Perego, who has navigated the indie circuit with his own projects, urged the audience to reconsider their motivations before signing on to produce a low-budget feature. “Don’t produce an indie film for the money,” he said, according to remarks from the session. The statement landed with particular weight given Saldaña’s presence beside him - a performer who has starred in some of the biggest commercial franchises of the last decade, yet still champions the scrappy, personal work that Perego champions.

The couple’s appearance at the Swiss festival, a hub for financiers and producers during the main Locarno Film Festival, drew a packed room. Perego’s comments weren’t a dismissal of profit, but rather a warning about the grim economics that define independent production. He emphasized that the return on investment for most indie films is negligible, often failing to cover the years of unpaid labor and personal sacrifice required to get a picture made. If the sole goal is financial gain, he argued, the pursuit will likely lead to disappointment - and worse, compromise the art.

Perego has walked that path himself. His directorial efforts, which include the 2017 drama The Last Word and the 2022 Venetian-set mystery The Absence of Eden, were made outside the studio system, relying on a mix of private backing and sheer determination. The latter film, released in 2023, starred Saldaña and explored immigration themes, a subject Perego has tackled with personal urgency. His work rarely aims for mainstream commercial appeal, favoring moody visuals, fragmented narratives, and performances that linger in the memory rather than topping box-office charts.

For Saldaña, the conversation highlighted a divide she navigates daily. As a star of Avatar, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Star Trek, she operates in the blockbuster stratosphere. But her presence at the panel was a signal that her passion for storytelling extends beyond the green-screen soundstages where she’s spent years. She offered quiet support to Perego’s points, at times nodding along as he described the fiscal perils of indie production, and she framed the craft as a calling rather than a career move. Her own resume includes smaller titles like The Book of Life and the Sundance premiere Nina, choices that suggest a deliberate balance between tentpoles and passion projects.

The advice landed in a setting where many attendees are actively seeking funding for their first or second features. Locarno Pro serves as a marketplace where deals get made, but Perego’s counsel seemed aimed at recalibrating expectations. He didn’t discourage the pursuit of production altogether; instead, he pushed for a mindset that treats the finished film as the reward, not the paycheck. He spoke about the collaboration, the creative risk, and the rare thrill of seeing a personal vision materialize on screen - all things that money alone cannot buy.

Perego’s tone was conversational, occasionally wry, as he recounted the realities of financing: the endless pitch meetings, the cold rejections, the times he had to bankroll parts of his own productions to keep them alive. He noted that the few indie films that do break out financially are outliers, exceptions that too often become the misleading yardstick for newcomers. The numbers, he suggested, simply don’t support the dream of a lucrative indie career. What sustains filmmakers, he argued, is a deeper attachment to the material itself.

Saldaña, who has produced projects as well as acted in them, echoed the sentiment when she addressed the crowd, albeit more briefly. She reflected on the value of building films that resonate personally, even if the audience is small. Her comments underscored a shared philosophy between the couple: that the indie ecosystem thrives on passion, not profit margins, and that the best work often emerges from constraints rather than budget sheets.

The panel closed with questions from the audience, ranging from distribution strategies to creative partnerships. Perego answered each with candor, but kept returning to his core thesis. If you’re producing an indie film, he repeated in essence, do it because you can’t imagine not doing it. The money will likely never come, but the film - if you’re lucky and persist - might.

For those at Locarno Pro, the advice was a stark counterpoint to the festival’s own glamour. The red carpets and premieres can obscure the harsh math of independent cinema. Yet Perego and Saldaña’s joint appearance offered a rare moment of visibility for that truth, delivered by two people who have seen the business from wildly different angles - one as a bankable star, the other as a filmmaker who dances with the margins. Whether prompted by love or pragmatism, their message was clear: make the movie you need to make, and let the money be an afterthought.

Source: Hollywood Reporter