In 2014, three Chicago-based filmmakers raised close to $78,000 on Indiegogo to fund their first feature film. The sketch comedy artists known as FND Films had a popular YouTube channel and collected the cash quickly using a goofy plea video. No details were revealed about the promised film aside from the title: It's All Good.
Then with the money in the bank, the guys fell off the map. Two years passed, and there was no update, no movie. A few photos surfaced—one of the guys drinking on a boat, a travel pic from Italy—and hundreds of angry contributors start littering their social media accounts ("Are you fucking serious???? Where's the fucking money??"), while others threaten with legal action. Finally, a video apology from FND Films president Aaron Fronk emerges: "I'm so sorry to announce that due to complications and things beyond our control," he says, "the movie can no longer be completed." In a Fox news segment, Fronk admits that the group ran out of money before even a fraction of the film was completed.
It was a great stunt, because the FND guys actually have made a film—about not making a film.
A two-and-a-half year viral publicity scheme that somehow didn't get totally sussed out by an online audience that loves tearing apart a hoax with their bare teeth—that's hustle.
http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/q-and-a/a49026/fnd-films-indiegogo-its-all-good/
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