Parisian production company Dissidents has partnered with Santa Monica's Non Fiction Spots. In unrelated news, Non Fiction has also partnered with Toronto's Partners' for representation in the Canadian market.

The arrangement between Dissidents and Non Fiction is essentially a cross representation deal allowing each company access to the others' native market. The two companies are akin in that they both represent documentary filmmakers for commercial projects.

Dissidents represents directors Philippe Borrel, Stephan Moszkouicz, Pascal Vasselin and Benoit Lemoine. Non Fiction represents directors Peter Gilbert, Steve James, S.R. Bindler, Bill Livingston, Jessica Yu, Maciek Wszelaki, Barbara Kopple and Jon Else.

Dissidents was officially launched by documentary producer and journalist Pascal Dupont, who is now executive producer of the company. Dupont got his first job, a spot for the French National Railroad, from a contact with French agency BDDP & Fils.

"They called me and asked me to make a dummy film of an idea they wanted to have, filming real life people, kind of a report, not a testimonial. Testimonials belong to the ad world. They wanted to sound real, rather than having a comedian pretend to be a real person and say the washing powder is good," says Dupont. "We tried the opposite; having real people speak of the client or service, but being true to themselves. In their responses they were honest, not just text they had to learn but honesty. We did a trial and it worked and the dummy became a film."

After doing several more jobs on an ad hoc basis, Dupont decided to form a company. Part of the approach of Dissidents is to get involved in the creative process at the early stage in order to ensure the reality quotient for their projects remains high.

"Since we are different we called ourselves Dissidents. We don't obey all the rules of this fantastic profession," says Dupont. "We can not be totally obedient."

Gaining legitimacy for their different process has been a struggle at times, but Dupont says the company has reached a certain level of respectability within the French market.

"Now we get more respect, although some are reluctant and defiant. Because we film real people in real life most of the time, we get also a lot of crisis projects; big companies who have problems and they want to adjust their communications," he says. "They come to us to deal with these things in a short amount of time."

As for the newly forged arrangement with Non Fiction, Dupont says he was told of the American company by an agency producer friend in Paris.

"I was struck by what they do, almost exactly the same concept as us, although it is on a larger scale. They cover the whole US whereas we are smaller and France is not as big a market. I knew one of their documentary makers, Barbara Koppel, and then with Non Fiction there was the team who did 'Hoop Dreams,' Peter Gilbert and Steve James," says Dupont. "I just talked with (Non Fiction executive producer) Loretta Jeneski and we started to work on the basis of an agreement."

As for the status of documentary or reality style commercials as a passing trend, Dupont says he thinks the power of realistic advertising is not a passing fashion.

"I still think the trend we represent is a deep one, although maybe still marginal. Over the years, people are used to swallowing new trends and fashions and then moving on. They say 'you are in these days' and then move on," he says. "I am convinced we are not a fashion, but I don't know if it will be less marginal soon. I still think we are a trend that is going to last for some time. Especially since there is an ongoing recession and the more there is are crises in companies, the more true they want to talk."

Contact:

http://www.dissidents.fr

http://www.planetpoint.com/nonfiction