I recently completed a feature film and would like to bypass the sales agent route and sell it myself.
Sure you can, though you need to be aware, you may do harm to your movie if you're not ready to take on this task.
is it possible to make sales with just a pass and not a booth?
Technically, yes. Deals for movies are made each and every day outside the AFM.
Would you say the value of the booth is significantly greater than a pass?
Yes, no, kinda, no, yes, maybe. I suspect for you, the answer would be that having a booth would be a significant waste of your time and resources. This is just an opinion, and I have to say, it comes from a complete lack of knowledge of your situation. I also don't know what your goals are.
what would you say is the correct approach for selling a marketable film w/o a sales agent? [snip] I'd rather not give 20-25% commission and a 50k expense cap
I'm not sure about the 50k expense cap (sounds like you're getting taken for a ride from the sales agents you're talking with or your feature may not have any commercial value hence they're looking at getting paid somewhat up front).
The 20-25% commissions aren't too bad. The good sales agents know more than you do. Things like, who are the buyers to avoid (there are people who are willing to buy your film, take your film and never pay you a red cent with your only option is expensive legal action in a foreign country). What are particular buyers looking for?
Are you capable in talking Chinese? Japanese? German? French? Would that mean you cannot sell to those buyers or do you expect them to be able to speak in your language? On top of that, if the German buyer offered you $5k for your film, is that a good deal? What about 2.5k from the Australian buyer? What about $25k for worldwide rights? What about $4k for new media rights? Without a good agent you won't know what the current market is, what's currently an acceptable offer, what terms will screw you and the best way to sell foreign territories. They may even be able to make arrangement with other sellers to get your feature in packages for certain territories. Can you do that solo? Maybe. Would an agent be able to squeeze more than their commission from the sales that'd you miss will ultimately depend on your films value to a worldwide market and your sales agents' abilities.
This is also linked to your next question:
would you say the buyers are going to ignore me even if I have a booth and they are interested in the film?
How are they going to know they're interested in your film without spending time (which they don't have) watching your film (in an area that you don't have).
The real questions are:
What real assets does your film really have?
What buzz has been generated about your film?
If your diamond is truly a gem in the rough, you may have a chance. The problem is similar to the writers elevator pitch. 50,000 movies are made annually. Every filmmaker thinks their movie is the best thing since sliced bread. Less than 1000 films a year see any meaningful theatrical distribution. Take into consideration that there's less than a 2% chance that your "better than sliced bread" movie is actually any good. Next consideration, you're also going to be asking them to spend anywhere between 20 and 200 times the budget you spent on your film distributing it. Lets say I'm a film buyer and you have 10 seconds to convince me you're among that 2% and I'm going to make money with you: Go:
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10.
Time's up. How did you go? Any "umm" or "errr" there?
Were you able to convince the film buyer to then spend another 30 seconds to listen to your logline and the assets of the film. If successful, did you then convince them to spend 2.5minutes to watch your trailer? They now love it and want to buy it for worldwide rights. They ask, "How much for worldwide rights?"
Did you give them the right answer or did they laugh in your face and walk away? Did they snap you up in a deal that was a steal for them?
I've never attended, so all I have is hearsay, but even with a both and a single film to peddle they're not even going to be interested.
What rayw says is true and false. From my understanding, there are people looking for filler movies. If your movie is a filler movie, then you're shit out of luck. As Rayw said, these are sold as a package and you'll need a sales agent or to team up with other filmmakers.
This is all just scratching the surface. Do you think you're ready to walk that floor?
Oh, I forgot one thing. No pressure. If you don't sell your film this year, there's nearly a 100% chance that your film will never ever sell. Buyers can think along the lines of, if it didn't sell last year, it must be bad.
What's the right move?