In the Wake TV Producers Shayna and Julia pull back the curtain on how the film industry really works—exposing the tension between profit-driven decisions and artistic quality, plus the unspoken rules that shape how critics write reviews.

The Business Behind the Art: In this candid conversation, Shayna and Julia break down the machinery of the film industry: how distribution deals prioritize marketability over merit, why certain films get pushed while others with better storytelling languish, and the economic pressures that shape what audiences ever get to see. They also reveal the "tone secrets" of film criticism—how publications, advertisers, and industry relationships influence the language critics use, what gets praised versus what gets buried, and why truly honest reviews are rarer than you think.

Why This Matters: For audiences—especially Black audiences and communities of color—understanding the industry's profit-first model explains why our stories are often underfunded, under-distributed, or forced to conform to white gaze expectations to secure financing. It also exposes why mainstream film criticism often fails us: critics beholden to industry access can't always tell the truth about what's actually good versus what studios want hyped. Shayna and Julia's transparency is a masterclass in media literacy.

Watch the full conversation as our producers dish on the realities of film festivals, the economics of independent cinema, and what it takes to maintain integrity as a critic in an industry built on compromise.

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