Photo credit to Joseph Jeavons.
The suspense comedy Blood in the Snow is finally getting its moment in the sun on Tubi and YouTube.
But the film was supposed to launch on Amazon Prime Video.
Back in 2024, we wrote about how three friends — Joseph Jeavons, Sam Teague and Owen Swift — were about to get their big break on Prime Video.
The creative crew first made the first short film Parasocial in 2022. Then, Jeavons and Swift wrote The Big Pelvis and won a finalist award at the Student World Impact Film Festival, an Amazon Prime partner at the time. This entitled them to waived distribution fees and free submission access to Prime Video.
Once they finished Blood in the Snow in summer 2024, Jeavons said they sent it to their distributors in the fall along with filled out paperwork. In return, the Woodrow Wilson High School alumnus said he and his team didn’t hear back for months.
“At that point, it was getting a little fishy,” he said. “Like, why haven’t they responded to us yet?”
Jeavons then found that the Student World Impact Film Festival website hasn’t been updated in a while.
Lakewood/East Dallas Advocate can confirm the site only includes details about the 2023 film festival and winners. Likewise, posts on the festival’s Instagram and Facebook pages stop in 2023, and there are no posts on its LinkedIn or X accounts. (And unless I’m missing something, there was no mention on the website of Jeavons or The Big Pelvis, but Jeavons did appear on the festival’s podcast in 2023.)
Jeavons said he entered this film festival specifically because it was free to enter and came with perks, like the podcast interview. He reached out to the film festival’s founder and Executive Director Mark Leschinsky as well as to Amazon, the latter of which told him that the company’s partnership with the film festival had ended.
“That was pretty discouraging because we had two years of work that we had invested into making this movie and all these people behind us,” Jeavons said. “One, we were devastated, like, was all of this for nothing? And two, we were also very scared to tell people because we didn’t want to disappoint all those people that showed up for us. I told the guys who worked on it with me, I was like, ‘We’re not going to just let this die. We’ll do what we have to to get it up somewhere.’”
On Instagram, Student World Impact Film Festival announced the distribution partnership with Prime Video on Feb. 18, 2023.
“Prime Video Distribution is now available for all Honorable Mentions and Award Winners at the Student World Impact Film Festival,” the post reads.
This didn’t just affect Jeavons and his team. One commenter on Instagram claimed to be a film director of a project that received an “Honorable Mention” award.
“From what you reported, all award-winning and honorable mention films will automatically be distributed by Prime Video,” reads the comment posted in November 2023. “More than a year later, unfortunately I have not received any response regarding this. I have already sought contact several times via email and WhatsApp. Could you give me an answer?”
We reached out to both Student World Impact Film Festival and Amazon, but didn’t receive a response by press time.
Jeavons spent months figuring out how to distribute a movie. He had to reformat the film, get it copyrighted, find spots for ad placements and hire an artist to create the poster, among other “tedious” tasks. He worked with Filmhub for distribution (and spoke highly of that partnership), which eventually led to the film being picked up by YouTube and Tubi in January.
“They’re not the biggest streaming services, but those are two that a lot of people use anyway,” he said. “So we were pretty ecstatic that people are finally going to see this movie. It’s going to see the light of day.”
Making Blood in the Snow came with help from financial backers (friends and family) in Lakewood as well as volunteer support.
“Even some people from the City helped us set up the screening event at (Lindsley Park), like, waived the fees for us because they knew us, and they were excited to see what we were up to,” Jeavons said.
The experience made Jeavons realize the “cutthroat” nature of the film industry, which has inspired him to step back and focus on being an author, though he is still studying film at the University of Texas.
Looking back on Blood in the Snow, Jeavons sees things that he wishes were better, like the visuals, but he’s still proud of the project.
“I’m very happy with the performances given by the actors, and I’m very happy with the writing,” he said.
You can watch Blood in the Snow for free with ads here and here.
