I’m just back from a long weekend at The Cannes Film Festival 2026.
What on earth are you doing there Charlie?
Fair question.
About 14 years ago I met Ed Rigg in an office in Soho, we worked together for a bit (see here). He went off to become an award winning film director and producer, we worked a bit more for another software business in 2017, had some times in Vegas and became friends.
In 2020 Ed founded Recdek, an app business solving the problem many of us have with choice paralysis when we turn the TV. Ob average we spend 8 days a year scrolling shows and movies on the major streamers (Netflix, Prime Video et. al.). If we could connect on Recdek and recommend content for our friends to enjoy, we’d save time and when we next got together be able to talk about the excellent entertainment we’ve been enjoying.
The first few years of any startup are always hard, building tech, raising finance, finding your tribe. Ed found that by holding Recdek events using the app as a ticket to get in was a great way to build a loyal following as well as drive downloads and exposure to the app.
Over this time Ed and I spoke regularly, in and out of COVID, about startup growth and he appointed me as an advisor.
By Cannes Film Festival 2023, Ed had been building his series of Recdek events, they had been gaining notoriety within the independent film making community as excellent events to meet producers, actors, investors, writers and a host of contacts to make dreams come true and nightmares dissappear.
That’s when I got the call. “Charlie, it’s working, we have a series of events lined up in Cannes and I could do with some help hosting, can you help?” – I was obviously there in a flash, all went very well and over the next couple of years Recdek has established itself as the place for the independent film community to get together at many major international film festivals. This year to date Recdek House members have enjoyed events at Sundance, SXSW, Bernale and Cannes.
There was a distinct step up this time with the addition of The Big Screen Hack, a concept conceived by my old mate, the legend that is Aaron Jones. Aaron is a serial exited founder and at the vanguard of what can produced by AI video today.
The Big Screen Hack, leveraged Recdek’s community and paired them with AI experts to leverage the best AI tools available today to create a short film in 48 hours. The weekend before Cannes 280 people subscribed and 180 people turned up and submitted 56 films. 14 of them shortlisted to be screened at The Cannes Film Festival and gain access to Recdek House.
A massive screening room was booked for the Monday after Recdek’s Sunday main event followed by an in depth panel offering an opportunity to play back to it’s community the opportunities presented by this new way of working. This was all followed by a yacht party. The template proved out and this will be happening again.
It’s very much the beginning of the road for Recdek and the opportunities being presented are many and varied. Stay tuned.
Charles Cadbury 