Dear Film Festivals and the independent film festival community,

We, the undersigned, hereby protest the inclusion of the motion picture THE FLYBOYS (2008) (also known as SKY KIDS) in film festivals in competition categories which pit the motion picture against smaller, local, independent films made for as little as 1/10th or even 1/100th of the budget of FLYBOYS.

With all due respect to THE FLYBOYS as an excellent motion picture, the film's $2 million budget and Hollywood stars (Stephen Baldwin, Tom Sizemore) have practically guaranteed the film Best Feature awards at nearly every film festival the film has played in to date, at the exclusion of smaller, less expensive, equally deserving motion pictures.

We, the undersigned, take umbrage at the fact that the filmmakers responsible for THE FLYBOYS have entered the film into small festivals which have historically exhibited motion pictures in the $50,000 - $500,000 budget range.

Along the same principle as a boxer only boxing within his own weight category, we strongly suggest that all of the smaller, local film festivals which have chosen to exhibit FLYBOYS please divide the competition films into separate categories -- we suggest "over $1 million budget" and "under $1 million budget" -- to prevent low-budget, deserving independent films from being shut-out from awards as they have at nearly every festival in which FLYBOYS has played.