Indie Game: The Movie Filmmakers Announce New Special Edition
Lisanne Pajot and James Swirsky, directors of Indie Game: The Movie, are not only skilled filmmakers but also very savvy businesspeople. They chose to self-distribute their film rather than sell themselves short by giving it away to a distributor, and did a brilliant job of connecting with their audience and maximizing the potential of their product. (You can read their evolved thinking on self-distribution in a Filmmaker article they penned earlier this year.)
Now the pair say they have reached “the end of a life-changing, 3-year odyssey” of Indie Game with the just-announced the release of a Special Edition, which collects together 100+ minutes of “new epilogues & short films.” It’s on sale right now, and there’s also a 300+ minute Special Edition box set you can preorder for shipping in early August.
Describing their motovation for the Special Edition, Pajot and Swirsky write:
This entire project is the result of making the film that we wanted to see as film-watchers & fans. And then, extending that community-centric mode of thinking to the financing, production, communication, distribution – everything. We think we did some interesting things, and, for the most part, it seems to have worked.
…We see this Special Edition release as a new way for us to continue telling the story. It allows us to build on the narrative & the themes in the feature, including a deeper look at the challenges of living a creative life on Internet & into the creative process of other game developers.
For more of their thoughts, check out their Director’s Notes post on the film’s official site.