Distribution
Filmmaking - Distribution
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DIY Lives? #LIKE‘s Distribution Journey, Part Two: The End of the Beginning
On January 26th 2021 my film, LIKE, a feminist noir thriller, debuted on Apple TV, Amazon Prime and others. It has been a long and winding road just to get to the end of the beginning. Part 1 of my article, published in July, details my voyage into the opaque world of film distribution and the ever-evolving influence of streaming, which had for years been diminishing independent film theatrical box office. But then, of course, live audiences were near-obliterated when COVID-19 lockdowns shuttered theaters. In other words, the theatrical exhibition experience was all but gone until who knows when. I […]
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Movie Theaters to Receive Billions in Relief Funds as Part of the Save Our Stages Act (Updated)
December 28, 2020 update: After delaying his signature by several days, President Trump signed the COVID-19 relief package containing the Save Our Stages act. The final specifics of the act, as released by Senator Chuck Schumer’s office, can be found at the conclusion of this article, which has also been updated. Small and mid-sized movie theaters will receive a portion of $15 billion in funds contained within the COVID-19 relief package being voted upon by Congress today. In addition to $600 stimulus payments, an extension of the $300/weekly enhanced federal unemployment benefit and further Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans, the package […]
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Searching for an Independent Distribution Strategy Amidst Pandemics and Streaming Wars
I made a microbudget movie called #LIKE. Amazingly it is wrapped, posted and on the festival circuit, and it has been receiving glowing reviews like this: “Writer/director Sarah Pirozek’s teenage noir #Like pulses with the energy of a ’70s thriller.” Discouraged by stats on Hollywood hiring and women directors — a 2015 DGA report reported that 84% of first-time scripted TV directors were white men — and inspired by the work of independent female filmmakers like Marielle Heller, Laurie Weltz and Anja Marquardt, I decided to stop waiting for permission to make my first feature. Instead of making a short-film calling […]
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Why I Will Not Put My Film Online: A Filmmaker’s Response to Covid-19
Back in the days when I used to distribute avant-garde cinema on home video, I asked my friend George Kuchar about releasing Hold Me While I’m Naked and a few other of his classic films on DVD. “I can’t let you do that, Noel!” he explained. “You see, my films are legendary because nobody can see them. If someone could just go out and rent one, they’d find out they stink. I’ve got to maintain the legend!” George was sort of joking. But there was a kernel of truth in his statement. Kuchar might have been wrong that his films […]
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Are Virtual Theaters Here to Stay?
When Toby Leonard, programming director at Nashville’s Belcourt Theatre, returned to the space for the first time since the COVID-19 shutdown began, a six-foot cardboard display for Never Rarely Sometimes Always struck his eye. Eliza Hittman’s film was four days into the first week of a planned platform release before it was pulled from theatrical exhibition and hadn’t yet made it to the Belcourt, but its physical teaser remained. “How many of these things were there and how many did they send around the country?,” Leonard wondered. Then he took it down. As exhibitors and distributors initially adjusted to no theatrical releases for […]
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Kaleidoscope and the Museum of Other Realities Step In to Help the VR Industry During the Pandemic
One thing that’s been uplifting to observe throughout all the recent closures of movie theaters, festivals, and other cultural institutions has been how individuals and companies have stepped in to provide relief, support, and camaraderie during an unprecedented crisis. This is true in the virtual and augmented reality community as much as in the broader film industry, as content creators and distributors have come together to support each other as their work has come to an essential standstill. Of course, some companies and services have seen an uptick in their business, as consumers explore using VR products to hold meetings, […]
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“VR Can Be So Many Things”: Diversion cinema Co-founder Camille Lopato on Distributing VR
Frequent visitors to major film festivals will have spent the last few years tracking the improvement not only of virtual and augmented reality pieces, but also of how they’re shown. Throughput has increased, displays and decorations gone from relatively slipshod to professional, and most recently entire groups of viewers have been accommodated simultaneously in group viewing sessions through synchronized headsets. In the meantime, commercial venues—some permanent, some pop-ups—have sprung up around the globe, offering VR games and films as part of a new wave of location-based entertainment (LBE). The Paris-based Diversion cinema is at the forefront of developments like these. […]
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Hits & Misses 2019: Surveying the Success of the Sundance Film Festival’s Theatrical Releases
The times, they keep a-changin’. In its immediate aftermath, the story out of Sundance 2019 was its bounteous acquisition market and record-setting sales numbers—from New Line’s $15 million purchase of Blinded by the Light to Amazon Studios’ $27 million splurge on Late Night and Brittany Runs a Marathon. By the summer, a different narrative began to emerge. While these top acquisition titles earned millions of dollars at the box office, they all still under-performed in theatrical release. Then, Amazon Studios’ veteran head of theatrical distribution Bob Berney left the company, a departure that potentially signaled shifting priorities at what had […]
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On Making a Proof-of-Concept Short and Getting Representation
The following article, filmmaker and author Matt Szymanowski points out, is not strictly an article about making a proof-of-concept short or getting representation. He says that if you only want to know about those subjects you can read these informative articles here and here, and here, and here. (There’s also an article on the subject here at Filmmaker.) Instead, Szymanowski, who has covered his filmmaking process several times in these pages, has written an article about how he made his own proof-of-concept short, how it helped him land legal representation, and how it has led to conversations with literary managers and agents. […]
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Unpredictable Tides: Distributors Talk Streamers, Foreign-Language Films in the U.S., and the Changing Festival Acquisitions Environment
With Toronto wrapped, New York upcoming and Sundance on the horizon, the film festival season is here, and distributors — particularly the traditional arthouse distributors — are facing tougher competition than ever. While critics and audiences struggle to keep up with the sheer volume of buzz-worthy films, industry executives must contend with tectonic shifts in the marketplace, ensuring in the process that their release slates are kept full of strong pictures. In this new environment, when a pay TV outlet likes HBO scoops the competition by paying near $20 million for Toronto’s hot title, Bad Education, traditional distributors are often […]
