Sundance: Take My Film...Please! (ABC News Article 1-24-09)

[michael zaletel]

Interesting Article on ABC News dot com today...

Sundance: Take my Film...Please!
The Annual Indie Film Festival is Proving a Tough Sell for Moviemakers as the Economy Craters and Distribution Channels Shrink

Excerpt:
"Critics often feel frustrated that, with disturbing frequency, movies they champion at film festivals never see the light of day. For the foreseeable future, this frustration will only get worse. "

"In this year's festival there are a total of 118 features, selected from 3,661 submissions, and many of them, the good as well as the bad, will be orphaned. (I saw 15 of these films in five days.) This is partly because, as a result of the recent gutting of specialty film divisions like Warner Independent and Paramount Vantage, there are fewer adoptive families out there. But even the remaining big buyers, which include Sony Pictures Classics, Focus, and Fox Searchlight, agree that a new paradigm, a new delivery system that doesn't rely so heavily on theatrical distribution, is essential if small and worthy indies are going to be seen by the audiences who should be seeing them. "


Online Article:
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=6719614&page=1

Full Article for Printing:
http://abcnews.go.com/print?id=6719614

-shooter

[James Mathers]

I've noticed that Sundance can be an especially tough place to premiere comedies. A film I shot premiered there in 1990, (actually at the US Film Festival -- before it was even officially called Sundance), and was never heard of again. It was a broad comedy featuring the members of the Ducks Breath Mystery Theater, called "Zadar, Cow From Hell"; (see, you never heard of it). It was raked over the coals by the critics, ruining any chance for distribution, and the positive words about the camera work didn't seem to count for much.

I've recently been tracking reviews of "Manure", the Polish Brothers' picture which premiered there Tuesday night. As in my previous experience, the critics were pretty tough on the comedy, but had very nice things to say about the Cinematography, such as The Hollywood Reporter's Stephen Farber: "But the cinematography by M. David Mullen (who also shot "Northfork") is consistently stunning". After the seemingly unavoidable references to excrement, and completely bashing the movie, Steve West, at CinemaBlend.com said: "...there were some real redeeming qualities. The film is shot with gorgeous painted backdrops and a sepia tone that makes it unquestionably one of most beautiful films to come out of the festival this year."

Although I worked a little bit on this RED shot movie myself, I have not yet had the pleasure to see anything but the dailies or still images shown here at REDuser, (which were incredible). So, congratulations to David for his fine work, and lets hope that "Manure" is not torpedoed, so it can be widely seen and his exquisite Cinematography can be appreciated on the big screen.

James Mathers
Cinematographer
Studio City, CA

[Bob Gruen]

Makes you wonder if Indies will get the digital projection treatment before the big budget Hollywood films. Maybe the distributor will run a questionable Indie digitally in test markets before determining the size of the roll-out and the number of film prints to be made (if any)...

[michael zaletel]

Wouldn't straight to iTunes (iPhone, iPod and Apple TV) be a better distribution method for independent films?

-shooter

[M Most]

Makes you wonder if Indies will get the digital projection treatment before the big budget Hollywood films. Maybe the distributor will run a questionable Indie digitally in test markets before determining the size of the roll-out and the number of film prints to be made (if any)...

In at least one form, that's already been available for quite some time now. If you've never heard of Emerging Pictures, you might want to visit their website, www.emergingpictures.com.

[jpp]

Urban art-houses have been projecting DVDs for years now, and audiences put up with it, so that route has already been taken more or less by default, though the model is probably not one the majors would want to adopt. At least, we hope not.

Per mmost's post above, Emerging Pictures rang a bell, and then I remembered:

"Emerging Pictures is no longer in the business of developing screenplays or financing productions. Our activities are focused entirely on distribution and exhibition services. If you find yourself with a completed film and have need for those services, please contact us by clicking here."

It's evidently a safer bet these days to sell services than invest in movies, particularly given the poor producing track record of their principal owners (sorry, had to get that in). But if they really knew how to distribute this stuff in the digital realm, they might be more venturesome with their own capital(?)