The failure of independent film.

[Captain_Video]

Hello folks.

I have been thinking and musing about film distribution, particularly by indy film-makers.

Now we all know that the internet has been great for film, you can go on a website put in your credit card details and get almost any film from any country in the world, its amazing, in the last five years I have seen films I never would have dreamt of seeing back in the days of VHS.

So here is my question, why is it that we do not buy our films direct from the film-makers ?

It seems to be working fairly well for musicians, but nobody to my knowledge has ever made self distribution of film work.

Think of what this could do for film-making if it was ever embraced, the big studios odious monopoly on Cinema chains would eventually fall, we would no longer be subjected to predictable fare and could see a thousand different stories.

So why has it never worked ?

I have purchased a few films direct from the directors ( breakfast with hunter being my favourite ), its always been a smooth transaction and it feels good knowing where the money is going, so it is not some sort of practicle difficulty.

Is it the herd mentality ? Who is in it ? We want stars !! ( people only wanting to watch what everyone else has seen to have a shared culture and society )

Is it lack of trust of internet stores/sellers ? ( safer than using it in a restaurant and we all seem to love and trust people on ebay )

Lack of advertising ? ( people sell films themselves you say ? !! )

Everyone wanting stuff for free ( sure I will download it off Youtube, but PAY you are out of your mind Jack ).

Most indy films are terrible, I dont trust it ( true most are appaling, usually due to filmmakers just no having the funds to make high quality productions ).

So what is the deal here ? it seems we are on the threshold of a cultural revolution, yet still we cling to outdated systems run by cynical business men..."there is no money in finding the cure"

Any thoughts ?

[StoneGold]

For one thing, digital downloads of movies still hasn't taken off yet in general. That's a lot of bandwidth, especially if you want something you can burn to DVD. Although as speeds increase, that will be less of an issue. I think we are right on the cusp of it. Seriously, the whole HD vs. Blu Ray issue is probably moot, because we'll just be downloading HD films anyways.

[IamtheRock3]

I view independent films like I view Garage sales


You can find GREAT stuff there if you look there. You find great stuff that you wont find at the MAINSTREAM stores. You may even find a lost Picaso. But for the most part you find Pink Flamingos


Main stores like Wallmart, and Best Buy, We all say we hate em, but we all buy for them. The reason why. Cause we know we can find something we least LIKE. It may not find to much stuff we LOVE or memorble. But you know you be realtivly satisfied


movies kind of the same thing. Most people not going to risk 9 bucks on some weird indie flick. When you see a trailer LIVE FAST AND DIE HARD, you basicly know if your going to like it or hate it. And thus make your payment accordinly

idenpent films..it a gamble. That may hit well, or bad


Now Idenpent movies havent been playing in the part NJ that I'm in. But what I have been doing is ordering some ON DEMAND. They have a thing where you can order indepent movies that are in therater for like six or seven bucks. It goes right do your TV

I do this not cause I am great suporter of the Arts. I do it because it easy and convient. They give me a trailer and some info on the movie before I order. You even get a short interviews with the actors afterward


The ON THE PC thing hasnt really hit off with MAINSTREAM movies, let alone independent

wait a couple of years

now that everyone NETFLIXING It may help idepents. But then again got to advertise.

word of mouth is cool and all. But your Audience cant do all the foot work for you

it easier with music. Cause making a music CD's is cheaper(therefor more advertisment dollars), you can give sample songs on Your CD. You get a whole song from a CD. Hard to do that with a 2 hour movie cause of Flow and story progresion. Also songs tranfer over computer better

most mainstream movies that sold over the computer ALL READY been in theaters. So word of mouth and advertimsent all ready there.

[BoosterBronze]

Are a lot of musicians successfully selling their own product witthout distribution? Really?

[Ontir]

Back in school, one of my professors said that TV is radio, @ 10 times the price. Film/Cinema is even more so. If you've got a decent room, with little surrounding sound, a decent computer with Pro Tools, and lots of memory, not to mention your own instruments and a bit of talent, you can record and burn disks pretty inexpensively. A simple film can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yes, there are the exceptions, like El Mariachi and Primer, but they are few and far between. (I've got four projects I'm trying to put together, and I was thrilled when I figured out that one of them could be made for $300,000!) Beyond that, comes the problem of distribution itself, and the question of portals.

Netflix has been amazing, for indie cinema, because their customer base skews more toward indie and cult. They pick thinks up, like Tim Robbins filmed version of his play Embedded. They're also headed, no-holds barred, toward download. iTunes is making inroads, they've been pretty good for shorts, but I've yet to really see them embrace either real indie rock, film, or TV. There's stuff out there, but again, the cost that has to be charged, for someone to produce the disk and packaging, after the cost of pre, production, and post, and it's still high. I'm hoping that the aforementioned services will open things up, because when the doors finally are open, there's going to be lots of room for people like my friends, and myself, and anyone else trying to get over the studio walls.

[Buzz Dixon]

If a movie (a) is in focus and (b) cost less than $2 million then (c) it will make money in DVD.

[Ontir]

I've got some friends who would differ with that opinion. ;)

[cactusmaac]

I don't tend to buy movies unless I've watched them and don't tend to watch unless they have good word of mouth. Given how many DVD options are out there, it'll be a long while before I run out of the stuff it costs me £2 to rent.

[Captain_Video]

If a movie (a) is in focus and (b) cost less than $2 million then (c) it will make money in DVD.

I would dispute that slightly.

I am talking primarily of the money going to film makers, if you have ever have the pleasure of dealing with a sales agent or a distributor I encourage you to do so, because it will show you that Machiavelli was an amateur.

My worry is, if we do not support independent film makers, then they will always have to pander to the studios to live and finance there own productions and Film as a media will suffer as a result, we all deserve interesting unique movies.

Unlike music it is simply impossible to make a decent film production and hold down a nine to five job, I am currently working two jobs and still barely raising enough ( I did not initially want to bring up personal experience because it will invalidate my argument making me seem biased, everyone has an agenda apparently).

There are a lot of interesting ideas so far, but it does seem to be skewing towards the herd mentality/distrust of film makers side of the argument.

Bringing up Tim Robbins is a good example, because if Tim Robbins is involved it will not be a true independent production and the budget will certainly not be reflective of that...also getting onto Netflix/Itunes is nowhere near as easy as it appears.

El Mariachi and Primer, could not have possibly cost the prices quoted by the film makers, unless some guardian angel swooped in to do the processing costs....( Wha ! Rodriguez had a Hollywood agent BEFORE he ever made El Mariachi ??....say it aint so, he didnt mention that in the book :eek: )

( $300 000 is a damn good price for a project by the way, especially originating on 35mm ).

I know a few bands who are making a decent sum from downloads of their music, so I know it is possible with music to be truely independent.

It seems as though Independent Film is doomed to always be the gnarled ratty dog scratching at the door of the dog show.

[Ontir]

IIRC, Tim Robbins paid for Embedded out of his own pocket. It was shot on HD, like a rock concert, in one take. It wasn't an expensive film to make, as it was a recording of the stage play.

Getting onto Netflix isn't easy, and I've not been able to find anything about getting onto iTunes, which seems to be focused entirely on the labels. I can see that, as a start, but it's time that they used the strength of their position, and began to support the indies, in music, film, and TV.

[Buzz Dixon]

An e-mail from an acquaintance mentions the following:Check out FilmBaby.com. Works just like CDBaby.com. It is a NON exclusive way to sell your DVD's online. People can buy your movies online with a credit card. They also report all sales to videoscan. They keep $4 of every disc, and you get the rest...you set the price, they pay out every week.

Check out more info at:
http://www.filmbaby.com/members/how_we_work.php Maybe that would be of help.

[Greg Hatcher]

Julie and I will often buy a DVD from an indie producer when we see one; we are at lots of different events where there are small-press folks tabling and displaying their wares and there's usually one or two indie film guys there. We'll risk ten bucks on something, especially if we have a chance to talk to the guy about what it is and what he hopes for it. We like encouraging the arts.

Last weekend we watched a guerilla documentary on DVD we picked up at this event (http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2007/02/02/zapped-friday/) -- it was called "Three Questions," in which a fellow asked a whole bunch of different people the same three questions and recorded their responses, with occasional voice-over narrative. It was by turns funny and compelling, and very much in the DIY ethic. I'd be surprised if it cost him over $500 to make it.

We find lots of things like that. It depends on where you live. Seattle's a good town for that kind of thing -- there's indie festivals at places like Northwest Film Forum (http://www.nwfilmforum.org/) and so on. The one's we've enjoyed the most are the DVD of a short film called Professional Courtesy made by Mark Price (http://www.khoras.net/Community/Crew/Mark/artist.htm)-- and we handed our fifteen bucks directly to Mr. Price when he was at his table at the Emerald City Con -- and a series of short films at the Asian-American film festival to which we'd been invited by CBR's own F. Chong Rutherford, who had a movie in the festival. (Later he gave us a DVD of that film and some of his others as a wedding present, and it was one of our top-three gifts, believe me.) My friend Dave Larson spent a hunk of the late 90's shooting this --

http://www.microcinefest.org/QuarrelPostera.jpeg

And while it took him a couple of years, I don't think it was any $300,000. No idea what's up with Dave now or if that movie's even still available -- I think he distributed it via mail-order VHS and did a couple of festivals.

You have to wade through a lot of crap, same as you do any underground, alternative arts community. But the good stuff is often breathtakingly good and even the bad stuff has a rock-n-roll exuberance you don't see in the mainstream.

It's out there. There's an indie DIY film community same as there's an indie DIY comics-zine community and an indie DIY music-CD-mail-order community. It's just that because film is that much harder the number of folks that hang in there long enough to FINISH things is a lot smaller.

[Captain_Video]

Julie and I will often buy a DVD from an indie producer when we see one; we are at lots of different events where there are small-press folks tabling and displaying their wares and there's usually one or two indie film guys there. We'll risk ten bucks on something, especially if we have a chance to talk to the guy about what it is and what he hopes for it. We like encouraging the arts.

Last weekend we watched a guerilla documentary on DVD we picked up at this event (http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2007/02/02/zapped-friday/) -- it was called "Three Questions," in which a fellow asked a whole bunch of different people the same three questions and recorded their responses, with occasional voice-over narrative. It was by turns funny and compelling, and very much in the DIY ethic. I'd be surprised if it cost him over $500 to make it.

We find lots of things like that. It depends on where you live. Seattle's a good town for that kind of thing -- there's indie festivals at places like Northwest Film Forum (http://www.nwfilmforum.org/) and so on. The one's we've enjoyed the most are the DVD of a short film called Professional Courtesy made by Mark Price (http://www.khoras.net/Community/Crew/Mark/artist.htm)-- and we handed our fifteen bucks directly to Mr. Price when he was at his table at the Emerald City Con -- and a series of short films at the Asian-American film festival to which we'd been invited by CBR's own F. Chong Rutherford, who had a movie in the festival. (Later he gave us a DVD of that film and some of his others as a wedding present, and it was one of our top-three gifts, believe me.) My friend Dave Larson spent a hunk of the late 90's shooting this --

http://www.microcinefest.org/QuarrelPostera.jpeg

And while it took him a couple of years, I don't think it was any $300,000. No idea what's up with Dave now or if that movie's even still available -- I think he distributed it via mail-order VHS and did a couple of festivals.

You have to wade through a lot of crap, same as you do any underground, alternative arts community. But the good stuff is often breathtakingly good and even the bad stuff has a rock-n-roll exuberance you don't see in the mainstream.

It's out there. There's an indie DIY film community same as there's an indie DIY comics-zine community and an indie DIY music-CD-mail-order community. It's just that because film is that much harder the number of folks that hang in there long enough to FINISH things is a lot smaller.

We need to have you cloned a thousand times, or at least get you a public platform.

So tell me, do you have anything specific you look for that Indy film can give you, like a niche subject matter ? or is it particularly the idea of people trying to prove they are artists, which means it ( the work ) will inherently have heart to it ?

Myself I lean towards the niche subjects, also some indy film makers use outdated concepts like proper script structure and having a point to make, which I suppose would now fall under niche subjects.

I wouldn't say film is any harder than music, or comic books as it art form has its own pitfalls, but it is certainly more costly, unless you shoot D.V but Film vs DV is a whole other argument.

( The straight edge documentary has peaked my interest by the way, good find sir ).

You have proved there is hope out there, but its a small twinkling star amongst a city of neon signs.

[Ontir]

Filmbaby is onto the right idea, but there isn't much there that I'd watch for free.

[Tages]

Bringing up Tim Robbins is a good example, because if Tim Robbins is involved it will not be a true independent production

...what?

If he pays for the whole thing with his own money how does that mean it's not a true indie production? Because he's rich?

[Captain_Video]

...what?

If he pays for the whole thing with his own money how does that mean it's not a true indie production? Because he's rich?

No, because he is coming from working got years within the studio system, so he will have many contacts that can make life much easier.

For example try getting quotes on all the equipment you would need to shoot a film and watch the rental/stock houses umm and ahh and give wildly different prices....Tim Robbins would have to say his name and then they would try and work something out.

Not even bring those damn unions into it, at a low budget level they are extortionists.

Also looking into the "Embedded" production it seems there are a number of songs by really high cost artists in there...indicating a much higher budget than it would first appear.

Because he is rich he can afford to self distribute and make a massive loss, this is not a luxury anyone else working outside the established system has, if you are willing to live completely on the breadline you can maybe make one film every seven years....if indy distribution takes off then we could see self supportive studios spring up, giving say ten glory years before they too become corrupted by success.

Every year we get "the big new indy hit" and it is so frustrating as these productions are almost never actually independent in any way.

If we bring practicalities into the discussion most people turn off, to bring a comparison, the majority of people do not know/care where their food/entertainment is coming from.

Thanks though everyone, believe it or not this small board is better than any other film board I have found as other boards completely ignore any practicle discussion at all.

[Buzz Dixon]

Captain Video, everybody needs to network in order to have connections to make things work. I guarantee people do not cut deals on equipment rental just because a major star is involved; quite the contrary, they're more likely to jack the price up. Besides, many productions have production managers who do the actual wheeling and dealing and signing of contracts for this very reason.

Let's say an aspiring film maker in Montana has a camera, has read enough books and had enough practice to make a competent film, recruits some talented local unknowns and makes a passable film. How does he get it out to the world?

He can set up a PayPal account, offer it for sale on the web, send out review copies, then wait for the money to trickle in. And by "trickle" I am not being sarcastic; if he (or she) is patient enough and kept the production cost down, eventually the costs will be recouped and a profit shown.

Or he/she can get the film on the film festival circuit and hope to drum up a distribution deal with an established distributor. That means networking: Going to film festivals to understand how they operate, meeting with people who run such festivals and ask for advice ('cuz all things being equal, if they have a choice between a film from a completely unknown person and a film from "that nice guy from Montana who worked so hard to put his project together" well, you don't have to be a weather man to know which way the wind will blow).

Same thing with comics, same thing with song writing, same thing with book publishing. You (i.e., the rhetorical creator) need to make contacts. You've got to find out who the buyers are, know what type of material they are looking for, make yourself well known enough to at least a few people that you can get your foot in the door (and by "well known" I don't mean just with secretaries and d-girls and readers; you need to find people who can say yes or else strongly recommend to the yes-sayer that yes be said).

It's easier to do this where the action is: New York if you're into comics and publishing, Nashville if you wanna break into country-music, Hollywood if film and TV is your goal. It's not impossible to do it from outside of those venues, especially using the Internet to help market and publicize your material, but sooner or later froggie gotta go a'courtin'.

[Greg Hatcher]

This is starting to sound a little like one of those "how indie are you?" things where it's all about ideological purity. It might help to define your terms.

If you insist that it only counts if it starts with festival/thetrical premiere -- first experienced by an audience in a theatre -- that cuts out an enormous, and to my way of thinking significant, number of guys who've gravitated to DVD/download/home video because that's the low-budget alternative. All of the examples I gave you above were done that way -- they had theatrical showings AFTER the initial home-video push.

The obstacles you cited of equipment cost, unions, etc., are certainly real ones, but that's what feeds any alternative underground DIY movement in the first place -- people who want to do their stuff and can't do it traditionally have to find work-arounds.

My point, I guess, is simply that there ARE people doing it. Just not as many as in comics or music, because the work-arounds themselves are harder and take longer. Seven years sounds about right as an average, though the people working with video that I know personally or know of, anyway, seem to manage to finish things in about two. And I think as the technology moves forward and film and TV becomes more about delivering things online on-demand, this will accelerate. That's what my cloudy crystal ball suggests to me, at any rate.

[Greg Hatcher]

Oh yeah, and what Buzz said, too. Any freelancer in any of the arts will tell you that you spend ten percent of the time DOING the work and the other ninety percent HUSTLING the work.

[Captain_Video]

How indy are you ? ....I suppose I did unintentionally lead the conversation in that direction...made me sit back in my chair there, thanks, I need that every now and again.

In regards to equipment, if you go to industry rental houses or even stock manufacturers they go based on your budget and what they can squeeze out of you...imagine you go to buy a roll of film for your still camera, you go the pharmacy and they say "How much have you got" ? ....it wouldnt stand.

Because the industry has been monopolised they can do this and get away with it....Tim Robbins would get a standard deal with clear terms..

The practicalities are boring it has just occured to me and irrelevant.

Talking about the money trickling in...boy do you have that right, in my research I spoke to a fairly low level film maker, whose work some of you may even have seen, he distributed a project with a known actor himself...and it would have taken him by his calculations thirty years to break even...this is with a known commodity.

If you do network and get a distributor you would need a sales agent, I know for a fact that these people rip you off blind and there is nothing you can do, its like gambling in vegas, even if you win, you will probably lose.

The sad reality is that it is a change of mindset that seems to be needed of the buying public, given the completely random quality of indy productions I fear this will never happen.

Hustling and networking works fine if you want to make other peoples projects, I can't speak for Hollywood ( though not being naive, I have a pretty good idea ) as I am U.K based but it is next to impossible to get an original work greenlit being a no name, like any job, you can't get it till you have experience, catch 22.

Just because it peaks my interest, from a pure idealogical stand point is hustling and networking morally correct if we are talking about the quality of art ?

[Buzz Dixon]

Captain Video, seriously, try making short films with home equipment and uploading 'em on YouTube. Build a rep for yourself so when you approach actors and collaborators ('cuz you're going to need somebody to help lug stuff, set up cameras, etc.) they can look at what you've done and know you are the real deal.

Have an interesting hook (it doesn't need to be outre' or edgy or exploitive, just something that can help your stories stick in people's minds), enter amateur film festival and contests, and just build until you get to the poijt where you can convince people to help you finance a bigger film (and, yeah, 99.99% of indie films need some sort of financing).

If you want to be in the game, ya gotta know the rules and suit up. They won't come to you if you're invisible. Make yourself and your creations known.

[Buzz Dixon]

And you are right on one thing: Try to get as much as you can up front 'cuz the back end comes small and/or late if it comes at all.

[Sean Whitmore]

I view independent films like I view Garage sales

You can find GREAT stuff there if you look there. You find great stuff that you wont find at the MAINSTREAM stores. You may even find a lost Picaso. But for the most part you find Pink Flamingos

I don't tend to buy movies unless I've watched them and don't tend to watch unless they have good word of mouth.

There you go. #1 plus #2 = Me.


SEAN

[Captain_Video]

Captain Video, seriously, try making short films with home equipment and uploading 'em on YouTube. Build a rep for yourself so when you approach actors and collaborators ('cuz you're going to need somebody to help lug stuff, set up cameras, etc.) they can look at what you've done and know you are the real deal.

Have an interesting hook (it doesn't need to be outre' or edgy or exploitive, just something that can help your stories stick in people's minds), enter amateur film festival and contests, and just build until you get to the poijt where you can convince people to help you finance a bigger film (and, yeah, 99.99% of indie films need some sort of financing).

If you want to be in the game, ya gotta know the rules and suit up. They won't come to you if you're invisible. Make yourself and your creations known.

Buzz, thanks a lot for the advice and thoughts it is much appreciated.

I should say that I have had work on productions here in the U.K ( albeit in lowly but great for learning positions ) and that I have done some film festivals and that getting work/corporate finance is not something I personally am interested in any more.

I should be making my first feature soon next say five months ( once schedules are tied up ) and I suppose certainly a degree is venting at the fact that I will almost assuredly neither break even nor make profit and will be languishing in debts for a good few years for chasing an impossible dream. ( this is not relevant to the discussion of course and I only mention it as background, I feel it makes the argument become personal if you mention that you have experienced comics/films/music business and changes the responses, I would never shill the project here as peoples work taints their arguments, for good or ill. )

I was purely trying to discuss the naive idea of totally changing the business, getting it to a position where you do not wait for people to come to you or beg and plead for studio/corporate financing, that film makers set up there own studios, which was the internet dream.

I am trying to find out from people why the well meaning original internet dream has not yet come to fruition and may very well be impossible.

Why has the digital distribution/ independent revolution not happened ?

I love the glory days of MGM and Warner, the second golden age of seventies cinema, I love good blockbusters and cheesey B-movies...but I feel deseperately that it is time to try something new before the businesses buy up the internet too.

But even if every indy film maker out there went it alone ... in you guys ( clearly educated ) opinion would it still fail ?

Thats the thing that really interests me...because obviously I am biased.

Thanks again for the discussion all as I know it is fairly hard going and no easy subject.

[Greg Hatcher]

Why has the digital distribution/ independent revolution not happened ?

You have to bear in mind, Buzz actually has worked in the business. I'm just a magazine guy who reads a lot and has met a lot of folks doing this stuff. So I don't know how seriously you should take what I'm saying.

But speaking as an interested onlooker and consumer, I think it IS happening. You look at media -- not just movies, I mean EVERYTHING, TV, comics, popular music -- and you see this huge sweeping tide of on-demand consumerism changing everything. There's no such thing as 'appointment' television any more, because of TiVo and the DVD boxed set. Likewise, comics are moving from a periodical magazine industry model to a book publishing one. Music is all about downloading to your iPod.

Movies aren't QUITE keeping pace because so far we aren't QUITE at a place where an indie digital distribution piece has the gloss of a major DVD release. But my gut feeling is that we are very, very close, and the guy that figures out how to get ahead of that curve and give indie digital movies the commercial gloss people expect to see will be the next big media billionaire.

Sadly, I'm not smart enough to be that guy. But I know somebody is.

I think your complaint is a lot like the one I had when 2001 got here and there were still no personal jetpacks, or hotels on the moon: the future doesn't look like I thought it would. But if you squint you can see that there is massive, MASSIVE change happening in media. What did people use personal computers for in 1985? How many of those people used a modem at all, let alone to download ENTERTAINMENT? Who knew the internet would become the major component of home entertainment that it is today -- not just of content but also as a delivery system? (Amazon and eBay have had a MAJOR impact on what I buy and when I buy it.) And so on.

The future's here, it's just not what we thought it would be. I think that's the thing that's got you knotted up.

[Captain_Video]

You have to bear in mind, Buzz actually has worked in the business. I'm just a magazine guy who reads a lot and has met a lot of folks doing this stuff. So I don't know how seriously you should take what I'm saying.

But speaking as an interested onlooker and consumer, I think it IS happening. You look at media -- not just movies, I mean EVERYTHING, TV, comics, popular music -- and you see this huge sweeping tide of on-demand consumerism changing everything. There's no such thing as 'appointment' television any more, because of TiVo and the DVD boxed set. Likewise, comics are moving from a periodical magazine industry model to a book publishing one. Music is all about downloading to your iPod.

Movies aren't QUITE keeping pace because so far we aren't QUITE at a place where an indie digital distribution piece has the gloss of a major DVD release. But my gut feeling is that we are very, very close, and the guy that figures out how to get ahead of that curve and give indie digital movies the commercial gloss people expect to see will be the next big media billionaire.

Sadly, I'm not smart enough to be that guy. But I know somebody is.

I think your complaint is a lot like the one I had when 2001 got here and there were still no personal jetpacks, or hotels on the moon: the future doesn't look like I thought it would. But if you squint you can see that there is massive, MASSIVE change happening in media. What did people use personal computers for in 1985? How many of those people used a modem at all, let alone to download ENTERTAINMENT? Who knew the internet would become the major component of home entertainment that it is today -- not just of content but also as a delivery system? (Amazon and eBay have had a MAJOR impact on what I buy and when I buy it.) And so on.

The future's here, it's just not what we thought it would be. I think that's the thing that's got you knotted up.

You are absolutely right in summing up my perspective.

It is exactly like the kid who wakes up in the future and wonders where he can buy his jet pack.

So I suppose my next naive question is "Ok then future, why arent there any jet packs".

But your post is certainly one that makes me happy, it did remind me that it is the future after all.