The Future of Indie Film

roxics

roxics

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The internet has its positives and negatives. On the plus side, it connects us all together so we can have conversations like these and gives us access to a whole variety of new information. On the negative side, it increased the amount of competition we are faced with as there is only so much time in a persons day and a lot of things vying for their attention. We're not just competing with other indie films these days, we're competting with facebook, twitter, youtube, video games that are cinematic experiences themself. Plus there is an increase in the amount of indie films being made, especially if you loosen your definition of "indie film" to includes everything from vine videos to youtube skits.

People are consuming their content differently today. Even on a busy day in my local video store, it is nowhere near as crowded as I remember even at the turn of the century. The result of all of this I think has devalued films. When you pay $8 a month for netflix and have thousands of movies to chose from, suddenly a $15-20 DVD/blu-ray is too expensive. Even though wehn you compare it to the price of a two movie theater tickets, it's bargin, especially since you own it. But there is a difference between seeing it in the theater versus just watching it home. The theater is an experience, even if not always a great one.

I don't know what any of the real numbers are, but I suspect that indie films these days are not making a great profit (if any) off of VOD (video on demand) services like netflix, amazon and so on.

Back when I was growing up I heard about and saw all these break out indie films like Evil Dead, Clerks, Reservoir Dogs, El Mariachi, the list goes on. These days, I don't. It's like they don't exist anymore. But in a way it makes sense because there is also an entire group of films released every year with bigger budgets and name stars that I don't even hear about until months or even years after they're on DVD. I find myself saying "where did this come from?" I didn't se any trailers for it and I didn't even hear about it being made. So with movies like those flying below the radar, it's no wonder I'm not seeing any break out indie films made on micro budgets with no name actors.

So where does this leave us indie filmmakers who don't have access to $100K+ budgets and name actors? It seems like Hollywood will continue to do ok so long as it continues to push out massive budget tentpole movies to chain multiplexes every year. But all of this attention for eyeballs has affected us indies more. Making it harder for us to get movies seen, even if it's made it easier for us to get them made.

So what is the solution? Is there a revolution or new renaissance coming for indie films or has the state of things changed so much the indie film is no longer a viable thing?

I have some ideas based on an epiphany I recently had.
Some friends and I made a series of films back in 2000. These were impromptu comedy films that in truth are not very good. At least from a conventional perspective. From an unconventional perspective they are great. We've never put these movies online or given out discs of them. In fact only two or three of us have a disc copy of them. So every so many years, we'll all get together at a party, have a few drinks and put them on. It's always a blast. Anybody who is new to the group at that time will be seeing them for the first time but they're in the right environment to see them. If we had just sent them a link or a disc to watch them on their own they would no doubt say something like "WTF is this crap?" Environment matters. Some movies are just as much about the experience and the people you're with when you see them as they are about the movie itself. This spawned my epiphany. Maybe we as indie filmmakers houdl stop consentrating on trying to get our movies distributed in the older conventional style by just pushing the out there for anyone to see. Maybe we need to start turning our movies into events and make that the only way to see them for a number of years.

This is by no means a new idea. This is often how indie films were seen in the past before home video. You would go to an indie arthouse style theater and watch the movie with a group of others. But today there is no insentive to go to those kind of showings when you know you can just download the movie online or watch it on DVD or VOD. So filmmakers will do a premiere and then push the movie out to as many formats as possible to get it seen. But there was only a window of time of about 25 years where that actually worked well, these days it may be hurting your indie film more than helping it.

What if instead you went on tour with your movie (again this is nothing new) in much the same way a band tours the country playing live shows. Where there is no way to see the movie other than one of these showings. Again, the whole world doesn't need to see your movie and they probably won't, even if you get worldwide distribution. Once it's out there in that magnatude, the hype dies. It's no longer a special event. It doesn't have that exclusive club persona to it anymore where only certain people are going to get in and get to see it.

I don't know if this is a good solution. But it's one idea. I'd be interested in hearing other ideas about how you think we might change the state of indie film going forward.
 
I believe that the future of "marketable" indies will be documentaries. That is the only level playing field left. Of course, the important thing for all of us is to continue doing what you did...make the films that we want to make and that interest us. But narrative film lottery winners are becoming less and less these days.
 
I too have thought about theater-only presentation, roxics. A friend of mine rented out Alamo Drafthouse for a few screenings of his indie movie. He was able to fill the theaters, but he was exceptional at networking. Even with his social skills, I imagine it would be hard to make a living this way. Even so, I think your idea has merit and may be the right fit for some movies.

I have pondered this subject now and again. It's really hard to pin down any concrete answers, at least that apply to everybody. First, you might say, before you start deciding on how to show your film, you first must decide how much money you need to bring in to make it sustainable. But even then the figures can vary widely. Do you want to make a decent middle class living, doing just this? And if so, what size crew do you need, and do they need to make a decent middle-class living? Or do you want to spend just a few weeks a year doing it? And do you just need a crew of volunteers for those few weeks? Arthouse indie in regular locations? Or something with more "production value": crowds, special effects, recognized names?
 
IMO, the indie film maker cannot compete with Jenna Marbles and Pewdiepie. Their production costs are practically zero, and they make a lot of money on youtube. the popular ones jump to mainstream TV. Pewdiepie was recently on South Park.

Before the internet and cable your choices for entertainment were limited. You might spend some money on a DVD if you'd already seen the big movies at the Theater, or at least Blockbuster would buy your straight to video production, and then there was foreign distribution as well.

Now, indie movies can't make back their budget to produce a movie even if they get a netflix deal because the pay is peanuts per view.

I think if you want to make low/no budget narrative movies you pretty much have to accept that chances of making your budget back today are close to zero since you are competing with mainstream hollywood, a billion cable channels, video games, people falling down, laughing babies, and pewdiepie.

your best bet is film festivals. your audience is not really VoD IMO, most of those people are looking at Transformers or something. But the Film Festival audience wants an experience, something outside the mainstream, something on the big screen. They are open to the low/no budget film and very entertained by it and the experience of watching it with other people that like the same thing.

Paying entrance fees to film festivals gets expensive and the festivals make money off of the film makers just as much as the audience. But it's a lot of fun to see an audience watch your film and appreciate it.
 
I think you have hit it, roxics. The communal experience is the key. As others have suggested, it's going to be hard to make a middle-class income doing this, but that probably did not happen even back in that 25-year glory period. My reason for making narrative films is that I can't find anything commercial I want to see - so I have to make it myself. Money is not the primary reason. The tour idea is appealing, because you don't get burned out like musicians do, playing the same thing every night for 40 weeks. It might even make sense to buy your own projector and rent small venues rather than going for one screen at the local multiplex. Thanks for waking us up.
 
I suggest everyone here read Ted Hope's new book HOPE FOR FILM. Excellent book that goes into this subject. Ted's blog is also a huge source of information and he's not just some guy saying things...he's produced a ton of stuff.
 
@roxics

I was thinking the same thing. The 'Dave Matthews' model always struck me as an alternative to the 'link' to my work model. Dave Matthews toured and performed a lot in college towns, or so the legend goes. College students.

Dave Matthews is a good performer, so the same goes for films, if they are not good, then they won't go anywhere. I have been to several small film venues, and they were really bad. But I think the way you and your friends created an environment, where the viewer had some ownership or connection to the material trough a relationship and being embraced by the group is good. So, it would all be a personal venture. And if you feel you have something fun or important, it may just catch enough people to keep it going.
 
KyleProhaska said:
I suggest everyone here read Ted Hope's new book HOPE FOR FILM. Excellent book that goes into this subject. Ted's blog is also a huge source of information and he's not just some guy saying things...he's produced a ton of stuff.
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+1

Another book dealing with this subject is "think outside the box office" by Jon Reiss.
 
combatentropy said:
I too have thought about theater-only presentation, roxics. A friend of mine rented out Alamo Drafthouse for a few screenings of his indie movie. He was able to fill the theaters, but he was exceptional at networking. Even with his social skills, I imagine it would be hard to make a living this way. Even so, I think your idea has merit and may be the right fit for some movies.
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Good luck! Would love it if this were commonly possible.

There are many gigantic issues with trying to do this as a business model. First and foremost, since the early days of film, the larger studios have kept smaller indie films from getting theatrical releases by threatening to pull their studio films if the theater plays indie films. It's not hard to get a premiere or a couple screenings, but once you grow bigger than that, the pressure is put on by the studios to keep you from entering their competitive domain.

Most of the indie world will live on VoD, through the web. Any indie films with even limited release is typically due to being bought by an indie seeking division of a major studio... Think Fox Searchlight or something similar.

VoD, has a nasty stigma to it... as it was commonly a graveyard for terrible sequels churned out and not good enough for theatrical release. Think straight-to-video. But now-a-days, with Netflix, HBO-go and other VoD services streaming directly to our 40"+ home theater systems, it's actually quite decent, so long as you aren't extorted and abused by those services.

The theater is in decline. I believe theater ticket sales peaked in 2002 or 2003. Only the spectacle of 3D, IMAX, and otherwise larger presentations of epic scope is keeping it alive. Maybe, in the future, these smaller high-end theaters will survive and will show smaller indie features, as 'art house' theaters do now, but speaking about the theater system as a whole, it's in decline and still very much under the studio grasp. An indie film getting any sort of larger release in theaters will be almost impossible without being picked up by a larger player.
 
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I love the idea of the projector and a screen and putting up your film for a special event. There's a group in Brooklyn, Rooftop films that do that. What a great treat to have a night like that.

I do think, however that it's not a sustainable business model but could be a wonderful way of building interest and getting folks to see it. I think, I hope at least, that the venue is the TV through VOD. I like watching movies on my TV and I really like that people can see my movie on their TV through the Roku or whatever they use to stream. Streaming is the way, I think, however that shakes out and however you can get your movie seen that way, will be the way for indies. Plus, it opens up a world that could welcome indie series.. .not there yet but I'm hopeful for indie long form too.

I was in a couple of indies that four walled for interest. They did great in festivals, but the real distribution came from Vod sales and rentals on Amazon and iTunes. That's the future. it's not bad and the systems are good for watching them.
 
http://www.hollywoodmobmov.com/

Mobmov stands for MObile Movie. You project your movie on a wall, people drive up to the wall to watch it, and you broadcast the sound with a cheap FM transmitter so people can tune in with their car radios. This sounds like a fun way to promote your movie.
 
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