With past stories of success such as “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” which cost $5 million to make but grossed more than $368 million worldwide, it is not surprising that many aspiring filmmakers are opting to finance their own films or find other independent production companies.
But the growing popularity of independent films in the market has a price: Due to increased marketing and other postproduction costs, films often need to earn more than triple their original budgets to break even.
“What filmmakers don’t realize when you have a film that has a name like Alex Baldwin, even though they agree to a lower pay rate, the filmmaker still has to pay the going SAG rate,” said Vince Di Pierro, a former Warner Bros. executive and founder of Indieroad.net. “If they use music, they have to pay for the rights when showing it at a film festival. When their movie, which they made for $200,000, turns its first $1 million, they think they made a huge profit. Not really: All the other agencies will come back to them and say, “˜Excuse me, you owe me money.'”
The honor of being selected for a prestigious film festival such as Sundance or Cannes often has a huge price tag for independent filmmakers.
In her “Overview of Contemporary Film and Television” class, Professor Denise Mann talks about how filmmakers are not only responsible for getting themselves and the film to the festival, but they also need to pay to create 35mm subtitled prints with dubbed language tracks.
“What most people don’t realize is if you make it into a film festival, you’ve already won ““ it’s a huge competition,” Di Pierro said. “What was upsetting to me is that out of 100 films, only 10 films would get an award. What would happen to the rest of them?”
The largest source of pressure at film festivals seems to come not from the judging committee, but from the competition to find independent financiers and companies to distribute the film without wanting to change it too much to fit their corporate interests.
“If you are contacting a Lionsgate or small indie label, you are going to have a tough time trying to get them to answer your calls,” said Tim Clark, an employee of a software company that recently wrote and produced his first independent short film, “Hair of the Dog.” “They don’t look at the stuff creatively, they just look at it as product.”
Changing technology, however, has led to the growing popularity of a new distribution method: streaming and downloading films online.
Recently, Di Pierro partnered with other film industry executives to create Indieroad.net, which is being described as iTunes for the independent film market.
“I thought, “˜Wouldn’t it be great to get these films on the Internet and share the revenue with the filmmaker?’ which is what we’ve done,” Di Pierro said. “The independent filmmaker has very little ability to get out into the public eye. They could be the next Spielberg, or Soderbergh; they are going to be the people who replace these guys.”
Instead of showcasing the independent films in limited release in theaters, Indieroad.net allows people to download the films for a price between 80 cents and $2, depending on the length of the film.
“If you get a distribution deal, it will be released at Wal-Mart or Blockbuster, but it’s going to get buried,” Clark said. “No one is going to pick it up unless you have some extra marketing behind it. Now all you have to do is send your friends and family a link to where your movie is, and they can check it out for a couple bucks.”
After facing difficulties finding a distribution company for his film, Clark decided to work with Indieroad.net after a friend suggested the site to him.
“My movie is only 45 minutes, so you could imagine the trouble of trying to get a DVD release for it,” Clark said. “Even though I have a 60-minute making-of documentary with it, it wasn’t sellable even though (distribution companies) said they really loved the movie.”
Clark is now the featured filmmaker on the Web site, and he has no reservations about choosing the online distribution method for getting his film out.
“At this point, when you are trying to make a name for yourself, it is huge thrill to get your product out there in a professional format with a company like Indie Road, which has Hollywood veterans behind the thing,” Clark said.
However, Di Pierro isn’t outright banning the idea of having an actual theater release for the films on his site.
“We have industry experience, so we have the contacts,” Di Pierro said. “We can always get someone that distribution deal if we find that on our site the film is getting 100,000 hits a week. I’m going to go to Warners and tell them this film has potential.”
Although Clark believes that people will never make the switch to watch films solely online, he said that he believes more and more people will look to the Internet for the newest in independent film.
“People are going online now, and it’s sticking,” Clark said. “More and more content online is now migrating to people’s TV ““ downloading content onto their computer and putting it on their TV. The online component gives instant gratification.”