In the old days, the model of film acquisitions meant that you would give up your film to a distributor for years at a time, in exchange a cash advance and a back-end percentage. You would then move on to your next project and the distributor would send you a quarterly statement. This film acquisitions [...]
Rae Dawn Chong is an actor, writer and producer. As the eldest daughter of comedian Tommy Chong, she started acting at age 12 appearing in Disney’s “Whiz Kids of Riverton.” Years later she is still making movies appearing in the Duplass brothers film “Jeff who lives at home” which also starred Susan Sarandon and Jason [...]
When filmmakers talk about a movie release window, they are describing the time between a theatrical run, a TV broadcast and a DVD release. And as a filmmaker, planning a “Release Window” strategy is essential. But what worked in the old days for studio releases is not applicable to small indie films. Why? Because video [...]
Do you remember the old days when you would see a movie in the theater and then wait months for the movie to come out on video? This is an example of a release window. Windows worked for major motion pictures because they put millions behind marketing. And in some cases, having a theatrical release [...]
There are a lot of filmmakers that tell you it is NOT okay to sell directly to your movie fans. The reason for this is based in our industry-wide belief that we must follow traditional release windows, or miss opportunity. “I’m going to do festivals. Then I’ll hopefully negotiate theatrical. Then I’d like to focus [...]
The other day, I found myself in a huge Facebook debate about the importance of building your own audience. Despite the fact that the entire world of movie distribution is shifting away from a physical product and people are now watching movies on their small devices – there are still some fuddy-duddies who believe that [...]
