It's not that we make too many movies... it's that we try to distribute them in cookie-cutter fashion.
There is no way that one size -- or even five -- could ever have fit all.
We distribute most movies wrong — but that is because of several larger problems. We’ve discussed one of them earlier this week; let’s look at another now, okay?
Although each movie requires a custom fit of distribution, even a slightly more considered fit for each type of film release would be a huge step forward from what he have now. But why do we keep relying on such a limited set of patterns?
When we talk about “distribution” it is still based on the antiquated concept of media and territorial sequencing that got fine tuned in the nineties but we now graft on top of it some of the opportunities that the global streaming platforms have generated. It’s nowhere near the only model we could have though, and if we’d designed a few more, we’d increase both our capacity for releases and our audience base for each film.
We think of theatrical as the launch of most movie releases. For smaller and more artful films, theatrical is generally limited to just the festival side of things. “Play that and those, and then get it up and out on the net.” The logic is that some movies don’t get the critical love to warrant going beyond this stage; some titles are deemed non-commercial and stop there, but… This is just lazy and there are multiple solutions.
Generally, in These-Still-United States, we have three basic sizes after the festival fit: small, medium, and large.
Small is the arthouse release, and although they will generally pick up some chains, this is for films that are expected to under $5M at the box office — if they should be so lucky.
Medium could be a thing of the past, but it was a healthy mix of the chains and arthouse and types of audiences. When there was a regular business in $50M grossing films this was a go-to.
After that we get to that which is driven by the chains and plays on thousands of screens. The fact our studios no longer make enough films to fill these theaters does create some interesting opportunities — and risks. What worked for TERRIFIER 3, did not translate for either DIE MY LOVE or CHRISTY, despite having Jennifer Lawrence and Sydney Sweeney over Art The Clown. Not every film could or should open on 2000 screens, even if they can.
After the theatrical side of things, it then becomes all about the windows. “Windows” being the time the film moves from one form of media to the next. Windows are primarily a necessity for studio films — but we speak of them for all films, and many of the specialized distributors follow the studio model — not because they work, but because that’s easy.
If you’ve been reading this newsletter for awhile, you likely know I am a fan of a long theatrical window. But it is not a one size fits all model.
There is a lot of innovation to be done by adjusting windows in a variety of manners. That is where some of the special sauce is that will transform our industry into something better.. We need to add some new flavors and that’s what I most want to get into today.
For the uninitiated on the studio model though, the window for how long before a film hits the first pay window —usually now premium video on demand — depends on whether the studio involved is trying to maximize downstream revenue. Most agree on a minimum of 45 days of exclusivity is needed (unless you don’t believe in the film that is). Films are often given 15-30 days on the TVOD window before hitting streaming, but sometimes it will take 90-120 days.
Sony Chief Tom Rothman, a man I am indebted to for helping to make the careers of two of the directors I worked with earlier in my journey (Ang Lee and Edward Burns), had a great opinion piece recently in the NY Times about theatrical windows you should read. He’s right.
I like to think of all the studio and specialized films as general audience films. And yes that is where most of the business is and where most of the money is to be made. And that is to whom I think the typical windowing applies best to. I don’t think we have much more capacity with general audience films. We aren’t going to grow that market. But it isn’t the only business or money to be made or had.
The last decent opportunity to increase supply and audience capacity for general audience films is to abandon the award season overload. This industry puts all the prestige films out at the same time. If you are audiences like me who see 250 films in a year, it’s wonderful and I see them all; but for average human beings, one might do better by spreading the goods across the calendar. A good experience at the theater leads to more experiences at the theater after all. When do people increase their movie going? Whenever they recently enjoyed going to movies last! Why train these prestige-loving film goers to limit their attendance to between mid-September and March? Makes no sense, but here we are.
We have a fifth model (after festival launch and the general audience S,M,L) that often includes many of the first model (festival) films too. I call it the spaghetti model, where people still throw it against the wall and hope that it sticks.
These are films that are generally just dumped. Some of these can become streaming premieres, and there is more of a business there than we currently want to make of it (but we will save that for another post). But most films in this category are just trying to catch audiences’ attention with a thumbnail of a star and provocative title. These films might have a S-size model launch for a bit of awareness or to qualify contractually, but make no mistake these are dumped films that are launched and abandoned.
Those are all what Ami Vora has labeled “checklist distribution”. This unfortunately is what most were groomed to accept. And not only does it not suffice for most non-studio films, but our prior acceptance of it is leaving far too big of an opportunity undeveloped. The design of our distribution system distorts our perception and leads us too foolishly believe we have too many films, too many filmmakers, and not enough distributors.
We have enough of everything… except those that want to do things in a better way.
Our industry has never built an audience-centric distribution system. It is not only that we tried to make five sizes cover the waterfront, we looked at it as just “an audience”, as opposed to the wide assortment of movie-loving people who are out there and generally being left unsatisfied. Fixing that will be much of the work of the next era, but it will be the main cog in increasing capacity for work to be released. A wider audience desiring a wider array of films is waiting and wanting — and it is made up of manymanymany smaller audiences tired of being ignored.
Want me to tell you how it is going to be built? Let’s go! Read on, friends, read on.
