We Are Releasing Our Movies Wrong
Time to rethink the what and the when -- The INVISIBLE NATION Distribution / NonDē CaseStudy begins!
Well, not me… not anymore.
You know how you fell into the routine of doing it one way, but know there is another way, and that other way might very well be the better way? But that is track you are running on, and trains don’t change direction much fast than giant ships do. Even when it is on single human scale, that shit ain’t easy to redirect.
Like, when you heard the big news that we figured out a no-mess method to get the seeds out of the pomegranate, did you at least give it a try? Okay that one didn’t really work, but how about the one on opening cans? Or tying your laces? I’ll share the list of oh-so-many things you are doing wrong one day, but I think you get the picture.
We do a lot one way, even when there is a better way to do them. Which is certainly the case of film and even more so those in SC-Indie, doc, micro, and aesthetically bold world.
It would be one thing, if we experimented regularly, even if we were still holding onto the traditional way — generally speaking — but that hypothesis-testing practice doesn’t go on. And that is the slow way. Forget about changing our ways very rapidly.
Is it cowardice? It is something more than just fear and weakness, because people KNOW the old ways will fail them but they stay at it. I get those that are employed by the process. It is hard for them to give up old mechanisms for something new because they need that paycheck to feed the bambinos. Or they just need the job security so why stick their neck out?
But what about the filmmakers? The ones that put so much heart and sweat and labor into the film. They have all their chips on black and the roulette wheel has moved onto a whole other color spectrum. They know there is no one that is going to pick up their film and make it work. They know they should have raised marketing funds when they raised production funds, but how the hell were they going to do that when it was so hard to get what they did? Unless everyone changes, no one really will change. Unless the industry wisens up, the participants in it won’t be forced to.
The Better World is within our reach but we stay stuck in our habits. That’s also commonly referred to as “being in a rut”. And I am not even touching the whopping number of inherent biases that infect our thinking (or really it’s “processing” —not thinking — because if we thought about it, we wouldn’t do it).
Anyways, what am I doing talking about life? That’s not what you subscribed for. This is supposed to be about movies, right? The art, the creation, the business! Pardon me, let’s resume our regular programming; shall we?
If we want our films to succeed, we would do well to change our release patterns, and nowhere is this more true than in the documentary world. Docs are our canaries in the coal mines. They point regularly to better practices and the benefits that come from them. They pave the way for the rest of the industry. And they are one of four different frontlines showing us what is now coming in the distribution field. I am going to out line all three in an upcoming post.
My favorite such example of docs being the leaders is the field is the reason why documentaries have long held more proportional gender representation in the directorial class. It shows how having a more challenging financial situation can build new and better practices. Docs have long required staged financing. Investors demand a proof of concept. The filmmakers most often have to put it together piecemeal. As frustrating as it is, the money comes together because the movie is likely to work. The financiers aren’t dependent on someone speaking knowingly about something they know little about. Investment isn’t shaped by arrogance or confidence. When you need to say what you will do and do what you say, do you know what happens? You have equal gender representation in the directing ranks — like you do in the documentary field.
Documentaries will also be the innovators in film distribution by exploring new release windows and methods.
Primarily this is going to come through the exploration and refinement of both Slow releases and Dynamic releases, and I am going to go deeper on each of these in subsequent posts. In looking at the attributes of each of these release strategies, I see seven — yes, count them: seven — “windows” within the traditional theatrical release window alone. And I am going to give you a stand-alone individual post on the collective seven windows too. Today though I want to raise something else. Those seven are for your FINISHED film. What about windows BEFORE you have locked picture and sound? They exist and you need to use them.
