For indie filmmakers, the trick is finding an audience
In these digital days, anyone can direct. But with hundreds of microbudgeted movies made each year, the competition for exposure is fierce.
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"Theatrical distribution is not viable for most films," says Danielle DiGiacomo, documentary film coordinator for Indiepix. DiGiacomo says low-budget filmmakers often end up losing money on a distribution deal.
Indiepix.net "releases" select movies for "download-to-own"; members burn DVDs from their computers. Filmmakers receive $10 per sale, DiGiacomo says, and are freed from the "full-time job" of promoting their films. Similar indie-friendly download sites include SuperIndieFilms.com, Jaman.com, indieflix.com, and greencine.com.
DiGiacomo was speaking on an IFF Boston panel discussion called "Non-Theatrical Distribution for Filmmakers." Audience members wanted advice: How to build buzz on sites like MySpace.com and YouTube.com, for example. DiGiacomo cited the recent "Four Eyed Monsters" as a film that used podcasts to draw fans in major cities, who in turn lobbied local theaters to book the film.
But some filmmakers, like Allie Humenuk of Cambridge, Mass., find online distribution undesirable. At IFF Boston she premièred "Shadow of the House," her documentary about photographer Abelardo Morello. "Yes, I want it seen by as many people as possible," Humenuk says, but she'd prefer they see her film on the big screen. "The idea of it being played on a small monitor doesn't appeal to me."
"Your market doesn't find you," says Tom Putnam, "you have to find your market." At last year's IFF Boston, Putnam premièred his World War II documentary "Red White Black & Blue." It then played Switzerland's Locarno International FilmFestival. But it was a run at an Alaskan museum that proved to distributors that a market existed.
"The hard part is to get out there and rise above the din of the other films," says Putnam, who lives in Los Angeles. A year later, he finally did. PBS's "Independent Lens" series will screen "Red White Black & Blue" on Veterans Day.
As for "On Broadway," it will play two more small fests, New Jersey's Hoboken and Michigan's Waterfront, this June.
McLaughlin remains confident. Sort of. "I feel that I've made the film we wanted to make. There's nothing to be nervous about," he says.
"You roll the dice, grit your teeth," adds "On Broadway" actress Jill Flint, basking in the film's Boston première, "and let it go."
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