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What to Consider When Distributing a Film
If you do not know already, Pete Jones's "Stolen Summer" will be released in theatres on Friday, March 22nd. The decision did not come easily, as the "release date" has been moved a few times in the last several months.
"Stolen Summer" will have a limited release, meaning it will initially go out to four major U.S. cities: Los Angeles, New York, Boston, and Chicago, Pete's hometown. In each of the four cities, it can be expected that the movie will play in a handful of theatres.
It doesn't take a studio head to determine that "Stolen Summer" is not bound for blockbuster status, that used-to-be-more-exclusive-than-it-is-now club of films that hit the $100 million box office number. That is usually reserved for those films that have the names Cruise or Roberts above the title, and open to 4,000 screens.
Movies' hitting the $100 million plateau is happening more and more these days, but don't think it's because movies are any better. Don't forget, "The General's Daughter" is part of that club. Revenue and quality are not always directly proportional.
So, are the Miramax honchos conceding that "Stolen Summer" is not destined for box office gold? It's not that simple. But Pete's movie is a low-budget feature, and cost cutting trickles down to marketing and distribution.
So how does distribution work?
The short answer is that there is no set formula. Distribution is about making your film available to your audience. It goes hand in hand with marketing a film. If marketing is about striking an emotional chord with a certain demographic, distribution is about physically reaching that demographic in their neighborhoods, in their theatres.
There are huge costs to opening a film with Godzilla-like numbers. Remember, "Godzilla" opened on over 6,000 screens. That means 6,000 film prints have to be made and shipped to exhibitors all over the country. Film prints alone are estimated to cost a studio between $1500 and $2,000 per print.
Bottom line: A studio needs to be confident that they can return that $2,000 from every screen they send a film print to. Understandably, Miramax is hedging by limiting the number of screens to which they send "Stolen Summer." The benefit of a low-budget film is that its break-even point is considerably lower.
Wide release does not equate success. Studios are looking to make a return on their investment. In the case of say a "Godzilla," a $100 million budgeted film, it might take $150 million or more in box office receipts to please Sony, depending on the additional costs of prints and advertising. If "Stolen Summer" makes two percent of that, Miramax will be overjoyed. Output must exceed input, regardless of scale.
Releasing and distributing films is a juggling act. There are studios in town that will sign up as many theatres as will take a film, employing the theory of throwing noodles against the wall and hoping that at least some stick. Others are more cautious.
Typically, studio films are developed, produced, and distributed in-house. Back in the day, studios were also the exhibitors, meaning they also owned the theatres in which the films were shown. Nowadays, studios must negotiate with theatre owners to have their films played.
Independent films are those that are made without the one stop shopping benefits of a studio. Many films are made, but never find distribution, and merely end up collecting dust in someone's basement. The lucky ones get acquired by a distributor, and are put into one or several or thousands of theatres, so you and I can pay $9 to see it.
While distribution does have trends, there are more exceptions than rules. "Small" films can make it to thousands of screens, and big movies can peter out in just a handful of theatres. Remember "Four Weddings and a Funeral"? Small British film, Mike Newell-directed. Small audience, right? Well, more and more people were showing up for this movie, and before long, the studio had "Four Weddings" on several thousand screens because the demand was there.
While "Stolen Summer" will enter the market in a limited release, it will expand to more cities as the weeks go on. This is what is known as a platform release. Studios are likely to send the same set of prints around to different cities, so as to not incur huge print costs up front. Now, if a theatre owner in Boston finds that they want to keep their print longer, and the print can no longer travel to Philadelphia, Miramax will happily send a new print to Philly. This is an uptown problem. Before long, you have audiences flocking to thousands of screens all over the country to see "Stolen Summer," and Pete Jones is the man.
Distribution is more than sending film reels out to "x" number of theatres around the country. Now more than ever, distributors have more to consider. With the latest trend in movie-going turning toward "presentation value," distributors must be mindful of where audiences are going to see movies as much as what they are going to see. The influx of megaplexes, stadium-seating with built-in drink holders, huge screens, state-of-the-art sound systems, and easy parking have allowed audiences to enjoy the movie-watching experience like never before.
Audiences are choosing their movies based on the free-parking-next-to-Banana Republic-and-we-can-eat-dinner-next-door-afterward factor more and more. As a result, distributors must be mindful of that.
To be sure, there is still something romantic about the neighborhood theatre around the corner that has the same décor as when it was built in the 1970's. But theatre ownership belongs more and more to chains that deliver reasons beyond what is on the screen to ensure audience turnout.
A lot of distribution is knowing your movie, understanding its audience, and having a realistic grasp on the expectations of a film. The "Lords of the Rings" and "Episode II's" of Hollywood are meant to be seen on huge screens with huge sound. And it certainly doesn't take a lot of poll tracking to know that people are already lined up to see the next "Star Wars" installment.
In the same way, it is understood that an art-house film or a Woody Allen movie will not do $100 million, and probably shouldn't go out to 3,000 screens. Foreign films are not usually widely released, because the distributors take a realistic view of the audience demand.
More and more, studios will hope for a successful "front end" to a release, where they hype the movie in the weeks leading up to its release date, and it does $30 million in its opening weekend at the box office. And two weeks later, when word of mouth hits that "Vanilla Sky" is Cameron Crowe's worst movie yet, the studio is already laughing their way to the bank, and well on their way to $100 million.
Very few movies hit "Gladiator" or "Sixth Sense" mode, where audience response is overwhelming, and studios negotiate and renegotiate with theatres to keep those prints running. Both movies started out strong, and stayed strong for months and months, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.
Don't be fooled. This is not to take anything away from art-house fare, those movies with a more select audience and often a breath of fresh air from the formulaic Hollywood trend of mediocrity. "Smaller" movies can be huge moneymakers for studios, as positive word of mouth sells tickets, and the movie undoubtedly has a significantly lower break-even point than larger budget films.
Lucky for Pete Jones and "Stolen Summer," Miramax Films wrote the book on maximizing profit out of smaller movies, making quality films for people with good taste. There is little doubt that Pete's movie will pay for its prints in those four cities. After that, it is up to the audience to decide the ultimate box office fate of "Stolen Summer."
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