Filmmakers spend a lot of time leading up to the making of a film - development, pre-production, production and then....release. Play a fest, flirt with a distributor, find one who takes it out for you, because your job is finished. Filmmaker is done and on to the next show. Getting the film in some fests is the filmmaker’s release.The distributor follows this same male climax pattern. Lots of attention is paid to building a campaign, taking it to market, woo-ing audiences. Once the audience comes to see the show, be it in theaters, DVD or VOD - distributor is done. Wham bam thank you ma’am.
I love the message here. I've been a little disappointed to see so much focus on box office in the media when most of the revenue from any film – especially an independent one – comes from post-theatrical sales. It's true that DVD sales are dropping and no one's quite sure how to make up that revenue, but clearly there's more to a film's release than just how well it does at the box office. Brian Newman's article is a good starting point for a discussion of these ideas.
