Slashdot Mirror
Film Distribution Comes To The Internet
Dooferlad writes "thisisnotalovesong.com hosts something of a first - a film that is being distributed over the Internet because independent films are being pushed out of the box office by blockbusters. At a time when everything on seems to be a sequel it would be nice to have something original on the silver screen, but unless you live near the 5 cinemas in the UK where this is been shown you will have to do with your own small screen. The film is being distributed in Windows Media format, either streamed or for download. The code you pay for (2 to 3 UK pounds) allows you to watch as many times as you like. The catch for most of you reading is that it is only for people in the UK. More coverage is available from the BBC."
with no Linux or Mac alternatives
If this is the future of film distribution where MS leads (and to hell with the EU antitrust violations
) then ill stick with stealing movies from hollywood in DVDRip.DIVX format
and congrats for buying the marketing for this flick, film distribution has been on the Internet for at least 4 years (IFILM etc)
They need to ditribute this in multiple formats if they want a chance in hell of making this work. It seems that the same people that go to see indy movies are the same people using linux and Mac. So they need to make it available to us.
...and I'd love to put it to some use. I'd pay and download this, even if it's something I don't fully like. I figure supporting this distobution would be the best way to show the industry that it would actually work. ...too bad I'm in the States. There other legal distobutions centers for indie movies out there online?
To write a haiku - all you need is the correct - number of syli...
independent films are being pushed out of the box office by blockbusters
Close, but true independent films are being pushed out of the way to make room for independent (low budget) films aiming to be blockbusters. It's not that art houses are going to be showing Bad Boys II or Freddy vs Jason, but that they would rather show My Big Fat Greek Wedding and Bend It Like Beckham over Gerry and The Secret Lives Of Dentists.
You see, even if it is only 3or 4 euros/dollars for the "token", you have to pay for the download time/bytes.
:P
So, for some that have 56K/ISDN or a broadband connection with traffic limit (my isp makes me pay 50euros month for 2G and 2euros plus for every 100M), it's always cheaper to buy the damn thing.
Same applies to download/buy linux distributions.
But hey... you can always download it at work
Funnily enough, I think you'll probably find that the feeling is reciprocal coming from them - ie you can die, as far as they're concerned.
Not that I'm saying that it's a good thing that it's windows-only - I don't think it is. But just giving you a little free tour in the not-even-close-to-infinite-just-kinda-earth-sized perspective vortex.
Daniel
Carpe Diem
Did anybody understand the trailer? I for one was not left with any idea of what the movie was about. Some guys in a car screaming. Some people get thrown into a barn. Somebody shoots a shotgun. Somebody pushes a boulder. Techno music throughout. What the hell is this about, why would I want to watch it, and what does it have to do (or not to do) with a love song?? I'm not really impressed by the i'm-more-clever-and-hip-than-you trailers that don't give any indication of wtf a movie is about. Especially if they are trying to gain a following in an alternative distribution channel.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Um... I've seen this advertised/discussed in exactly 3 places now: the BBC (yes, the British Broadcasting Corporation), the GLLUG mailing list (that's the Greater London LUG) and here. Of them, I would only consider the BBC one to be an 'official' announcement and they are a British corporation, aiming at a British audience, paid for by the British tax-payer.
The amount of content on this site which is only available or in any way relevent to residents of the US is phenomenal. And that's largely okay, since this is effectively a US site. But you and others who are complaining that this is only available in the UK are only seeing a small example of what we see all the time.
In a more practical sense, I can think of at least three major reasons for the limitation:
Paranoia isn't an infectious condition, it's a way of life
This might be a stupid question, but isn't the quality of the movie going to be pretty crappy? Even on a good internet connection it still takes a long time to download decent quality movies. Why not wait and get the movie on dvd for the same price and a much better qaulity movie.
I could see so many ways this could go bad.
I love my wife!
"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" was no "indy" film. The film studio that made the movie was Sony Pictures Classics, one of the largest and best funded film houses in Asia and a part of the same Sony that is a member of the MPAA. A mere glance at the film should tell you that this was a high-budget feature backed by a large company. Just because something's not made by Hollyhood doesn't mean that it's "indy."
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I very much doubt whether this is legal in the EU. With the internal market directive, you can't really sell something to people from one EU country and not to another (or even charge differently depending on the country).
- -
Help draw the world map of our collective minds.
It was sponsored in part by Microsoft as a vehicle to show off WM9 for theater use.
I must say it was pretty impressive -- the whole movie was projected from one DVD disk (though not the standard DVD compression) through hi-res projectors. It looked great -- the only time I really noticed was on the credits -- thin white text on a black background brings out the compression artifacts.
The cost of a DVD vs. a huge reel of film is substantial -- but the question, in part, is whether theaters will install the pricey projectors...
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
The catch for most of you reading is that it is only for people in the UK.
The real catch is it's Windows Media Player Format.
You are confusing the production entity of a movie and the distributor.
Crouching Tiger was produced by Good Machine International, which (until it was bought out last year to become Focus Features, the indie "arm" of a studio) was an 800 pound gorilla of East Coast indie production. James Schamus -- one of my film professors here at Columbia -- raised financing from smaller companies and private investors worldwide. (Schamus and director Ang Lee discuss the complicated financing on the DVD, in the scenes near the end of the movie in the cave.)
Sony Pictures Classics purchased the film for distribution. They invested money in making duplicate prints, sending them to theaters, and the like. (I'm not totally sure of what the division of labor was, but that's an educated guess.) That does not rob the film of "indie" status. If it did, there would be almost no indie movies at all, since self-distributing your film is a Herculean task almost no one tries to do. What is a threshold for "indie" for you anyway? Was Good Machine small enough or should it have been made by two guys and a Arriflex? (no vituperation intended.)
Personally, I think that the main benefit of the 'net will not be in home-user distribution. Rather, there will be a proliferation of art houses that use satellites to download digitally distributed movies for little distribution cost.
Those prints I mentioned cost a lot. Thousands of dollars to copy the film once and send it to one theater. Smaller distributors make only a few prints and then cycle them around the country, beating them up royally. Big distributors make it up in the economy of scale, but for small ones, those costs could mean a world of difference. Since an exhibitor would also save the cost of getting people to handle and change the reels, it could have four different indies play on a screen over the course of a single day.
That's the promise we should be looking at, in my opinion. Home Internet delivery robs viewers of the whole social aspect of moviegoing, as well as a HUGE amount of quality. Imagine buying a DVD that gave you a 320x200, 15fps image with 22Khz mono sound, not to say those are the specs for this particular movie being premiered.
Awesome idea, I just hope that when more film companies catch on they'll use a format thats multi-platform. (cough) DiVX (cough)