One of my favourite filmmakers and bloggers is Ted Hope. I have been a lurker – stunningly mesmerized by his career as a filmmaker since he set up shop with James Schamus and created New York’s Good Machine away back in 1991 – the year before I started Raindance. Ted’s Good Machine launched most of the major indie careers: those of Ang Lee (The Ice Storm), Hal Hartley’s Flirt and over a hundred others.
Today I was contemplating the future of Raindance, as I often do, and the future of independent film-making, when I stumbled across yet another of Ted’s brilliant posts: 15 Predictions of the Future of Indie Film.
What is interesting about Ted’s list is that five of his fifteen relate directly to possibilities created by the advances in digital innovation. Specifically, Ted talks succinctly about Multi-territorial Short Term Limited Platform Licensing, Customized Positive Ratings For Films, Immersive Cinema, Dynamic Pricing, Filmmakers Will Start To Share Data.
Eight of the remaining ten predictions are thought pieces, of which are three I want to highlight the most: that some indie filmmaker is going to make a killing on self-distribution, soon all filmmakers are going to be talking about ‘priming’, and finally, enrollment in film schools will start dropping (making our postgraduate film degree much more relevant).
What does this mean? It means you have a lot of F**King homework to do – and there isn’t a better way to shortcut the process than by reading Ted Hope’s 15 Predictions of the Future of Indie Film.
Now for my two cents? What has Ted missed?
Firstly, we are going to be seeing a lot more of live event cinema. Whether it is Wimbledon on screen in a multiplex, with artificial turf and ushers selling strawberries and ice cream – as they have done the past two years at the VUE Piccadilly (the home of the Raindance Film Festival); or Opera from Covent Garden, event cinema is here to stay. Companies like London’s Secret Cinema prove weekend after weekend that people will pay a premium to get dressed up and go and see a film if it is marketed enough.
Secondly, as film exhibition margins get shaved thinner and thinner, I predict that more exhibitors will move into film production, and literally cut out the middlemen of sales agents and distributors. This means that the 50 seat cinema in their multiplexes can be filled with independent film – the films that we all know we can make cost effectively. And it’s here that I would challenge Ted to a debate: Theatrical distribution still has a huge place, and online and so-called ‘self-distribution’ is merely the hand-maiden of the good ol’ Friday Night at the Movies.
Have you read Ted’s article yet? If you are even semi-serious about cinema and film-making you better, right now, right here.
Of course there is a comments box below:
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Photo Credit: Bertie Watson
I founded Raindance Film Festival in 1993 because the British film industry was closed, polite, and congratulating itself while shutting new filmmakers out.
I co-founded the British Independent Film Awards in 1998 because British indie film deserved more than a shrug, a pat on the head, and a Tuesday night screening.
Raindance didn’t start as a brand. It started as a rebellion: film training without gatekeepers, a festival without permission, and a community built by filmmakers who weren’t waiting to be invited in.
Later, we took it global: Toronto, Vancouver, New York, LA, Berlin, and Brussels, because independent film doesn’t belong to one city, one class, or one accent.
I’ve produced 700+ short films and seven features, including Deadly Virtues (2014) and ALICE, which won the SXSW Grand Jury Prize (2019) not because someone “discovered” us, but because the work earned its place.
I’ve written three books used by filmmakers worldwide because too many courses taught compliance instead of survival.
In 2009, I was awarded a PhD for services to film education, ironic, given that most of my career has been about tearing down the rules that education insisted you follow.
I don’t believe in waiting for permission.I believe in making work, building systems, and forcing the industry to catch up.
Specialties: Independent Film (the real kind) · Producing · Writing · Film Education · Festivals · Breaking Broken Systems
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