Lance Hammer, winner of 2008’s Best Directing Award at Sundance for his film Ballast, talks about walking away from a distribution deal with IFC on KCRW.com’s The Treatment, hosted by Elvis Mitchell (podcast feed here).
Here’s the excerpt where he talks about it.
Analysis and the whole interview after the jump.
This is basically another brick in the wall for the death of conventional theatrical distribution and Sundance as a film marketplace.
If there’s nothing to gain from a deal, then there’s also nothing to lose. As all of the business models of film and television get worked and reworked over the next few decades, that’s worth remembering. The ability to distribute and produce is completely democratized now. It’s just a matter of how hard you want to work.
Will self-distribution ever pay as well as making a blockbuster? Probably not, but if you play your cards right you can more than break even and probably even make a decent living wage. But it’s an all consuming situation where you will be the only person that cares that much about the project.
I had drinks with a couple of other new media poneers last night. And we talked about Roger Corman and his model, I was thinking his pattern budgets were under $100k, but my friend who comes from the theatrical world said the budgets were $500k and they tried to a Million off of each one.
We are still waiting for the Corman of the New Media age. Someone who can make a film with a decent enough budget to have scope and scale, but also have the cast and crew get paid. And then has enough savvy to sell the film both online and then to overseas markets to make a profit. I could also see adding in touring as a big component of the theatrical experience.
Click on the player below to listen to the whole interview with Lance Hammer.
5 Comments
November 15, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Kent –
I agree that new media needs another Roger Corman that can take the tools and create a ton of content that can be sold…
Where we diverge is the idea that “production value” is a function of budget – in fact this flies in the face of what Corman has always done. The idea is always to get the biggest look for the budget you have, not the budget you desire to have. Production value is always a function of design and creativity.
I have made a couple of these $100K movies you speak of and they have done quite well for the distributor (making back at least 5x the budget). They can be done, and crew can get paid on them. Again a function of design and creativity. Get the most bang for the buck.
And one thing we can all do to help make sure that the media we create is “sellable” is to declare a moratorium on the whole “breaking the fourth wall” / webcam view… while I understand this is a Ninja and LonelyGirl staple, a lot of people have come after you and killed it. I hate the fact that Rosario Dawson addresses the camera in Gemini Division in order to move the narrative…
November 28, 2008 at 10:04 am
[...] Kent Nichols While you’re there listen to the interview of Lance Hammer. [...]
December 20, 2008 at 11:35 pm
[...] yes deals are crappy right now, that’s why we’re seeing things like a Sundance darling turning down a conventional distribution deal. (But my filmmaking books all talk about crappy deals for first timers even during the [...]
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[...] Kent Nichols While you’re there listen to the interview of Lance Hammer. [...]
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