Edward Burns on 'Newlyweds' and the Future of Indie Filmmaking - The Moviefone Blog

via blog.moviefone.com

Excerpt from Christopher Rosen's interview with Edward Burns:

"MF: You have been a champion of VOD in recent years -- do you really think that's the future of independent film?

EB: Two things that I just heard. Comcast is about to release something that says in the last 12 months, indie film viewership on VOD has jumped 75 percent. So, that tells me the message we've been preaching for the last couple of the years ... people get it. That the audience is there. They are in their living room. They used to go to the art-house theater. It isn't that they're not interested in these stories anymore, they just aren't interested in shlepping out and paying the extra bucks when they have a nice system at home. I absolutely think it's the future -- especially for the smaller independents. Because you can get out there and with a very small marketing budget. Depending on how much money you're going to spend on your film, you can now create a business model where you're not losing money. I don't wanna say you're going to get rich. Some films aren't going to make money. But if your'e smart about it and tenacious, there's a chance to break even. It costs so much to release a film theatrically just by P&A costs that you're always behind the 8-ball financially. You're almost guaranteed to lose money.

The other thing is, by going out on VOD and iTunes, especially, you can go out with an aggregator as opposed to a distributor. There's now a way for you to retain your copyright -- or just lease it to them for a couple of years -- and actually participate in the money that's coming in. Theatrically, I can tell you, we've had films where we should have seen some backend, and however they do their accounting, I guarantee you don't get it..."

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