Rain partners with others to launch cinema-on-demand in April 2008 in Brazil (?). It will be called MovieMobz, which will “book film screenings of new and old features as well as niche content.”
Films will be distributed via satellite of Comsat.
“MovieMobz plans to open subsidiaries in Argentina and Mexico this year.”
Edit 02.2009: It seems like MovieMobz is working in Brazil!
Rain Network
MovieMobz
Variety ~ Digital logs Demand (26.02.2009)
Games grew by 20% in 2008 to $25bn.
“The gamer” does not exist any more, since “a majority of Americans now play some sort of video game.” The term is inappropriate.
“The products coming from companies like Nintendo (the Wii and portable DS), Activision Blizzard (Guitar Hero, World of Warcraft) and Rockstar (Grand Theft Auto) are very different in style, yet they are the same in that each has been conceived, realized and marketed not as games for gamers, but as mainstream lifestyle entertainment.” Should film go the same way? Not market as film any more but as comprehensive lifestyle entertainment? Shall film cease to be film?
NY Times ~ An Industry Is Booming, but Not Just for Gamers (25.02.2009)
Interview with Marshall Herskovitz
Hollywood does not seem to be “particularly on top of the changes [posed by the Internet].”
“I have a feeling that the corporate structure as it manifests itself in Hollywood is too rigidified.”
TV will stay more profitable than the Internet for at least the next 5 years. “It’s going to take a while to get a business model for broadband that makes sense. People truly do not understand the extent to which new media is not a business. It’s remarkably not a business. I’m speaking from painful experience.”
“The highest average [of serialized video on the Internet] is ours – [quarterlife had] 300,000 unique visitors. No scripted video has ever done better. The moment of convergence is where you can create serialized video for 1 million viewers per episode. I don’t think we’re that far off from that. But no one knows how to do it. No one knows how to market that show.”
Quarterlife cost “around $500,000 per episode.”
“Advertising is the petroleum that fuels the television business. [...] What’s beneath all these discussions is a deep anxiety over the power and reach of advertising today, and whether it’s worth it. I don’t know if corporations know what to do instead of advertising. And advertising doesn’t want its omnipotence destroyed.”
“The question of the Internet being the great democratizer may be on its way out. Because although it is still cheap to create and distribute stuff on internet, it’s not cheap to market on the Internet. And that may be where big companies win as well, because they’ll have money to promote on the Internet.”
The Wrap ~ Lessons From Life on the Internet (23.02.2009)
There is a massive cultural divide between Hollywood and the Silicon Valley.
In Hollywood failure is deadly. It’s always your last film that counts
In Silicon Valley failure is learning. “There are very few successful serial entrepreneurs. Failure is almost a rite of passage.”
In Hollywood people want money and they want it NOW.
In Silicon Valley people are OK with stock options and can wait years.
The Silicon Valley seems a lot more sustainable, long-term oriented, and sound than Hollywood. This is interesting, because normally Silicon Valley is seen as the essence of the new world: get rich really fast. But they seem to be a lot more sane and prudent than I thought.
NY Times ~ Bridging the Gap, the Sequel (23.02.2009)
A new indie distributor for world cinema has been founded in the USA.
They have a very different approach from Hollywood and probably all the others too: “we take reduced distribution fees, we report monthly, we have transparent book-keeping and we keep our expenses chargeable to the pictures to a bare minimum. Our goal is to make money hand in hand with the producers, not to make money at the expense of the producers.”
If the concept works they will open a subsidiary in Germany and they will produce films.
Screen Daily ~ NeoClassics’ new wave of world cinema (21.02.2009)
Indie film maker who distributes his films himself. He grossed $5m with his past 2 (?) projects.
For his newest project HIM he wrote a film script which extends to “an alternate reality game, episodic shorts for the web or mobile platforms, interactive live events and an online graphic novel,” which he all produced himself.
“HIM at its core is a film with a strong story. These other platforms are ways to build on that story. It’s not just gimmicks, they all serve the story.”
Now THAT’S what I’m talking about!
Lance Weiler’s multi-screen ambitions (19.02.2009)
A completely different and new cinema experience.
“Using re-edited, re-animated footage from the entire original Mad Max trilogy, the MAD MAX remix follows the story of Max, the greatest dancer of all time, on his quest to join Miss Tina’s prestigious Bartertown Dance academy. The re-edited film plays silently while actors, musicians and foley artists recreate the new dialogue and soundtrack live. This is a re-scripted singing, dancing, cinematic experience. This is a live video remix. This is Mel as you’ve never seen him before.”
The Imperial Panda Festival ~ The MAD MAX remix (19.02.2009)
Statistics about life expectancy in Germany.
It will also be released via Bittorrent and advertised on Mininova.
“This site combined with the other bit torrent sites will expose the film to more that 60 million viewers alone.”
Mininova
New film to be released across all platforms (18.02.2009)