SimultaneousRelease Tagged Articles at Cinematical

 

The most shocking moment of Sunday night's Oscar ceremony came early in the evening, long before Three 6 Mafia or Crash scored their twin victories for mediocrity. An hour or so after losing the night's first award to George Clooney, Jake Gyllenhaal trotted out on stage to ostensibly announce one of the night's many disposable montages. "They're called epics," he near-monotoned. "Extravaganzas. Spectacles." With that last one, Jake's voice took an unexpected up-turn. He went on to list a few (oddly amalgamated for mass cross-generational appeal) examples of the genre in question – "West Side Story. Star Wars. Ben-Hur." – before delivering the kicker: "You can't properly watch these on a television set, and good luck trying to enjoy them on a portable DVD." Gyllenhaal punctuated that embarrassingly over-scripted slice of Academy propaganda with a desperate, self-referential giggle – a composure break that lasted long enough for an insert shot of Heath Ledger and Michelle Williams, Gyllenhaal's Brokeback Mountain co-stars, just two members of what sounded like a large chunk of the audience laughing along with him. It was rather amazing, a pure, bumbling moment of transparency that neatly struck down whatever was left of Sid Gannis' sad house of cards. The new takeaway for the evening: If Hollywood can't take its own last-ditch propaganda seriously, how can we?

I just got word that IFC Films is about to launch a new distribution banner, aimed at releasing films in theaters and through On-Demand cable TV, simultaneously. The program will be called First Take, and to it IFC has already attached six films: CSA: The Confederate States of America, Caveh Zahedi's I Am a Sex Addict, New York Film Festival favorite Three Times, American Gun, Russian Dolls, and Sandra Oh-starrer and my early vote for Title of the Year, Sorry Haters. First Take hopes to release an additional 20 films this year. The basic idea is that by closing the window between theatrical and cable on these types of niche releases, films that would have only shown on the coasts can get a nationwide release.

What do we think about this? Is this a more or less viable plan than the cable/DVD/theatrical simultaneous release program that Mark Cuban and Steven Soderbergh are launching this week with Bubble?

The last deal of Sundance 2005 was announced the day we got to Park City for Sundance 2006. After a year-long tour of festivals worldwide, Mark and Jay Duplass have scored a deal with Roadside Attractions and Netflix to release their relationship comedy,The Puffy Chair. As I understand it, the deal is for both theatrical and DVD distribution, though not, as some are reporting simultaneously. Roadside plans to put the film in theaters next summer with both their logo and Netflix' on the print. Netflix will promote the release through their channels, but when the theatrical window closes and DVD distriubution begins, they'll not hold on to exclusive rights.

It's a pretty traditional deal, by the looks of it, which is sort of disappointing – the film is a cult classic waiting to be discovered, and seems like the perfect candidate for a Cuban-esque simultaneous release.