5 Film Business Tips From a Distributor Who Doubted Netflix
Om avsnittet
What do you wish someone had told you before you made your first film?
Joe Amodei has watched movies go from $60 rental tapes to streaming, and he has five film business tips for anyone making a documentary. The first one changes how you see the whole project: making your film is only half the miracle. The other half is getting people to see it.
In Episode 194, Christian Taylor sits down with Joe Amodei, founder of Virgil Films and Entertainment, with Jason Rugg hosting. Joe starts with history, because he's a film historian at heart: the days when a tape cost a video store $60, the Paramount test that sold Raiders of the Lost Ark for $19.99, and the meeting in Dallas that, as people who were there told him, made Netflix decide to take Blockbuster down. He admits he told Netflix it was out of its mind about streaming. Then he explains how the streaming boom of huge budgets and original films ran into a wall, and why independent films are the ones hurting.
From there it's the five tips, and Christian brings her own experience to each one. Know the business and read the trades every day. Watch films of every era and learn from the masters, who went through the same aggravation you're going through. Learn film marketing in a world with almost no newspaper reviews, where a $20,000 publicist may not pay off. Christian shares what happened when she spent about $200 boosting Instagram reels, and what happened when the 101st Airborne Division collaborated on one post instead. Decide your objective before you start. And treat your film as a business, which includes a realistic budget and some pay for yourself. Christian admits she hasn't paid herself in five years of making her film.
Full disclosure: Virgil Films distributes The Girl Who Wore Freedom, and it now sponsors Documentary First. This 2023 episode has no sponsor read.
In this episode, you'll learn:
- How Netflix beat Blockbuster, as Joe tells it
- Why streaming budgets boomed and then hit a wall
- Why making your film is only half the miracle
- Why someone on your team should research your audience while you shoot
- Which trade publications to read every day
- Why a $20,000 publicist may not pay off for a direct-to-digital film
- Why one collaboration beat paid Instagram boosts
- What a distribution service deal is and who it's for
- What a documentary budget should be, and why you should pay yourself
CHAPTERS
0:00 Twenty Years, Every Format
7:35 Raiders for $19.99
10:59 How Netflix Beat Blockbuster
14:10 Streaming's Boom and Bust
20:56 Half the Miracle
30:27 Which Trades to Read?
33:10 Learn From Hitchcock
35:24 Marketing Without Newspapers
42:08 Why Are You Making It?
44:48 Open a Business
47:09 What Should Docs Cost?
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
What should filmmakers know about the film business?
On Documentary First in 2023, distributor Joe Amodei of Virgil Films and host Christian Taylor walked through five points. Know the business and read the trades. Watch movies of every kind and learn from the masters. Learn film marketing, because newspapers no longer review most films. Decide your objective before you start. And treat your film as a business, with its own bank account, accountant and lawyer.
What trade publications should filmmakers read?
Joe Amodei told Documentary First in 2023 to start with Deadline, Variety and The Hollywood Reporter, read online every day. He adds Screen Daily, which is UK-based and more European, and TheWrap. Christian Taylor adds Realscreen, whose emails she gets for free, and says the top three or four are worth paying for and belong in a filmmaker's budget.
What is a distribution service deal?
Joe Amodei explained on Documentary First in 2023 that some filmmakers mainly want their film available, often after every distributor has passed. In a service deal, the filmmaker pays Virgil Films a fee and Virgil guarantees the film goes up on major transactional sites like iTunes and Amazon. Being able to tell investors the film is out makes the next film easier to fund, even if this one loses money.
How much should an independent documentary cost?
Speaking in 2023, Joe Amodei said he would not go much past $200,000, $250,000 tops, for an independent documentary, because there were very few places left to sell it, and the answer could change within months. The budget should also hold some pay for the filmmaker, even $5,000 or $10,000, so you haven't worked for nothing. He and Christian agreed that a big chunk has to be saved for marketing.
DocuView Deja View Picks
Joe: Fire of Love
Christian: Sr.
Listen and Follow
Support the show
Rate us, share an episode, or get our free guides: documentaryfirst.com/pages/support
Connect
All social platforms: https://linktr.ee/doc1st
Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
About the Guest
Joe Amodei founded Virgil Films and Entertainment and has worked in film since the first video store opened in Philadelphia. He watches a movie a day, sometimes two, and calls himself a film historian. Follow Virgil on Instagram and X, and see Joe's own documentary at coldwarinphilly.com.
About Virgil Films
Virgil Films and Entertainment acquires and distributes documentaries, feature films and series. Its releases include Super Size Me, the Oscar-nominated Restrepo, Forks Over Knives, Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me, We Are Columbine and I Am Chris Farley. virgilfilms.com
About Documentary First
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the people behind documentaries and how the work changed them. Host Christian Taylor, director of the award-winning The Girl Who Wore Freedom, talks with filmmakers, distributors, entertainment lawyers, actors and more, from Ken Burns and PBS American Masters creator Susan Lacy to first-timers, across nearly 300 conversations. Each week brings one of two formats: a long-form conversation with the people behind films for HBO, Netflix, PBS and independent film, or The Deep Dive, where Christian takes one insight from a recent conversation and follows it wherever it leads. Listen Notes ranks the show in the top 5% of all podcasts worldwide. New episodes every week.
Resources Mentioned
Documentary First: Conversations on Documentary Filmmaking med Christian Taylor | Documentary First finns tillgänglig på flera plattformar. Informationen på denna sida kommer från offentliga podd-flöden.