SPIKE LEE - CABLE SYSTEMS TO OFFER INDIE FILMS VIA VIDEO-ON-DEMAND

CABLE SYSTEMS TO OFFER INDIE FILMS VIA VIDEO-ON-DEMAND

In what could represent a reprieve -- if not a boon -- for struggling independent filmmakers, Sundance Channel is launching a video-on-demand service that will make independent, documentary, and foreign-language films available in 50 million households often on the same day they are released in art-house theaters. The service will debut on August 26 with Spike Lee's Passing Strange The Movie; the Australian animated film Mary and Max; and Alexis Dos Santos's Unmade Beds, which was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Joshua Sapan, CEO of Rainbow Media Holdings, which owns the Sundance Channel, told Reuters "I do see a time in the not too distant future when [video-on-demand] sales for films like these dramatically surpasses theatrical revenue ... and some of these movies will be released with VOD only."

18/08/2009