Oscar-Nominated and Broke
BRADY CORBET AND SEAN BAKER, the directors, respectively, of The Brutalist and Anora are using their awards campaigns to raise awareness of the financial condition of indie film. We should listen to them: Independent cinema is in trouble. The state of the industry is so dire that accurate descriptions would normally be dismissed as hyperbole. But it really is that bad right now.
Both Corbet and Baker have talked about how they, and other creatives in this space, get paid. The following is from Baker's acceptance speech at the recent Spirit Awards where Anora won best picture and best director:
The system has to change because this is simply unsustainable. We are creating product that creates jobs and revenue for the entire industry. We shouldn't be barely getting by. Creatives that are involved with projects that span years have to begin getting higher—much higher—upfront fees. And again, because back end simply is not—it can't be relied upon any longer, we have to demand that. If not, indie films will simply become calling-card films, and that's—I know that's not what I signed up for. So let's demand what we're worth.
Corbet echoed these thoughts on a recent WTF with Marc Maron podcast. Here is Indiewire's summary of his thoughts:
The 'Brutalist' writer/director said during the 'WTF with Marc Maron' podcast that he made 'zero dollars' from 'The Brutalist.' The indie notably had a budget of less than $10 million. The sprawling 215-minute drama spans 30 years in the life of Adrien Brody's lead character, fictional architect László Tóth.
To financially sustain himself, Corbet directed three advertisements in Portugal. 'This is the first time I've made any money in years,' Corbet said of the ads.
It was the same story with 2018's 'Vox Lux.' 'Both my partner [Mona Fastvold] and I made zero dollars on the last two films we made. Yes, actually zero. So we had to just live off of a paycheck from three years ago,' Corbet said, 'And obviously, the timing during an awards campaign and travel every two or three days was less than ideal, but it was an opportunity that landed in my lap, and I jumped at it.'
It is worth emphasizing that Baker and Corbet are both at the top of their game, professionally: Both have made several films and both are nominated for Best Director at the Academy Awards this year. Yet they are struggling to reap any sort of reward. Why?
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In the simplest terms, it takes time—years and years—to make an indie movie. First, one must write a script and start development on a film. That by itself can take years: writing, gathering funding, attaching stars, etc. Then it takes months (or longer) to shoot and complete post-production on a film. Then it takes more time for a movie to be released by a distributor. Anora, for example, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2024 and is still in the initial phase of its Neon release In March, it will hit its third and final major phase of exploitation—its streaming debut on Hulu—around eleven months after its festival premiere. Baker and his creative team got paid when the budget was fully paid for, typically a few months or weeks before the film starts shooting.
And that's it. They may have access to any profit the film makes with the distributor but that won't occur until months or years after the film has been released. It may never happen. First, the distributor has to recoup their costs to release the movie, the cost for them to acquire the film—which is the money used to pay for part or all of the film's budget—and their fees to release the film. From start to finish, that's at least two or three years of commitment in which nothing but initial fees are earned.
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AND LOOK: ARTISTS KNOW THE DEAL. They get paid 'up front' (that is, after a year or two of development) with the understanding it will involve years of work. They enter into this deal willingly. The problem in 2025 is twofold. First, the fees that creatives get have been reduced considerably. In Corbet's case, it sounds like he forewent any fees at all to keep the budget at a level where the film had a chance of finding investors. Second, even with the relatively low budgets for Anora and The Brutalist, their share of the profits may never materialize, and not because of the dreaded 'Hollywood math' or because their movies failed. It's because the markets have been reduced so much in 2025 that the opportunity for a film to break out and make money for all parties, not just the distributor, is akin to hitting the lottery.
Indie films have been considerably devalued in the marketplace. Yes, the industry as a whole has been hit hard by the one-two punch of COVID and strikes, but it's actually worse for indie films. Quoting Baker again from his Spirit Awards speech:
Gone are the days of DVD sales that allowed for a greater risk to be taken on challenging films. That revenue stream is gone, and the only way to see significant back end is to have a box office hit with profits that far exceed what any of our films will ever see unless you are Damien Leone and strike gold with a franchise like 'Terrifier.' But as we all know, that's an extreme rarity.
It's not just the collapse in DVD sales: Streaming has effectively replaced all transactional activity—which used to be DVDs and is now the digital rentals and purchases one makes on Amazon Prime or Apple TV. On top of that, the theatrical window for indie releases has almost entirely collapsed. Where once there were three revenue windows—theatrical, then transactional, and then broadcast/streaming—there now are three half-windows that overlap and allow audiences to be content to just wait for streaming, the traditionally least lucrative of the windows. Baker is absolutely correct that this is unsustainable.
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It's also worth observing that the main streamers are also paying far less to license these films than in the initial days of streaming. Yes, the biggest streaming services go to festivals and pay millions—sometimes upwards of $20 million—to license a few films every year. And a handful of indie distributors like Neon, A24, Bleecker Street, Roadside Attractions, Magnolia, and IFC/RLJ Entertainment have output deals with a streamer that guarantees a license fee. (Indeed, IFC/RLJ Entertainment is owned by AMC, a cable channel with premium streaming services.) Again, this is like hitting the lottery. These deals go to around 10 percent of films that play at major film festivals. (Needless to say, for the countless indies that never play at a major festival, things are even worse.) Additionally some streamers have told distributors that work on indie films that the services flat out do not want indie films any longer, and those that do are offering less than half of what was on the table a few years ago.
That's why the fees that creatives earn—and the overall budgets of indie films—have declined so precipitously. It's a vicious cycle: Streaming has largely replaced the other windows for indie movies, meaning that streaming is where most of these films make any money, and the streamers know this so they're offering less than ever. Too many independent filmmakers find themselves in an untenable 'take it or leave it' situation.
Well, you might say, it's a free market and the market has lowered the price because consumer demand simply isn't there. What's the problem? From my perspective, indie films are needed to create the healthiest ecosystem for the entire film industry. In part because they are incubators of talent: Without Memento, there may be no Christopher Nolan; without Reservoir Dogs, there may be no Quentin Tarantino. But I'd also argue that even in a landscape dominated by intellectual property (IP) plays—your comic-book movies, your reboots and your retreads—diversification and advancement of the product is essential in any healthy industry. What happens when the value of IP films diminishes? Look what's happening to the value of the biggest IPs: Star Wars, Marvel, Pixar, Fast and the Furious, etc., are all seeing diminishing returns. Nothing sustains its peak time after time. The algorithms will keep feeding itself the same type of film until that type of film is run into the ground because they are the only type of films getting any eyeballs. Indie film has been and will remain the best way of refreshing the types of movies that can get made and the creatives who can make them.
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WHAT'S THE SOLUTION THEN? If the movies are only making so much money, how do you create more value for them? I'll start with something Baker alluded to in another acceptance speech, this time at the Directors Guild Awards:
Let's do whatever we can do for us feature filmmakers to expand that theatrical window again; demand it. Let's get it back to what it used to be, at least ninety days, and really support movie theaters.
If we can return to fully exploiting all films in three windows (theatrical, transactional, and streaming/broadcast) again, then the amount of money each film makes can be greater. Much has been written about the value of an exclusive theatrical release (see Entertainment Strategy Guy's excellent piece here). Give a movie time to make money in each window. Give it three full bites at the apple instead of a few nibbles. Theatrical windows need to return to at least 45 days even if most of the revenue is generated in the first three weeks. The other three weeks is necessary to protect that exclusive window so consumers don't just wait three weekends to watch a movie at home, where it will be cheaper and more convenient for them. Then give the movie an exclusive transactional release so it doesn't hit streaming until at least six months after its initial release.
It's either that or hope there are enough wealthy individuals or companies who want to fully subsidize indie film, like when Criterion was saved by Indian Paintbrush. While I wish there were dozens of billionaires desperate to subsidize the indie game, it's far more pragmatic for the industry to commit to three windows again. That's what the strikes should have been about, not about streaming residuals. Without a realistic business model, it will be impossible for filmmakers like Corbet and Baker—and the dozens of people they employ on every production—to get paid their full worth.
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