Twilight Sequel 'New Moon' #1 Advance Online … 
MPTF: Open Letter To Jeffrey Katzenberg 
'2012' Dominates For $225M 5-Day Launch … 
Showtime Rattled By Rival EPIX Arrival 
4TH UPDATE: MGM Studio Claiming Business As … 
'Paranormal Activity' Crosses $100M Cume: … 
EXCLUSIVE: DISNEY'S BIG JOB SWITCH; CFO Tom … 
Rich Ross Restructures Disney Studios' … 
20 Animated Films Vying For 2009 Oscars 
THE END OF 'OPRAH' AS WE KNOW HER: Daytime … 
Comcast & GE Pact To Keep NBCU Talks … 
Elle's Women In Hollywood Power List 
When I recently learned that both the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times (and maybe even the trades as well) were working on pre-Sundance stories that attempt to blame the Screen Actors Guild for Hollywood studios supposedly not buying their usual numbers of independent films or entering into their usual numbers of deals to distribute them, I thought this was absurd. But clearly someone (the AMPTP?) has been whispering wrong information in the ears of reporters for both newspapers on the eve of the Sundance Film Festival when everyone focuses on indies. The way it was told to me, the articles were going to claim that Hollywood studios "don't know" if they can buy indie films made under a SAG strike waiver (i.e. Guaranteed Completion Agreement, or GCA) because "the terms might change". So the articles were going to blame SAG and its on-again, off-again Strike Authorization Vote, and not the economy or content or quality or all the other usual considerations that determine whether the majors or minis wanna buy indie pics or not, for a downturn. 
(The NYT's article did indeed appear online bylined by Michael Cieply, whose anti-guild slant would be laughable if he weren't writing for a major media outlet or constantly distorting the facts.) Funny, I didn't hear this distribution issue raised against the Writers Guild Of America before last year's Sundance Film Festival (or since) even though the WGA actually went on strike and, just like SAG, granted waivers to indie productions before and during the labor action. Plus, who wouldn't realize that SAG's strike waivers were a solution to an indie production problem, not an indie distribution issue. In short, this really smells to me like just another attempt by the LA Times and NY Times to bash the Hollywood guilds on behalf of the Hollywood CEOs. Yesterday, I asked the Screen Actors Guild for clarification, and SAG just posted the following on its website which, hopefully, clears up any lingering confusion:
To Screen Actors Guild Guaranteed Completion Agreement (GCA) signatories:
It has come to the Guild attention that some distributors of Guild-covered projects have expressed concerns about risks associated with distributing projects covered by GCAs in the event of a Guild work stoppage. As you know, one of the benefits of being signatory to a Guild GCA is the assurance that any work stoppage would not affect the continued production of the picture.
GCA signatories and distributors have the Guild’s full and complete assurance that there will be no disruption of distribution of projects properly covered by Guild GCAs due to any work stoppage. Signatories or distributors with questions should feel free to contact the Guild’s Theatrical Contracts department at (323) 549-6828.
Loading ...
Actors and directors on press junkets marketing their films which have been picked up by majors (who are then being struck).
Actor/director in violation of the strike?
Of course its a huge risk. No junket = no opening $ = crashed launch.
More or less what Sue said.
But Nikki, you write:
“Hollywood studios ‘don’t know’ if they can buy indie films made under a SAG strike waiver (i.e. Guaranteed Completion Agreement, or GCA) because ‘the terms might change’.”
That does seem like a BS issue, but SAG doesn’t help itself by using the phrase “properly covered” in its statement. If “terms change,” is one still “properly covered?”
Voila, BS issue just became debatable. Still BS, but now debatable.
AMPTP: Terms might change.
SAG: There will be no disruption of distribution of projects properly covered by Guild GCAs due to any work stoppage.
AMPTP: If the terms change, we’re no longer properly covered.
Nikki – the concern isn’t that the films will be struck – they’re finished work. It’s that the CGA stipulates that the distributor will have to adhere to the terms of any deal that SAG ultimately strikes. That means that a distributor could buy a film, distribute it and then two years from now be handed a bill for back residuals or other fees. That is uncertainty. It may not be the end of the world but to suggest that it’s not a consideration is absurd.
Just ask all those people losing their homes because they signed a mortgage with a teaser rate… Same thing.
SAG is not to blame – the leaders and negotiators for SAG ARE to blame. The sooner SAG can rid themselves of these people the sooner Sag will rise again as the stong union they once were.
The AMPTP is continuing its full-court press in the mainstream media. The LAT & NYT are going with this because they need the ad $$$ in their entertainment sections, and because their publishers ain’t exactly pro-union.
Funny, I thought the reason that studios were buying fewer independent films at Sundance (and other festivals) is because they figure nobody wants to see them. For every one Napoleon Dynamite, there are 75 Synecdoche, New York.
While I think the studios are amoral greedheads, that doesn’t excuse “indie” filmmakers who annually produce derivative pretentious piles of boring tripe that only appeal to their coterie of friends. The video stores are overflowing with them.
If a studio thinks an indie movie is going to make a pile of dough at the box office, they’re not going to worry about some grandfathered SAG terms they might have to deal with two years from now (they’re going to ignore them anyway).
Be honest, how many of you have watched an overhyped indie film only to sit there wondering what in the world the filmmakers, and critics, were thinking?
In short: Less indie films are being distributed because…..they suck and nobody wants to see them.
As good as Sundance is, its very existence is proof that the major motion picture companies have utterly failed to discover, nurture, and support new talent. Ours is the only industry that not only devours its young but encourages others, such as investors, to join the feast. What we need is an alternative form of distribution so that a $500,000 film doesn’t need $5 million P+A to reach its audience. The majors have become rightly squeamish about picking up indieprods because the audience for such fare is, indeed, so focused and hard to reach. But guess what? The majors deserve their tsuris because they’re the ones who crushed the indie system by buying into it and screwing it up. It’s not that indies are sacred, it’s just that you can’t smell a rose in a sausage factory.
Good luck getting a distributor to sign a SAG Assumption Agreement anyhow…Distributors always try to keep those assumptions to the producers and filmmakers…