Kevin Smith To Distribute “Red State” Himself, Forgo Any Advertising Dan Koelsch, January 24, 2011January 24, 2011 The big buzz late Sunday night was Kevin Smith’s surprise announcement at the Sundance Film Festival. After screening his latest film Red State, Smith was supposed to hold an auction for potential distributors. However, Smith instead chose a very unique distribution method. Get the details after the break. When the movie, Smith’s first action horror, ended, the geek-favorite director told the audience (among other things) how he was unhappy with the current studio/distribution system for films. He explained that he didn’t want to spend $20 million marketing a film that only cost $4 million to make. So, Smith decided to buy the rights himself for only twenty bucks in a rather theatrical manner. The film will be self-released under his own Smodcast Pictures on October 19th, 2011 to mark the 17th anniversary of the release of his first film Clerks. He also won’t spend any money on “conventional” advertising, which is obviously extremely rare for a relatively high profile film. One of the things he will do to promote the film will be a roadshow called “The Red State USA Tour”, which will take place mostly in March. Smith expects to make about half of the film’s production cost from that alone. Hopefully the buzz from that and Sundance will be enough to make the theatrical release successful enough to make up the other half and more. Here are the dates of the tour: March 5th – Radio City Music Hall March 6th – Wilbur Theater in Boston March 8th – Harris Theater in Chicago March 9th – State Theater in Minneapolis March 10th – Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor March 11th – Indianapolis, IN March 12th – Midland Theater, Kansas City March 14th – Springfield, OH March 22nd – Paramount Theater, Denver March 26th – McCalister theater, New Orleans March 28th – Paramount Theater, Austin March 29th – Cobb Energy Center, Atlanta April 4th – McCaw Hall in Seattle Get all the details of the tour here, where you can even request a screening in your home town. What do you think of Smith’s distribution and marketing plans? Fortunately for us, viral marketing isn’t conventional, so we may see more from this film. Source: /Film UPDATE: Below is a video of the post-screening announcement. News Viral Marketing Viral News Kevin SmithRed State
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He’s also offering his fans a chance to become filmmakers!!! That’s the real story!!! Why is everybody ignoring that?! That should be headline news!http://wp.me/p1gK9Y-er
Probably because that’s a “tomorrow” statement. He’s going to tour Red State, then wide-release it 9 months from now, then make Hit Somebody and all the accompanying follow up work for that movie, *then* he’s going to help others make and release films. That statement’s a loooong ways off (relatively speaking).I’m not saying it’s not going to happen, but a lot is capable of happening or not happening between now and then.Keep kicking ass, Kevin!
Yeah that part of the story was buried in the lead to the point where I even forgot to mention it. VanGoghX is right though, it’s a long ways off, and it doesn’t seem as unique as it sounds.