Viral Documentaries
I don’t have the stats to prove it, but I’d guess that a surprisingly high percentage (maybe even a majority) of the films produced in the US in a given year are independent documentaries. Certainly that’s true of the 1100+ independent filmmakers in the Fractured Atlas membership, many of whom participate in our fiscal sponsorship program.
Of course, very few of these films ever get seen by more than a handful of people. Movies are mass media in America, and if you’re not going to gross $50 million in your opening weekend, it’s tough to find a serious distributor.
Thankfully, the internet is systematically dismantling the very notion of mass media. Today, via Walter Mossberg, I learned about a new service called SnagFilms, which aims to faciliatate the viral distribution of independent documentary films. As Mossberg puts it:
The service … allows anyone with a blog, a Web site, or even a page on a social-networking site, to open a virtual movie theater and show these documentaries, free. The virtual theater is a small widget that contains the film, and that can be embedded easily and quickly in a wide variety of popular social-networking services and blog platforms. No technical knowledge is needed.
SnagFilms already has an impressive roster of films to choose from, and a wide open content model promises an even greater bounty in the future. Filmmakers can submit their work simply by emailing submissions@snagfilms.com.
So let’s try this out, shall we? A quick perusal of the site turned up a few interesting-looking films. (Disclaimer: I haven’t actually watched any of these, so view at your own risk. They may be offensive or simply not very good.)
First up is Heavy Metal in Baghdad:
Next we have Freestyle, the Art of Rhyme:
And finally, Black, White, and Gray: a Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe: