“If no producer, no movie.”
Dino De
If there is no producer, there is no movie, so I need to find a production company. My ideal production company would have experience producing independent films, specifically independent films that are drama comedies.
In order to find a production company that meets this criteria I first researched famous independent films, finding 25 to take specific interest in.
| 1. Frances Ha (2012) | 6. The Land of Steady Habits (2018) | 11. American Honey (2016) | 16. Trainspotting (1996) | 21. Blue Valentine (2010) |
| 2. Napoleon Dynamite (2004) | 7. Sideways (2004) | 12. Punch Drunk Love (2002) | 17. The Squid and the Whale (2005) | 22. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) |
| 3. The Way Way Back (2013) | 8. Little Miss Sunshine (2006) | 13. Broken Flowers (2005) | 18. 500 Days of Summer (2009) | 23. Lost in Translation (2003) |
| 4.The Peanut Butter Falcon (2018) | 9. Down to the Bone (2004) | 14. The Royal Tenebaums (2001) | 19. Before Sunset (2004) | 24. Juno (2007) |
| 5. I Can Only Imagine (2018) | 10. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) | 15. Far From Heaven (2002) | 20. Swiss Army Man (2016) | 25. Lady Bird (2017) |
I then took this list and recorded what genre each independent movie was.
| 1. Comedy, Drama Romance | 6. Comedy Drama | 11. Adventure, Romance, Drama | 16. Cinema | 21. Drama Romance |
| 2. Comedy | 7. Comedy, Drama Romance | 12. Romance , Comedy, Drama | 17. Comedy, Drama | 22. Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi |
| 3. Comedy Drama | 8.Comedy Drama | 13. Comedy, Mystery, Drama | 18.Comedy, Romance Drama | 23. Drama, Romance |
| 4.Adventure, Comedy, Drama | 9. Drama | 14. Comedy Drama | 19. Drama Romance | 24.Comedy, Drama |
| 5. Biography, Drama, Family | 10. Biography, Crime, Drama | 15. Drama | 20.Comedy, Drama, Fantasy | 25. Comedy Drama |
From this 25 I then isolated all the movies considered to be comedy dramas, because they are more similar to the film we are trying to make.
This left me with the list of movies below.
| 1. The Squid and the Whale (2005) | 4.The Way Way Back (2013) |
| 2. Little Miss Sunshine (2006) | 5. Lady Bird (2017) |
| 3. Juno (2007) | 6. The Land of Steady Habits (2018) |
From this list I then started to compare the production companies that produced each of these films.
I found that two movies (Juno and Little Miss Sunshine) had the same production company: Searchlight Pictures.
Searchlight pictures is owned by The Walt Disney Studios and is a sister studio of 20th Century Studios, a larger studio that used to be called 20th Century Fox. In fact Searchlight Pictures name was changed from Fox Searchlight Pictures just this past January since Disney acquired it alongside 20th Century Studio on March 20, 2019.
Unlike its sister studio Fox Searchlight Pictures focuses primarily on funding, producing, and distributing independent films. Fox Searchlight Pictures is also specifically known for working on comedy drama, horror, art-house, and foreign films.
This makes it a primary candidate for our film which is an independent comedy drama.
In addition to this movies produced by Searchlight Pictures are well viewed by critics and receive many awards.
For example, both Little Miss Sunshine and Juno won Oscars for best original screenplay. Awards like this draw the interest of audience members, producers, and distributors alike who will be looking to purchase the movie or fund a sequel.
Not only will Searchlight Pictures be a good choice for a production company but they also act as a distribution company as well. If they produce our movie it is likely they will also want to distribute it. They will want to do this to increase their own funds, but luckily for us, it increases ours as well.
The more distributors a movie has the more people have access to view the film. The more people that view the film the more people there will be who want to buy merchandise for that film as well as buy digital or Blue-ray copies of the film. This all increases the revenue, and success of the film.
Resources:
“Little Miss Sunshine.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449059/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“The Squid and the Whale.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0367089/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“Juno.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0467406/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“The Way Way Back.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1727388/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“Lady Bird.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4925292/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“The Land of Steady Habits.” IMDb, IMDb.com, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6485928/companycredits?ref_=tt_ql_dt_4.
“Searchlight Pictures.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 18 Feb. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Searchlight_Pictures.
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