Podcast – Distribution and discoverability of Australian theatrical releases
Madman Entertainment CEO Paul Wiegard and Screen Australia Distribution Manager Anthony Grundy on the distribution landscape.
Anthony Grundy, Paul Wiegard
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How can Australian filmmakers cut through the competitive content landscape and be more discoverable?
Use your points of interest, says Madman Entertainment CEO Paul Wiegard. Whether it's talent, topic, or creating an immersive experience, know the audience and have a plan to engage them where they are.
"It's always about momentum and just nurturing that," he says. And ask yourself "how do we feed that and how do we gauge that growth corridor? Because it's far more efficient or effective to talk to an engaged audience, […] start with them and then build out from there."
During the latest episode of the Screen Australia podcast, we explore the changing theatrical distribution landscape. Wiegard and Screen Australia Distribution Manager Anthony Grundy explain how audience behaviour has shifted since the COVID-19 pandemic and reflect on the challenges and opportunities this presents Australian filmmakers in an increasingly global marketplace. Wiegard shares Madman's approach to audience engagement as an independent distributor, while Grundy discusses some of the research and tools available through Screen Australia to support discoverability, including the new Where to Watch function.
"Five to ten years ago, it was a very linear, long tail. […] Audiences are just so thinly stretched now. There's content coming at us from more places than ever and demanding our time," Grundy noted. "And this tool [Where to Watch] is going to be great to clearly create those links where we can drive people to where they can find and watch Australian content."
Learn more about film marketing here or distribution here.
Find out where to watch the latest Australian titles, including some of those discussed, using the Screen Guide.
Further Reading and Resources
Subscribe to Screen Australia Podcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or Pocket Casts
AUDIO TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:06] Aimée Lindorff Welcome to the Sreen Australia podcast. I'm Aimee Lindorff with Screen Australia's online publication Screen News. I'd like to firstly acknowledge the various countries you're all listening in from the Unceded lands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This podcast has been produced on the lands of the Gadigal people of the larger Eora nation, the traditional custodians and first storytellers of this region always was, always will be. In today's episode, we're exploring the distribution landscape and discoverability of Australian film with Madman Entertainment's Paul Wiegard and Screen Australia's Anthony Grundy. First up is Anthony or Ant, as you may know him, distribution manager from Screen Australia to give us an update on the film distribution environment Since the last time he was on the podcast in 2022 and also shares some of the considerations facing Australian filmmakers and the latest resources available at Screen Australia. We're also joined by Madman Entertainment's CEO, Paul Wiegard, as he shares his insights on the changes in audience behaviour over the past few years and how Australian productions can break through a competitive theatrical market. Remember, you can subscribe to the podcast at any time from places like iTunes and Spotify, where you can leave a rating and review. Any feedback can also be sent to [email protected] to review, and you can also subscribe to Screen Australia's Industry News for the latest funding, announcements, opportunities and more. First up here's Ant Grundy to talk to us about distribution. Ant, welcome back to the podcast.
[00:01:49] Anthony Grundy Hello.
[00:01:50] Aimée Lindorff For those who have not met you before, can you tell us what's your role at Screen Australia?
[00:01:54] Anthony Grundy I sit in the content team. I'm in the production investment team and I look after distribution. So my title is Distribution Manager, and there's some initiatives that we run to support the release of Australian films, but I also contribute to the process of the funding decision assessment process. And the main focus is looking at the supporting the production investment processes as applications come in. I work with the doco team and the scripted team and part of that assessment I guess is looking at who the distributor is attached and what their marketing plan is and what the audience plan is. And then working with the the team as they move into production and then down the track into release.
[00:02:28] Aimée Lindorff So we were talking to Rick in our last episode, and she was talking about marketplace and sales agents. Where do distributors sit?
[00:02:36] Anthony Grundy My focus is more geared towards ANZ. So I work with the local distribution landscape where I think its focus is a little more international and within that Australia and New Zealand landscape it's it's kind of really working with the distributor mainly in at the time that I guess they're putting their marketing plans together and, and the film is, you know, on its journey to connect with audiences. But yeah, so it's my focus, it's mainly geared towards theatrical and Australia.
[00:03:09] Aimée Lindorff Fantastic. Now the last time you were on the podcast, we spoke about marketing in 2022. So really examining those post shutdown environments. At that time, we saw massive influx of video on demand models and changes in relationships between content and audiences. It's been a while now. How has that distribution landscape changed?
[00:03:33] Anthony Grundy One of the main differences I think that's happened in the last couple of years particularly, you know, we've moved through Covid. There's been a lot of industrial action in the US last year. So this this period of inconsistent product, particularly coming from international into Australia. At the same time, when audiences and consumers in Australia are now they're really understanding the way SVOD streaming services and even even transactional I guess, you know, at digital at home offering is there's now an education for them that perhaps they didn't have a couple of years earlier, for example. So they might know something's on at the movies, but then they're going to choose to watch it on a streaming service, you know, at a later date. So there's this inherent kind of understanding of how quickly content can move into another way of watching. And so I think with that, really one of the key things, I guess is crystallising. Well, what is it about the cinema experience that means you must watch it at the movies versus I think I'll wait. And yeah, there's been a number of films that I think maybe 5 to 10 years earlier would have done a lot more business in in cinemas. But they fall into that this category of of well actually that one can wait.
[00:04:48] Aimée Lindorff And then also a lot of those big titles that would usually, as you said, go gangbusters at the theatre are now doing digital first. So they're online as their first release rather than going to the cinema.
[00:04:59] Anthony Grundy Yeah, that's right. I think they the way, you know, 5 to 10 years ago it was a very linear, clear long tail. And now there's lots of different variations where, you know, those windows are being moved around and sometimes they're working, sometimes they aren't. So, you know, to my point earlier, I think that we are now in in an environment where we understand what those paths look like. And the good news is that there's been a lot of experimentation. And we we have is I think we can safely say that the theatrical does add value and you can have these different windowing opportunities line up and still create value for each participant along the way. But there is still nothing like the awareness driving of the A cinema release for a film. The other thing I was going to say with audiences before is that and now we understand what the value of the streaming window looks like from a from a consumer's point of view. And people are starting to realise, well, maybe I don't need to have as many as I had before and, and people will start to chop and change and move around services because yeah, you can. And I think that that's, you know, audiences are now really starting to understand what something is truly built for streaming versus what is designed for a theatrical release.
[00:06:18] Aimée Lindorff And how is that how have you seen that influenced the theatrical landscape?
[00:06:23] Anthony Grundy There's been some interesting observations to make in cinemas in the last couple of years. There's the key thing that I've noticed is and I'm calling it a product paradox where there is statistically more films being released in. Cinemas than ever before. But at the same time, the films that are actually carrying the weight and the load of of delivering the annual box office, there are less of those. So the films, let's say, let's call them the top five each year are making more money. So it's cinemas kind of saying, we want there to be more films. But there are actually a lot of films and this has been quite good for some smaller independent distributors where and it's a bit of a paradox going on there where there's a lot of those smaller independent distributors coming into the marketplace. And this some of them are specialising in foreign language films or particularly Indian films and Asian cinema. So we're starting to see a diversity of different types of distributors moving into the marketplace, which I think is really exciting. But when you look at the overall health for cinemas and just running the business, keeping the doors open, looking at the the films that kind of do the heavy lifting of driving their profit centres, there's been a bit of a shift towards, I guess, smaller, a smaller number of films earning more.
[00:07:38] Aimée Lindorff And what does that mean, I guess, for Australian content and Australian producers?
[00:07:46] Anthony Grundy I think what it means for Australian producers is that the theatrical moment. We live and die by it quicker than ever and it was always pretty quick. You know, maybe ten years ago you'd think, okay, I've got 4 to 6 weeks in cinemas. That's what the standard theatrical campaign would look like. Interestingly, Australian films tend to they don't come out of the gate as quickly, and maybe that's because there's less marketing money put into an Australian film versus an American film. But the word of mouth would do a lot of the heavy lifting and then they would carry on a lot longer than, you know, generally speaking, some of the American product would. So there was this opportunity for us to play longer. But then with this new environment where cinemas are really they're really tripling down on whatever the big film that weekend is going to be giving that, you know, the number one film is going to have the best sessions and lots of them. And I think that that has and obviously there's a limited amount of obsessions that a cinema can program each week. And so there are a lot of films kind of vying for what's left. And if you're not going to perform well in the opening weekend, we're seeing films come off in kind of, you know, week to week three and four, an Aussie film that can be really problematic.
[00:09:01] Aimée Lindorff And I guess where when it comes then to marketing and promotion, where does the bulk of that responsibility lie with film makers, or is it with distributors, broadcasters.
[00:09:12] Anthony Grundy I would say it is the distributors job for the most part. The reason why you have to have a distributor is because they have the experience that the connections they invest in, the PNA, the heavy lifting of setting, the tone for the campaign and understanding the competitive landscape is the job of the distributor. But what I'm saying is no longer can a film maker just make a film in a vacuum and then deliver it off to a distributor and cross your fingers and hope for the best. Hope for the best? Hope is not a strategy. As someone well wisely said, I love that line. And I think the definitely we're saying filmmaking teams really understand what that looks like and how they can work better with their distributor. And there's lots of examples of this. Talk to me. This obviously gets talked about a lot, but it's a really good example of the production team. We gave it a little bit of a PNA support around an idea that was developed during production.
[00:10:13] Aimée Lindorff Just to clarify, you've mentioned it twice now, PNA.
[00:10:15] Anthony Grundy Prints and advertising. Thank you very much. So the marketing costs and the costs of getting the prints into the cinema.
[00:10:22] Aimée Lindorff Fantastic. Thank you.
[00:10:22] Anthony Grundy So an interesting way that the production worked with the distributor right from the beginning was with Talk to Me and yeah, you could say that and the other interesting thing about this journey together for a distributor and a filmmaking team is that the path will change. And Talk to Me is a classic example of this at investment stage, even at production stage. The A24 deal hadn't been done at that stage, so to be along the journey and kind of navigate that whole global explosion was, yeah, I think that it's really beneficial if the distributor and the filmmakers have a really close and trusted relationship with each other. So yeah, we'd like to encourage that as much as we can. And I think that it's best to take the lead from the distributor, but absolutely get involved. And talking about the audience design work that we did recently was really fascinating and it was great to see filmmaking teams really hungry for that. Think like a distributor knowledge that they can apply to their projects at development stage. And the more that they can understand the journey of where the film is going to go and what it's needed at each of those steps as it heads out into the world.
[00:11:38] Aimée Lindorff It's a good segue to ask when is the optimum time for filmmakers to really be thinking about audience discoverability and how their projects are going to connect with people?
[00:11:47] Anthony Grundy There's never too early a time. I think the best time to think about discoverability or for the recent audience design initiative that we did, We asked for projects at late stage development and that was great because they're developed enough to really interrogate who the audience is, what the hooks are, what the themes are, And, you know, you can then start to adjust or turn things off or dull things down. If you're a little earlier than that. It could be harder. But at the same time, the more that even writers understand, who am I writing this for? Like, where's the likely home for this content? Who's going to come and see it and why are they going to want to watch it? It's just it's fundamental. And the more that it's baked in at the beginning, the clearer I think the journey is for the film.
[00:12:32] Aimée Lindorff So the marketplace we've already talked about at the marketplaces is quite crowded and it's more crowded than it's been in terms of the volume of high quality screen content available for people to watch across in theatres, across at home, even in-flight entertainment. How can we make sure local content cuts through?
00:12:51] Anthony Grundy There's something about Australian films that when they work, it's like there's this secret sauce baked in. And I can speculate. My hunch is that there is some connection to its authentic Australian ness. That is the driver. Sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't. So it's quite hard to pinpoint. But when it is there, it absolutely is. Part of, I think, the reason why people will search out Australian content. I do think that there is. Be it Australian, be it, you know, content from anywhere. What makes something theatrical needs to be really, really crystallised more than possibly it did before because consumers now have the chance to plan which which way they want to consume something. So the questions that I ask teams when we're sitting down to interrogate the audience, you know, does your project have a crystal clear audience? And some do and some don't. And even just at that top level, you can say it's very obvious who the audience is and then you know where they likely to find and watch that content. And there's definitely been projects that have come along where you can see that the subject matter might be a little bit challenging. The content excellent and the conceits are really great one, but it's something that people will in the decision making process think, Actually, I'd rather watch this at home. Where I can pull is halfway through or it deals with issues that my 14 year old daughter might be thinking about. I'll watch it with her. But in the comfort and security of at home. So what is it about your project that makes it absolutely clear that it must be seen in the cinema versus watching it at home? And then the other thing is, well, what are the elements of what makes things theatrical, such as, you know, Are they the function of what cinema can bring? So it's something to do during the school holidays. It can be date night. It can be morning tea for an older audience. We saw that really successfully recently with a project 'The Way My Way'. The Bill Bennett. Camino.
[00:14:57] Aimée Lindorff Camino Trek.
[00:14:58] Anthony Grundy Yeah. And it's one that you go, I know who you like. It's clear who that audience is. And it did really well in cinema. Is it? It has the opportunity to play like the heartland of that film. And the audience for that film is obviously an older audience and the occasion for them might be more morning tea programming. So you can say right from the beginning that, okay, that's where that's where the core is going to sit. Does your project lean into chicks at the flicks or girls night outs? That is something that cinemas tell us. You know, there's a real shortage of films that kind of fit those slots. And then what is it about the big screen in the technology cinemas we have some of the best cinemas in the world, like our major chains and our independents invest so much money in making that experience the best it can be. Yeah, that that's something that. Is there something intrinsic to your project that means it's going to be that much better on the big screen? Is it the music or is there something visual that needs the big screen to bring it to life? And it's hard to pick the zeitgeist moment, so it's hard to kind of three years before something's going to be released to go, this is going to be topical in the news. But then sometimes, you know, this is all just a plan and you can adjust accordingly as you go. But if you don't have a plan, that's the worst place you can be in.
[00:16:16] Aimée Lindorff And that's where working with your distributor to kind of come up with their marketing plans and then the scope and knowing who your audience is so that you get the best out of the theatrical window that you end up having.
[00:16:28] Anthony Grundy Absolutely, yeah. And distributors do this day in, day out. So, you know, it's not an exact science. We wouldn't need to be here if it was. People would just be everything would work. And there are surprises along the way. It's funny that some things will work, other things won't work and you can kind of post analyse it the difference between awareness and interest. There's definitely films that fall into this category that, you know, the awareness was high. Everyone knew that it was on the campaign didn't fail. They just didn't want to say it at the movies. And that's not new either. So that's always happened. But yeah, like I said, I think the bar for what makes things theatrical is has never been higher. And there's been yeah, there's been quite a lot of media coverage around this idea. And sure, there's absolutely challenges in the theatrical space, but at the same time I think that there's room for us all to, you know, live together harmoniously when things are truly theatrical. Audiences flock to cinema. So that hasn't changed. And the business is cyclical and it always has been. That hasn't changed either. So this idea that there's just a, you know, a very static pool of people and we've stolen them over to streaming, I think is I don't think that's right. The streaming environment has matured to a place where people understand what the streaming offering is. And at the same time, we now have a clear understanding of what the theatrical offering is as well. And the thing and maybe it's just within the business or within some of the industry reports, but I feel like. One film will live or die. That cinema is over because one film didn't work. Or we're hoping for that other film which is going to save cinema. And that's not I don't think that's the future. We should all be aiming for a really diverse range of product in the marketplace because there are so many audience clusters and some are currently underserved. And the more that we can really identify who those audience clusters are and make content that is theatrical cinematic, then I think we grow the pie and sure the audience is smarter and they're going to choose where they're going to want to watch. But I definitely don't think cinema is over. I just think it needs a bit of a recalibration about the kinds of things we make for it.
[00:18:31] Aimée Lindorff And that's where I guess marketing and distribution and exhibitors are all need to be on the same page in terms of what the story is and who the audience is and how to connect with them.
[00:18:40] Anthony Grundy Absolutely.
[00:18:42] Aimée Lindorff How does that fit into the work that's going to Australia's doing to support discoverability of Australian content?
[00:18:48] Anthony Grundy The there were kind of five takeaways that I took from the audience design piece that I was it was great because, you know, it was a new initiative for us. We brought our audience designer Sheila Colley from Ireland who has, you know, a huge amount of experience working in this space. We picked five teams that had to each of them did a two day workshop. And the thing that was great was you could see that there was a real hunger for filmmakers to understand more and have more knowledge around audience and audience design. The first day of the workshop was very much around understanding the themes. And then the second day is really the audience persona who's going to be connected to those themes, you know, in a very, very broadly speaking. But having the producer who is usually thinking with the commercial lens, who has the understanding of where the sale in the marketplace and, you know, with where it becomes a product, I guess. And then the writer who is obviously coming from a pure story perspective. And yeah, and that creates tension. Sometimes you can say the creative vision might be a little bit different or might be a little bit at odds with what the commercial potential could be. And so I loved really interrogating that. It was really it was really great. And sometimes you'd hit the hard like it might be understanding who the core, what the core theme is in a film, and you hit a barrier where you go, this is really hard because it's not clear yet. And that's the problem. And that's something Well, let's let's drill into that a little bit more. And then the big thing is assumption busting where it's like, my films four quadrant. And even there was a family film selected. And there's such a difference between the pre-teen, not like a younger teen family film, a family film that can still be exciting for a teen audience because when kids hit 12, they start to develop their own purchasing power and they want to go with their friends and they often don't want to go with their families. So really understanding the difference between an eight year old, a 12 year old and a 16 year old is fascinating. And looking at it from a story point to say, well, what are the barriers here for any of those? Or where is the viewing occasion? Is it grandparents who are going to take young kids or is it a family day out on a wet Sunday?
[00:21:12] Aimée Lindorff Or are they going with their school friends?
[00:21:14] Anthony Grundy Exactly. Exactly. And are they making does the marketing campaign need to hit them first and not necessarily the parents? So have we hit that kind of point? So, yeah, they were kind of the top takeaways. The Sheila does a lot of comping and benchmarking as well, which I love. So working out where the comparative titles are and those titles might be, there's so many different ways of comping and a lot of people think that it's only a box office analysis, which it is and it should be. But also it might follow the journey the filmmaking team is taking. It might be you can look at the Talk to Me example and go, okay, what were the steps along the way? What happened? What festivals did it go to? Where did its international significant sale come? And that will often yeah, just set the trend of a project that you can compare your project to, to say, well, you know, do I have the right ingredients to perhaps follow that that model?
[00:22:09] Aimée Lindorff So what are the similarities, what are the points of difference.
[00:22:12] Anthony Grundy Yeah. And getting into classification or getting into understanding on the spectrum of arthouse to mainstream what you fit and it's fine to fit wherever you want. So kind of finding out where and what, there may be some creative compromises that need to be made to then understand where you're going to fit that.
[00:22:32] Aimée Lindorff to feed that audience Yeah.
[00:22:33] Anthony Grundy So that's yeah, that was the audience design initiative. The other thing that we're really excited about is a new tool that we're adding to our website called Where to Watch. And it's basically a discoverability tool where people will and if people don't know, our website has so much information. And the best thing is that there's the screen guide, which is like the IMDb of Australian films. And it goes back for a long time and it, you know, you can find information about a lot of Australian films and onto each page I think we're starting with about 2500 titles at launch. We're going to give everyone the opportunity to find streaming links and session times for scripted drama documentaries and TV titles. And yeah, it's it's going to be a really important way for us to promote Australian titles. Like we were saying earlier, discoverability is it's a massive problem and particularly in a fast moving theatrical environment where if people don't know about you in the first week, you're going to have a problem. So this, you know, obviously the distributor does a lot of work, the cinemas do a lot of work. But what I love is that this is our chance to compliment some of that work and just provide direct streaming links and direct ticket sales links, live cinema links for our projects.
[00:23:56] Aimée Lindorff So the Screen Guide, as you already mentioned, it's kind of a central point for Australian titles, not just the one screen Australia have funded, but anything that that has the Australian flag attached to it. And then the way to watch functionality means that you can find it literally anywhere in the world, from what I understand.
[00:24:12] Anthony Grundy Well, the global part will be really interesting because we, we want our films to travel, that the, the global marketplace is so much smaller than it used to be and having visibility about where collectively a slate of films or individually, you know, individual titles may be resonating in a certain territory or in a certain region within the world. And it's down to a cinema programming level. So we'll be able to say, you know, what sessions they're getting and what cinemas they're in, as well as streaming links. And there's a number of reasons why I think that that's exciting. We'll be able to develop some benchmarks of where our content goes. And again, back to that assumption busting, you know, you'll see anecdotally, you'll hear people say certain things about how certain films perform in particular territories, and this will really give us that cold, hard data and that can help inform the investment process as well. But hopefully as the project goes, we'll be able to find ways of aggregating, probably in aggregate, that kind of giving that information back to producers and letting them, you know, get access to seeing where some of those trends and statistics lie.
[00:25:22] Aimée Lindorff That's exciting. And I guess, you know, from what we were talking to Raquel about last week with the marketplace data that we that screen Australia already curates, it's really going to be able to flesh out some of those details.
[00:25:34] Anthony Grundy Yeah, that's absolutely right. And even from a local cinema perspective, getting some data on the performance of the sessions. So this is going to give us a really interesting look under the hood just to say, and it might we're talking about morning tea sessions before we can see, okay, this film actually peaked in the morning, so you can actually start to close the loop out from that audience behaviour piece. And that is just going to, you know, greatly improve our ability of the funding decisions at the beginning to actually have a data source to test some of those assumptions at the end. So kind of closing the audience slow down I think is exciting. One of the things that hasn't changed and in fact could possibly be getting worse is the fragmentation for audiences of our time and where things are available. So it seems that we are more thinly spread than ever. And that's why the way to watch function is a really important tool because it helps consumers. You know, hopefully we can educate them about a project that's coming up. And then the the functionality is built in a way that it's really easy to use. You can just find out where that session is. It takes you to the website directly for the cinema and you can buy the tickets straight away. So we want to kind of capture the moment of when someone discovers they're interested and and then drive them to making that purchase. You know, audiences are just so thinly stretched. There's there's, you know, content coming at us from more places than ever and demanding our time. And yeah, this tool is going to be great to just clearly create those links where we can just drive people to where they can find and watch.
[00:27:16] Aimée Lindorff Joining us now is Paul Wiegard from independent distributor Madman Entertainment. You might recognise Madman from previous episodes of the podcast, including film marketing back in 2022. For over 25 years, the team at Madman have been working to showcase Australian films and are responsible for a range of feature films and documentaries, including High Ground, Shada Nytrom, Girls Can't Surf and The Giants, as well as upcoming documentaries Future Castle with Damon Gameau and Anna Kaplan and Justin Castles first feature documentary Ellis Park about Warren Ellis as well as the adaptation, Magic Beach, and Adam Elliot's latest claymation title Memoir of a Snail. Both of which screened at the recent Melbourne International Film Festival. Paul, thank you so much for joining us on the Screen Australia podcast.
[00:28:04] Paul Wiegard Very nice to be back on this podcast. Two years on.
[00:28:09] Aimée Lindorff Yes. So tell us a little bit for those who haven't met you before about your background in the industry.
[00:28:15] Paul Wiegard My background is basically Madman. Straight out of university, did a couple of degrees, at Melbourne uni and then worked at a small, I guess, music company. And then it sort of led into sort of into founding a business, business now known as Madman with a mate of mine over 25 years ago. So over that journey. Sort of. You know, the business has evolved with the myriad of new distribution channels and and with that was sort of leant a little bit on the job about how to engage audiences and and just accumulated experience. It's also been led into these days of actively participating. So there is an EP on a number of films, you know, endeavour to work personally across 2 to 4 films a year to sort of supplement our distribution business and on a more macro industry level these days, I chair the Australian International Documentary Conference and the Australian Independent Distributors Association. Lots of A's in what I do these days, and I'm still on the Board of Screen Rights and ACMI.
[00:29:29] Aimée Lindorff Fantastic. And you mentioned Madman works in both distribution and also EP.
[00:29:36] Paul Wiegard We're an all rights distributor. And I guess what does the word EP man? It means helping to bring money to the table. It also helps bringing in other partners with international. It also means a lot actually in terms of just our experience, particularly on the dock front with, you know, the latter stages of the edit to really meaningfully contribute to, you know, with more objective eyes and, you know, seeing a lot of what's happening in the market at large. On the scripted front, we spend a lot of time on the scripts and then hand it over to the producers to get on with it. So that's the participation producing. So I'm rooting for the Australian and New Zealand films and we wish them well. We think a lot of film do it as a distributor. We would think of Australia and New Zealand because we have offices both in Melbourne and in Auckland in the films that we are representing. All rights on where they are at script stage across the board, so, so films that we try and work on anywhere between sort of five upwards films across Australia and New Zealand each year. But over the last five years we have released high ground. Steven Johnson's film Girls Cant Surf the Australian Dream, Yatram Scheider Road to Patagonia, which is still on screens and doing really interesting bespoke journey up and down the East Coast in that old fashioned sort of surf film way. That's also tipped over half a million. How to Please a Woman, The Giants, The Bob Brown film. I mean, all these films have been released in the last yeah, probably four, maybe five years at most, and all grossed over 500k up to 3.5 million. Yeah, we would say the diverse, but we would say what's in common. They're all director lead auteur films. We like to think that we gravitate to know remarkable stories that are well told that will really engage audiences in a way that they'll feed a national conversation, ideally.
[00:31:38] Aimée Lindorff So when we talk about engage with audiences, what does that mean for you? What does that mean for Madman?
[00:31:47] Paul Wiegard Clearly one, they buy a cinema ticket. To gauge is it just a degree of is it relevant? Why's it being made? Do I have a sense of what the key themes are? Is it material that potentially will help possibly bring about either social change or, frankly, just straight out now entertain? And so it's like there's all different levels of engagement. This engagement clearly is engagement, at least word of mouth. And one of the things which we're excited about from the screening of Memoir of a Snail last Thursday at the Melbourne International Film Festival was the what we think will be extraordinary word of mouth that has come from just that, that one premiere, not its distinctive. We've certainly drawn Madman to stories that sort of help push cinema forward, like play with form. It's really bold and it's distinctive and it's all of the things that you want in cinema.
[00:32:50] Aimée Lindorff Fantastic. So the last time Madman was on the podcast was in 2022 to talk about film marketing. How would you say the marketing or distribution landscape has changed just in those few short years?
[00:33:05] Paul Wiegard I wouldn't say there's been any absolute fundamental changes in it's and that's a big question because we can talk about so many of the different distribution channels. I think the easiest one is always to talk about exhibition, I think because. The cinema figures are probably the most transparent and visible and people can sort of get a sense of what has happened and for how long and where it worked and comparing year to year. The number of films being released is pretty much been consistent the last 3 or 4 years. That sort of 750, a year, really, I mean we're talking, I guess the post-pandemic era, but the big change from pre-pandemic to where we are now is probably the number of blockbuster films that have been released by the studios. It's probably their 20% down. So I would say that on the box office level its been pretty flat since 2022. You know, it's sitting at 25, 28% down. This is the box office compared to where it was in 2019. Streaming numbers continue to to grow. That doesn't completely get lost out of the ecosystem. It transfers to somewhere else. So is that all gone into streaming? I mean arguably it has and into other media because, you know, we got a lot of screen time now. So I don't know whether there's been any straight out fundamental changes. I mean, a few of the things. It's been a few little quirks I would probably pick up on changes in audience behaviour.
[00:34:45] Aimée Lindorff Yeah.
[00:34:46] Paul Wiegard Yep. It's probably specifically called out the rise of the social networks, the film lovers. And this is I'm borrowing straight from Letter Box here and there, log line. It's fascinating to see the growth of that almost democratised film criticism. Anyone can be a film critic to a point. People inserting themselves into the content, providing a view on it, some sort of commentary, uploading it to Tik tok. That's certainly picked up over the last few years. And it's sort of, you know, it's an acceptable it's not like a shouty, angry, noisy, ugly space. It's it's interesting. It's a bit far more sophisticated than that. So it seems interesting challenge that now poses to the likes of producers and distributors. How do we feed that and how do we gauge that growth corridor? Because, you know, it's far more efficient, more effective to talk to an engaged audience who is into cinema or screen culture and then start with there and then build out from there in terms of the demographics that you're talking to.
[00:36:04] Aimée Lindorff That's such an interesting point about the content creation that isn't necessarily marketing material. It's actually coming from the audience as opposed to coming from the distributors or coming from the production itself.
[00:36:16] Paul Wiegard Yeah, it's like it's what's the balance, right?
[00:36:21] Aimée Lindorff So what I guess coming from that Australian New Zealand lens, what does that then mean for Australian projects and Australian productions?
[00:36:31] Paul Wiegard Well, clearly you need a huge suite of media assets and you need a plan. You can do it to a degree on the fly, respond to opportunities and activate them and evolve them. But I think it needs to have a very considered long lead campaign. I think in every Australian project you need at least six months run up to get all those sort of assets in place. And it's not to say that they will, that means it will necessarily work. But it's always about momentum, just nurturing that momentum. I don't think there's one sort of massive takeaway. It's just these are just evolving trends. I mean, it's always the challenges and it will always be the case. Australian films are up against the world and we're not the only English language territory, and there's a lot that comes out from other territories feeding into this marketplace. So you've got to have a she wider population and noise and activity internationally that you competing with. So how do you create your own energy and attention? So in all these discussions, Amy, you know there's the scripted features and then there's, you know, the feature documentaries, which they're not the same that both got their own nuances.
[00:37:49] Aimée Lindorff Well, that comes back to, I guess, what you were saying before about knowing who your audience is. But it sounds also like knowing what the medium is and what exactly your story and who's going to be watching it at the end.
[00:38:01] Paul Wiegard Correct. You know, quite a good question, because I got I sometimes sit down and go, what is an Australian scripted feature now? I think that's a much harder question to answer because I just think more broadly, does it reflect to our societies and the makeup of our communities? I find it's a tougher question. Then the same question of feature documentaries, because feature documentaries launch by their very nature are very much anchored in a local topic, particular personality. Usually something some event that's happened in Australia. So it's very anchored to who we are and what we are about and all those sorts of themes. Whereas with scripted features, I sort of hesitate to say, what is an Australian film now? What will we like to see even across? What genres should we welcome? That no doubt that we love seeing Alaska on screen and no doubt that it's very egocentric, but the Australian humour, when it nails who we are and we feel and see and experience that on screen, incredible experience. You know, like I'll never forget the first screenings of Kenny back in the day. Same sort of capturing it. Turner Frames.
[00:39:20] Aimée Lindorff Yep.
[00:39:20] Paul Wiegard But outside those sorts of two sort of areas. I wonder, you know, what is an Australian film these days? Films like Scheider, for example. I think that's a really important part of our of the mix of films that we participate in, the films that we make in this territory. Frankly, to finance Australian scripted features, they need to be able to play in other territories versus feature documentaries. You know, if you look at what feature documentaries have been doing. Even though it's been tough for the box office over the last 12 months for feature documentaries and more for the internationally, we looked at where feature docs are. Over the last 3 or 4 years to where they were ten, 15 years ago. It's extraordinary how much that area of its great content has grown and the regularity with which these films are finding audiences since the pandemic, I think we've only had about. Ghee. I think at most 15. Feature films that have grossed more than $1 million. That's a pretty modest output over the past four or five years. And in that list, there's several docs.
[00:40:43] Aimée Lindorff So moving away, I guess, from theatrical and talking about that online space and streaming a little bit more. What have you observed in terms of the changes to the theatrical landscape and how do you see Australian productions or Australian projects pivoting to those changes?
[00:41:00] Paul Wiegard Its interesting. I would say you can't uncouple the pandemic and streaming. The same time the pandemic hit. The streamers were there, established it was working and basically educated. The 50 plus audience how to stream at home and how to get comfortable doing it. And the convenience of streaming, that's been the most challenging audience to get back into the groove of going to the cinema for the independent space. There's a long tradition of, you know, talking to 40, 50 plus female audience, and we knew exactly how to talk to that audience. And now that's a lot tougher now to speak to that audience consistently to get them out. That impact the pandemic and streaming has been significant on the box office. And if the box office is in Australia, this year will be about circa 1 billion, down from its peak of 1.2 1.25 billion in 2019. So you could say, well, maybe just in simple terms, the impacts being $250 million or so and all that, that cash, I don't think it leaks out of the system. I think it ends up going into the streaming channels, particularly with so many little economies within the economy. And it's fascinating seeing the performance of the IMAX sites, which has been Stellar, events, people desperate to get out of their homes. And they do love events and they do so. So it's been refreshing to see that bounce back at the film festivals this year. But again, it's like all these questions, the quite complicated, right, because of like the impact the stream is on the landscape. I would say not all streamers are the same. You know, there's still a degree of experimentation. Films are very expensive, and if the thinking is there are these films that really ultimately they only ever want to be explored at all, on streaming platforms, I think that's not a That's not a healthy risk management position, you know, because it's a bit of a one trick pony. There are films that do deserve to be on the big screen and do do very well. And there are streamers that are leaning into that too, because how else can I fund these budgets? There's been a huge investment from a number of the streamers into getting audiences into cinema, not completely black or white. So one area that is and this is just modern distribution and convenience, it's confusing at the moment, a case of film in release, how many days have to wait until some streaming? And there was a world ten years ago. It was quite an established science film going to cinema 3 or 4 months with Pathe, depending on then you knew it was going to be on pay TV or at least on physical media, and then it would step out from there. Now its this haze of premium VOD, 30 days, 14 days, event releases. This is truly everything's all happening all over the place all at once, which means it's confusing. I think it's confusing to the industry, let alone others, let alone the audiences.
[00:44:21] Aimée Lindorff So then I guess, what are some of the things Madman are thinking about to enhance the discoverability of Australian content in that space when you've got so much on streaming, as we've mentioned, so much English language, foreign language on streaming. You've also got that competition at the box office as well. What should we be thinking about or what is Madman thinking about to enhance the discoverability of Australian content?
[00:44:47] Paul Wiegard We always think we're going to have lots of runway and lots of testing, observing, evolving, whatever the strategy is and being as bespoke as possible. And this is, again, I'm talking more specifically around independent cinema. So with Australian films, it really is all about enough runway getting enough and enough momentum on the project and just awareness that we can step out the realease and then escalate it. The problem with going out wide day one and you're constantly being pressured to do so because that fear of missing out that exhibitors have and it's all at once you can fail and fail very quickly and you can't evolve. When you go out to to wide and all at once. So what we're trying to do is just be bespoke without campaigns and just trying to event ties wherever we possibly can and frankly, just giving our selves enough runway to bring on as many partners as we can to participate in the film's release. So, like Magic reached the local publishers of the book to be involved. And they need time and bookshops and lots of things. So like Memoir Of A Snail that means setting up a major exhibition within the permanent exhibition within ACMI. There's a site there. We know there will be tens of thousands of putters walking through that free exhibition just to see it and dig in to see that particular film. And sometimes it also helps. Like there are times for some films you just by giving ourselves enough runway, we can also tell where the film is not going to work. So there's no point putting foot after bat too so, How do we risk manage that if we just can't gather any momentum? Gives us enough time to frankly pivot into other channels as well on a premium to then ultimately we're representing the interests of the filmmakers and the investors. How do we try to find a return on their investment?
[00:46:55] Aimée Lindorff And where does after the films come out, after it's had its exhibition window, Where does its Second life kind of sit in that long term? Because obviously, you know, Madman has been running for over 25 years now. You've got an extensive back catalogue.
[00:47:11] Paul Wiegard Yeah its interesting, probably in really simple terms, every film sits somewhere in each of these distribution channels and are weighted differently. So, I mean, ideally we sit here for three hours and go through a whole myriad of different case studies and say, well, this is the why that landed its this time of the year, it's collectable and landed there because we could get a major premium VOD release. That one had talent out there pushing the film around. You know, it's interesting in watching the film like the Giants, Bob Brown and his foundation end up using it as part of, as a way of reactivating those who have been dormant on the areas of activism, what have you. So he used that in a political sense, actually it was facinating to see that in another market. So back to the initial question about core of the revenue that we see comes from the box office quarter from streaming, maybe upwards of a quarter from the transactional space quarter comes from still physical media and the education sector.
[00:48:16] Aimée Lindorff Fascinating. So it doesn't.. a films life. And I mean, we talk about this a lot on the pod, but a film's life doesn't end at the theatre. It can have second, third, fourth life.
[00:48:28] Paul Wiegard Exactly. I mean, it's interesting. Too often critics ready to call a film a flop or a failure. And I just think that sort of undermine or basically doesn't show much understanding of the longer tale. I mean, there are films, of course, that they just found no audience. And there and there in ends of the story. But there are many films that have several iterations. We like to think still about a film's life in 3 to 4 year terms. So it was a world where probably many distributors used to think of films in a sort of 6 to 7 year cycle because of the free to air windows now think it's a bit more accelerated, but in that sort of 3 to 4 year window, which is a heck of a lot more time than the opening week of a box office, I'm talking I'm contemplating called 150 to 200 weeks versus one week at the box office.
[00:49:33] Aimée Lindorff But that level of, I guess, investment in the marketing or in those assets that you were talking about earlier, that definitely changes when we're looking at that four year window instead of that six month window.
[00:49:46] Paul Wiegard Yeah, I mean, that's. That's a big part of it, you know? What are we creating now on release that will continue to be used and then have dividends yielded from that activity downstream because those assets that were created can continue to be used in the education system be it on a transactional platform?
[00:50:09] Aimée Lindorff Yeah. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for your time today Paul. I really appreciate you talking with us.
[00:50:15] Paul Wiegard My pleasure.
[00:50:17] Aimée Lindorff That was Paul Wiegard, CEO of Madman Entertainment. Thanks to Paul and my colleague at Screen Australia, Ant Grundy, for sharing their expertise and insights. To stay up to date with the latest episodes of Screen Australia's podcast. Remember to subscribe through places like Spotify and iTunes, and for the latest news from the local screen industry, subscribe to the Screen Australia newsletter. Thanks for listening.
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