Opportunities for indie filmmakers to get their work out through non-traditional channels are amassing more and more every day. VOD platforms are especially growing more popular, with films like Some Girl(s) being released on Vimeo On Demand day-and-date with its theatrical released. CollegeHumor, popular for its comedic shorts and articles, has become the latest in a number of feature films to opt for the VOD option. Today they release their first ever feature film, Coffee Town, direct-to-digital. To find out where you can watch it, hit the jump.
According to an article in the LA Times, CollegeHumor has accrued 11 Webby Awards and 4.7 million subscribers in 14 years. But they've never released a feature film, something that will change with the release of Coffee Town, a comedy made for less than a cool million, starring Glenn Howerton of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and written and directed by Brad Copeland, of Arrested Development fame.
Since 2006, media mogul Barry Diller's IAC has owned a majority stake in CollegeHumor. The both of them decided on the distribution strategy of Coffee Town -- to take advantage of CollegeHumor's built-in web-savvy audience by releasing it on VOD and marketing it exclusively through the site's social media outlets. Says co-founder of College Humor, Ricky Van Veen, "We think that there are some movies that need to buy a lot of TV ads and be in 3,000 theaters to be successful, but something like Coffee Town we believe can find an audience without those bells and whistles."
Comedians like Louis C.K., who released a comedy special directly through his website for $5 and netted over $1 million and won an Emmy, have shown that a successful release of this sort is very possible, especially if you already have a following.
Coffee Town releases today (July 9th) across several VOD platforms, including Amazon Instant Video and iTunes. Check out the trailer below:
What do you think? As an indie filmmaker, do you think this is the future of indie film distribution? If you've seen the movie, tell us what you thought about it in the comments!
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