Name a commerically sucessful indie film

[Scotness]

I was going through all my DVD's - and CD's - that friends had made the other day - and I realised that none of them were commercially sucessful. And now that I think of it there are very few low/no budget indies that I can think of that I would call sucessful -- commercially that is - not "we finished it" sucessful!

Perhaps Primer, and Kisses and Caroms - I don't know what kind of money the latter did - but it turned up at my local Video Ezy here in Australia under the title of "American Pool" or something - so it got somewhere!

But anyway I know there are sucess stories out there - but can anyone name some that made any kind of decent profit - and perhaps one that was made and discussed by people here. None of my efforts fall into this category (yet!)

[Astro]

Necromantic.

[woods01]

Well it all depends on how you define "success". Do you mean that it got a distribution deal or that it made bags and bags of money?

There are the famous indies that were picked up and distributed like Slacker, Clerks and El Mariachi. Not as famous would be Chris Nolan's Following. And let's not forget all of Jarmusch's early stuff and I'll mention Winnipeg auteur Guy Maddin's first feature Tales from Gimli Hospital. However, I believe for most of those films their distribution deal put the actual project into a break even point and they weren't exactly hits except as cult movies on video.

The real indie hits I can think of are Napolean Dynamite and Blair Witch. And then there are numerous fake indie hits with million dollar budgets and a professional crew like My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

[Actor]

- but can anyone name some that made any kind of decent profit -

Deep Throat

Filmed on 16mm for $25,000. So far has grossed over $600,000,000.

[BigBeaner]

Technically, Francis Ford Coppola's and George Lucas' are usually independent movies - specifically the later Star Wars movies that were funded primarily from Lucasfilm itself and distributed through Fox. Memento, a lot of Kurosawa's films were independent, Blair Witch Project and the affore mentioned El Marachi, Little Miss Sunshine. There's a ton you just sometimes don't realize it.

[Actor]

Technically, Francis Ford Coppola's and George Lucas' are usually independent movies - specifically the later Star Wars movies that were funded primarily from Lucasfilm itself and distributed through Fox. Memento, a lot of Kurosawa's films were independent, Blair Witch Project and the affore mentioned El Marachi, Little Miss Sunshine. There's a ton you just sometimes don't realize it.

"Technically," The Terminator and the first James Bond film Dr No were independent films.

Orson Welles's Shakespearean films Macbeth, Othello and The Chimes at Midnight. were independent films. He often put the entire production on hold while he scrounged up more cash. I don't know if the Welles films made money but they are such classics and have been in release for so long that it would surprise me if they had not made money.

[Actor]

How about Herk Harvey's Carnival of Souls?

The movie was made in 1962 for $33,000 (probably $300,000 to $400,000 in today's money). It gained an immediate cult following, played for years at drive-ins and became known as "the movie that would not die." It's available on DVD from the Criterion Collection. Odds are it's made money.

It was shot on B&W 35mm, silent with Mariachi style ADR.

Wes Craven's direct to video color remake sucks!

[brokenflashlight]

Carnival of Souls; good one.

[Mmechanic]

Easy Rider, 1968-69

[ricohmite]

Blood Simple

[mattias]

few low budget independent movies become big hits, but for the filmmaker it's not that hard to make a decent profit. simply selling your film to one distributor in one market will cover your budget, give yourself a nice salary, and then some. of course you need to finish the film yourself, or they will deduct the finishing cost from the price, meaning you get nothing. something to consider for everyone who thinks they just have to edit the film and let the distributor pick up the finishing costs. i have my feature financed all the way to an answer print on 35mm, so when one of the distribution deals i'm working on finally closes that's money for me and my investors directly, whether my film becomes a huge hit or not. my budget was around $100,000 btw.

[Wade]

of course you need to finish the film yourself, i have my feature financed all the way to an answer print on 35mm, .

Besides mixing sound, lab work to get an answer print, what else should you budget to finish the indie film? Do you need to budget in marketing costs?

[Wade]

Looks like the movie Paranormal Activity can be added to the list. It's close to being home-made--literally being shot in the director's home for production cost of $15,000 USD. Last weekend BO as of 10-26-2009 is $22M. Marketing was on Twitter and other sites.

[Matthew Buick]

Blair Witch? :mrgreen:

[grainy]

There' s a lot of successful indy films out there: the above plus Pi, Night of the LIving Dead, Sweet Sweetback's Baaaad aaaas song, the list goes on.
I'm not sure but I think a few of John Cassevetes' films did well.
BTW, Primer was not commercially successful. It is popular with a devoted group on DVD but totally died in the theater. Not sure if it was due to ThinkFilm going belly up at the time or what...