![]() First there were the patents on the Edison Kinetograph (the photographic apparatus that produced the pictures) and the Kinetoscope (the "peep show" viewing machine that exhibited them) in 1891. So far as most American film histories and the US Patent Office are concerned, movies in the United States began with Thomas Edison (1847ā1931). The first independents: Resistance to the Edison trust New Hollywood and independent filmmaking.United Artists: Resistance to the studio system.Independent filmmaking in the studio era.The first independents: Resistance to the Edison trust.Of interest as well are the niche films that proliferated in the early years of studio Hollywood, the Poverty Row pictures of the 1930sā1950s, the so-called new American cinema avant-garde in New York in the 1960s and 1970s, and the various independent cinemas that emerged as Hollywood conglomerized and monopolized the entertainment market after 1980. What follows surveys the history of American independent cinema beginning with the very first alternatives to Edison's early films and the cartel he subsequently founded. Independent films are often screened at local, national, or international film festivals before distribution (theatrical and/or retail release). They are sometimes distinguishable by their content and style and the way in which the filmmakers' personal artistic vision is realized. Independence assumes a distance from the commercial mainstream that is systematically and industrially maintained. They often contain groundbreaking subject matter designed for sophisticated audiences, and are not necessarily produced with commercial success as the goal. ![]() Generally, the marketing of independent films is characterized by limited release designed to build word-of-mouth or to reach specialty audiences, but can also have major marketing campaigns and a wide release. Independent films, often with unconventional plots and characters, usually attract only small audiences in small, so-called art-house theaters, and have little access to prime distribution markets. The definition of what constitutes an independent film, or indie film, still needs to be clarified, although it usually means a film made outside of the established studio system, also known as the "mainstream" professional circut, by a little-known director who is working on a shoestring budget. As long as a feature is screened in commercial theaters and/or aired on pay or network TV, as long as it carries a PCA seal or MPAA rating system designation, independence is a relative term. Such an independence can be attained only by degree. To be independent in the film business denotes a freedom from something, whether the vicissitudes of the commercial market or the matrix of companies that dominate the production and distribution of motion pictures in America. "Independence" is in many ways the Holy Grail in the film business - something most everyone who makes movies strives for but can never quite attain. ![]()
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