Is A24 the Death or Rebirth of Indie Cinema?

Does the success of the studio signify a new interest in independent filmmaking or a new face of franchise loyalty?

A week ago, independent distribution company A24 made Academy Awards history, striking gold with seven above-the-line wins for two films and breaking the record for the most nominations and the most above-the-line victories for a single company in a single year. Everything Everywhere All at Once became the company’s second Best Picture winner, also taking Best Director, Original Screenplay, and three acting awards, with A24’s The Whale securing the other prize for acting. After last year’s winner, CODA, became the first Best Picture victory for a streaming service, the Academy seems to be shifting to more progressive media and distributors aimed at a more populist audience. A steady decrease in viewership over the past twenty years and a higher level of scrutiny of the institution has led to increasingly desperate ploys to reinforce the Academy’s own relevance — a likely contributor to A24’s success this season. 

However, the distribution company’s success this week stirred a thought that had been brewing for some time, and has likely crossed the minds of those in touch with A24’s films. Over the decade since its inception, the company has developed a cult following unlike any other studio of its kind. On Twitter and Instagram, A24 has collectively garnered nearly five times the following of any of its competitors, such as Focus Features, Neon, and Film4. Obviously, the studio isn’t the only one of its kind, but why is it considered the most prolific by so many young film fans?

A simple Google search will find many rankings of their entire filmography, and praise for the studio’s consistent output — consumers treat the company’s products as if they were the artistic canon of a renowned auteur, not the products of a company. Is A24 a truly different distributor, or has it simply been meticulous in crafting a direct-to-consumer relationship? 

A24 is not a ground-up startup, and unlike many other independent labels, it has not gone under or survived long enough to accept a buy-out offer. Instead, seed funds for the distribution company were reaped from Guggenheim Partners, and the founding trio were all well-established film veterans with deep connections around the industry. A24’s first film, A Glimpse into the Mind of Charles Swan III, was directed by Roman Coppola (son of Francis Ford Coppola) and starred Bill Murray — not the type of unknown endeavor with which most independent distributors debut. Using their already elevated platform, the founders wanted to revive independent filmmaking by going all-in on internet marketing and increasing their films’ relevance by solidifying themselves within the online cultural canon. 

In order to sell the idea that the company is synonymous with prestige and idiosyncrasy, A24 began to utilize new marketing techniques that were built entirely on a direct-to-consumer relationship forged from online marketing. They scrapped the traditional basis of billboards, network advertising, and in-theater trailers in favor of modern tactics based on social media interaction. To promote their 2015 film, The Witch, the company’s marketing team created individual accounts for the film’s characters, including Black Philip, the satanic goat. For the modern sci-fi classic Ex Machina, the marketing campaign included catfishing people on Tinder with an account featuring the main character, Ava — after engaging in conversation with Ava, her matches would be directed to her Instagram account which featured promotional materials for Ex Machina. 

The company’s interactive relationship with their fans through unusual merchandising and sleek online advertising has cultivated a unique engagement unlike that of the company’s independent competitors. They have even established an exclusive pay-to-join tier to access more of the studio’s online content — a remarkable feat for a distribution company to build such a robust fanbase that customers are content with paying a monthly fee simply to consume more advertising. A24’s fan base is more like Hollywood giants like Marvel than independent contemporaries like Focus Features. 

So what does this unique engagement mean for independent films? With in-theater viewership on the decline, the future of movie consumption seems ostensibly pre-determined. Big chain companies don’t want to take risks by showing lower-budget indie features, so AMC and Cinemark screens are exclusively dominated with franchise reboots and sequels. Martin Scorsese wrote that even he had trouble getting The Irishman picked up by a distributor until Netflix came along, because companies were nervous about losing out on in-theater profits to big-budget franchise films — all before the pandemic further decimated movie theater profits. Streaming services swooping in to distribute arthouse films increases accessibility, but the convenience of in-home entertainment discourages in-theater viewership, and movies from The Irishman to smaller indie features, like Petite Maman, are not given the time of day, shuffled into endlessly expanding streaming catalogs.  

So, in a sense, A24 cultivating a dedicated fanbase encourages young viewers to seek out arthouse cinema on the big screen, and diverge from more convenient consumption to appreciate movies as they were meant to be seen. But at the same time, brand loyalty to a single distributor who is lauded as THE face of the independent film landscape has set indie cinema down a dangerous path. 

Firstly, A24 was born out of a contemporary marketing plan, and while their methodology can get audiences committed to watching their products, entrusting the future of filmmaking to a corporate enterprise is dangerous, even if it is a studio committed to championing original storytelling. Brand loyalty results in uncritical media consumption, and A24 has expertly hidden their profit-driven motives under a facade of artistic integrity. 

Additionally, lauding A24 as the sole purveyor of independent filmmaking gives a distinctly white American perspective to non-franchise cinema. Of the in-house productions on their slate, the vast majority are helmed by white male auteurs, and the few that are not are usually buried by the marketing teams and sentenced to digital releases or extremely limited theatrical showings. Chances are you didn’t see, or even hear of, Elegance Bratton’s The Inspection, but there’s a much better chance you know about Noah Baumbach’s White Noise, released within the same week this past November. White Noise received a much higher advertising budget than The Inspection from A24 and Netflix despite considerably lower audience scores on Rotten Tomatoes (by over 60%), Letterboxd, and IMDB. A similar fate met Rashid Johnson’s Native Son, which was relegated to a digital release while Claire Denis’s High Life (released only two days earlier) got a theatrical release despite lower audience scores, burying the chance of proper promotion for Native Son. 

Additionally, A24 is based out of New York, and with a catalog of almost 200 films, 79% of their output is American-made while only 2% is non-English. Less than 30 foreign films have ever grossed over $10 million in the American box office, and so increasing the disparity of foreign films by culturally defining independent films as quintessentially American is a serious oversight. Even Parasite, an independent foreign film that entered the mainstream, only barely broke the Top 100 in the 2019 Box Office, despite its historic awards season victories. Foreign films are asymmetrically misrepresented in American film consumption, and so worship of a distribution company that vastly under-represents non-English films could continue this homogenous trend in viewership, even in indie circles.

So is A24’s unparalleled upward trend for better or for worse? As a viewer, it is hard for me to appreciate a distribution company’s artistic merit separate from profit-driven motives, leaving me disillusioned with the cult following behind the studio. But their unique marketing strategy is bringing young viewers back in touch with thoughtful and artistic filmmaking, even though A24’s filmography just scratches the tip of the iceberg when it comes to representing independent cinema. It is not surprising that a younger artistically-minded audience would latch on to a studio that consistently produces movies that are reminiscent of a classic house style. Simultaneously, it is increasingly frustrating to watch fellow young film fans develop a cult following around a domestic and homogenous corporation rather than an artist. It’s possible to appreciate a rebirth in independent cinema while demanding that audiences reach beyond the scope of a single studio, to seek out art that brand loyalty can’t buy.