Reaching Audiences: Distribution and Promotion of Alternative Moving Image

by Julia Knight, Peter Thomas

Through a series of case studies, this book tracks the inventive distribution and exhibition initiatives developed over the last 40 years by an array of small companies on the periphery of the beleaguered UK film industry. That their practices are now being replicated by a new generation of digital distributors demonstrates that, while the digital ‘revolution’ has rendered those practices far easier to undertake and hugely increased their scope, the key issues in securing a more diverse moving image culture are not technological. Although largely invisible to outsiders, the importance of distributors and distribution networks are widely recognized within the industry and Reaching Audiences is a key contribution to our understanding of the role they both do and can play.

306 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 28, 2011

About the author

Julia Knight is a Reader in Moving Image at the Centre for Research in Media and Cultural Studies of the University of Sunderland and a co-editor of the journal Convergence.

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Reviews

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

An important book for film and media studies scholars that looks at the important but often ignored phenomenon of independent distribution of underground work. Beneath the publicity of film and video festivals are the distributors on the quixotic quest of extending experimental and adventurous works to a wider public. Although UK based in its analysis, the book has large implications globally and makes good connections with distribution of independent film and video in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s with present concerns around digital distribution. A must read for film and media scholars as well as independent media makers.