Swedish arthouse sector and Göteborg Festival’s VOD launch new initiative

Since August 19, as part of their monthly SEK 89 (€8.5) subscription, Swedish customers of Draken Film are given complimentary tickets to watch new films in their local cinema, valid only the opening weekend.

The Göteborg Film Festival’s artistic director Jonas Holmberg who sits on the films’ selection committee told nordicfilmandtvnews.com: “The initiative is focused on boosting admissions during opening weekends, which are crucial for distributors’ ambitions to give their films a longer life in cinemas.”

So far 30 cinemas, as well as arthouse distributors Folkets Bio, NonStop Entertainment, Lucky Dogs and Smorgårdsbord Picture House have signed up.

All partners get a compensation from Draken Film, which in turn benefits from the promotional plug.

“Different subscription models for cinema tickets have been successful at other markets, and we believe that this initiative has the potential to attract more subscribers to Draken Film and give new energy to the arthouse film sector in Sweden,” says Holmberg who continues: “We have decided to launch this initiative now, despite the shaky market, since cinemas really need help to attract customers after the pandemic lockdown.”

New releases part of the offer are the Cannes 2019 entry Little Joe by Jessica Hausner (released today Friday by Folkets Bio), the Swedish documentary Meanwhile on Earth by Carl Olsson (De Andra), US biopic Shirley (Non Stop Entertainment), and Norwegian drama Disco.

The film directed by Jorunn Myklebust Syversen will be distributed by Draken Film, which makes its entry on the Swedish theatrical market.

This is the second collaboration of Draken Film with local distributors to support local arthouse cinemas, after the joint release mid-March of five premiere titles on VOD, with half revenues from new subscribers then donated to selected cinemas picked by each subscriber.

New windowing models
For Holmberg, the entire traditional distribution model has to be revised, alongside relationships between streaming and theatrical. “We are convinced that cooperation will be key in the future, especially for art house cinema, which for several years has struggled in the Swedish cinema market,” he notes.

Both Jakob Abrahamsson, CEO at NonStop Entertainment, and Katrina Mathsson, Head of Marketing and Acquisitions at Folkets Bio concur with Holmberg.

Mathsson says: The “holdback policies are something we have been discussing for years. One consequence of Covid-19 has been that even Svenska Bio [Sweden’s second largest cinema chain] has backed down on the terms. When the commercial cinemas closed down and our films were only playing in the arthouse cinemas we could apply a freer policy. Our general view is that every title is unique and needs a specific distribution strategy, and that we all have something to win with a more flexible model. Concerning Draken Film specifically, we need to team up with everyone on the arthouse scene in order to survive,” she said.

Abrahamsson adds: “Streamers are the new indie studios, they make the films Paramount Vantage, Focus Features, Warner independent, Miramax etc did ten years ago - and bigger stuff too. As a distributor and cinema operator [Stockholm’s Capitol cinema], there is no way of fighting this. On the contrary, one needs to embrace it!”

For NonStop’s CEO, Covid-19 has only “accelerated trends on the market and been hurtful especially for his exhibition business. “But during a crisis, there is also a momentum to try to pull things off that would never have worked in regular times,” he says, adding. “It’s the time of giants, but it’s also the time for small, low-overhead agile indies. At least for now.”

Urgent Public help
Looking at the second half of 2020, both Abrahamsson and Mathsson expect a rough ride, due notably to the extension until the end of the year of the 50 people max public gathering rule in Sweden.

The two seasoned distributors/exhibitors, pledge for extra public support to stay afloat, on top of the SEK 50 million covid-19 government package that went to loss revenues for March, April, May. “We absolutely need support retroactively for the summer, and for the fall, at least until Christmas,” says Abrahamsson.

Mathsson adds: “In order to maintain a diversity in the cinemas, it is of utmost importance that distributors and exhibitors of arthouse content receive support. This is the most important issue for us now that everyone is hoping that Christopher Nolan’s Tenet will save the cinemas. If this is not acknowledged, arthouse distributors and cinemas are at great risk,” she warns.