Boxoffice-July.1995

the screen total in Europe
Withbeing carried skyward by the
stampede to multiplexing, it
follows that tlie next idea on the minds of
international players is distribution. Simply
put: Who will feed the beast?
Europe's current distribution alignment
has different companies handling single or,
at most, three or four territories. Buying
European distribution rights piecemeal,
however, is considered by many to be untenable
in the long run. "One of the major
problems with European distribution,"
Kagan's Borde says, "is that they're so segmented.
There's no real European production
entity, although there're a lot of small
would-be entities. [Gemian conglomerate]
BMG owns one distributor in Spain and one
in Italy, but again there's no real united
European distribution front like the Americans
have. There's no way that [small European
distributors] can compete against a
well-oiled American distribution machine."
Decatron is just beginning to step into
distribution, and Bert likes to take the pan-
European distribution view as well. "In Europe,
when people go to the American Film
IVIarket or Cannes, they still buy rights for
France or for Germany [singly]. There will
be a trend where people will start buying
distribution lights for the whole of Europe.
The small distribution companies will come
under pressure, and we will see more and
more distribution on a European scale."
Bert believes the trend is already manifesting
itself in the fonn of multi-country
deals. "We see that [Belgium] is too small to
make a profit, and it would be better to buy
in bigger quantities. Even now, for example,
we will try to buy rights for the Benelux
countries [Belgium, the Netherlands and
Luxembourg] as a whole."
But Borde is skeptical that this shift will
happen anytime in the near term.
"There's definitely a big push by the European
Community to try to create a pan-
European distribution arena. But that
takes time, and it takes a state of mind."
As Bert stresses, "If rights have to be
bought on a European scale, the amount
of money that will be involved will be far
higher than at the moment. Again, the
smaller distribution companies will have
more and more difficulties buying the
rights to different markets."
Over at Miramax, Sands says his company
has evolved a successful strategy for
dealing with the currendy fragmented
state of Europe's entertainment tectonics.
The Miramax approach might best be described
as the distribution equivalent of
local co-production. "We have picked two
to tliree distributors in each marketplace,
and we try to sell them the bulk of our
product because they understand how we
work," Sands says. "That's been our strategy:
to align ourselves witl: a few distributors
in each marketplace."
More than that, though, when sending
films abroad Miramax helps helm the
marketing rudder "Once we license rights
to distributors," Sands says, "we give them
marketing, publicity and promotional
support. We supply them with the print
and electronic campaigns." The combination
of U.S. promotional muscle and local
market savvy appears to have been a resounding
success, as "Pulp Fiction," for
one, has at this writing brought in more
than $100 million in boxoffice overseas
against $110 million domestically.
For Robert Altman's "Pret-a- Porter"
("Ready to Wear" stateside) Miramax tailored
marketing campaigns for different territories
in league with local distributors and
expects the fashion picmre's overseas take
will quadruple its $9 million from America.
"The French campaign was considered very
controversial," Sands says, "and it worked
beautifully. The German campaign was tailored
from the French campaign and the
picmre did huge business."
that American firms are be-
more comfortable with
Nowcoming
their European counterparts and
have a visible presence in most markets, it
looks like another thing on the radar is a
surge in co-productions betsveen American
companies and local producers. "I tiiink the
world is clearly getting smaller," says National
Amusements' Redstone. "When you
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34 Boxoi'UCE
Response No. 62