Indie Film Has an Architecture Problem

I realized how broken the indie film model was when we released a good film — made on a disciplined budget, that premiered at a festival and was picked up for distribution — but the investor stood to lose money from that release, the distributors weren’t aligned with the marketing team, and we didn’t get enough audience out to theaters. We did “everything right,” we just didn’t do enough things right.

I see the same pain in nearly every filmmaker I speak with. 

It’s 2026. You’re exhausted, skeptical, and quietly terrified that the thing you’ve given your life to might not be viable anymore.

The indie film model isn’t struggling. It was structurally designed to fail those working in it. Instead of building a new model, everyone carved a moat to try and protect what they’d built for as long as possible, which looks like fixed fees, taking first position in the waterfall, and lack of transparency – all the way to outright unethical business practices. 

Worse, it splits us into factions of investors, filmmakers, distributors, and audiences that fight against each other instead of building together. 

It is irresponsible for someone to put money into an indie film that has no plan for distribution or recouping the investor’s capital. What’s more, the upside is capped.

When was the last time a $1 million film led to a billion-dollar outcome? Right. The closest thing is the “Paranormal Activity” franchise. Blum and Paramount got lucky — and then immediately built a new model to ensure they’d never have to rely on getting lucky again. 

One in 4,000 screenplays results in a profitable theatrical outcome. 0.025 percent. Not because the films were bad, but because they weren’t using a model connecting screenplay to investable package to a distributable movie to paying audiences.

Every year there are 200,000 scripts written, 3,000 to 5,000 produced, 500 in theaters, and 50 or so that are profitable. That’s an oversupply at every phase.

The current indie model ignores that there are four different audiences that it needs to serve. Investors only show up at the last moment with the most protective terms, because in the current model that’s the only responsible move. Filmmakers make the films they want without considering distribution or audience, because nobody taught them to think differently. Distributors need $50 million outcomes to break even, so they ignore everything smaller. And audiences are exhausted by sameness because only one type of film survives this gauntlet.

In the most ironic misalignment, the industry celebrates the myth of the lone auteur and then punishes anyone who actually tries to be one.

We’re not talking about studios and streamers here. They have different outcomes than we do. That’s not a criticism — their model works for them. It just doesn’t work for us.

There’s an idyllic bent out there that’s dangerously disconnected from market realities: “We need to be able to make the art we want to make and people should support it.” 

Sure, that’s a nice thought. 

The only way that model works is if it’s funded by donors and patrons. That requires either broad scale from many, or deep resonance from a few. But it’s not a marketplace model. It’s not profitable, and it’s not sustainable.

If we want to build a new model that works it needs to be married to market realities. We need to look at the data, understand buyer psychology across the entire value chain, and make things people want to buy. That’s not selling out, that’s selling. That’s business.

So what does a new model for independent film look like? My concern with indie film right now is that we mistake independent for alone, and that’s what keeps the model broken. We need a model that works better by working better together. 

There are a few reading this — one in 50 if my math is accurate — that are architects by nature. You lie awake at night trying to close the gap between a great script and a profitable release because you see it as a function of poor engineering, not lack of talent. But a film also needs craftspeople – filmmakers, artists, makers of all kinds. Those that do the thing they were put on this earth do and nothing else. 

Artists need architects to turn their work into something ready for the market. From chain of title to chains of theaters, the architect has a plan and makes it happen. But without art there’s nothing to architect or optimize. The architects need to value and design a system that protects the creative space for the artists to do their best work. 

The role of the artist is to master your craft, to tell the stories that resonate with you, and find the architects and the audience that match your frequency. The Architects do everything else — find the money, develop the package, enroll the best possible team, find distribution, and market the film every single day from day one to reach as many people as possible.

Filmmakers started coming to me asking, “What are you looking for?”

I didn’t have a good answer. But I do now. Along the path from story to screen are three essential questions:

The first: can I architect this idea into something the market will respond to? Said shorter: is there leverage? Can I do something to help make this “work”? An investor in my network that is interested in this type of material, a production company that can co-finance, a tax credit, or a built-in audience I’ve grown over time with each new film?

The second: do I feel compelled to make it? If so, then I can move that project to the next phase of development, then packaging, financing, production, and so forth. It’s not just about feeling good about the project – it’s commercial at the core. An architect-producer who is compelled is the one who will remain focused for 18 months of development, production, post, marketing, and distribution when everyone else has moved on to the next project.

The third: is this project inevitable? Is there a sense that it’s going to happen with or without me? Are the filmmakers a force of nature that I want to partner with rather than compete against.

Is there leverage, do I feel compelled, and is it inevitable? 

If you are the one asking those questions of yourself, you may be an architect. If you’re asking others to answer these questions about your project, you may be an artist.

There are questions you and I have asked that no one has answered honestly. How do you greenlight a film if you’re not a studio? How do you protect your investors when the system is designed to suck all of the profit out? How do you build a sustainable career instead of barely surviving from project to project, and if another strike happens you won’t be able to keep going?

It took reading about 40 scripts and hearing well over 100 pitches before finding a project that was an immediate and unambiguous yes to both questions.

I’ll chronicle the process of bringing that film to market over the coming months. As this first column gets published we are entering four weeks of pre-production leading up to a 20-day shoot for “Brotherhood – A Cinematic Musical”, a new work from writer/director Ross Boothe, starring Mauricio Martínez and Casey Elliott. We plan to release the film October 2. 

What emerges from this model is a flywheel. Each project feeds the next, each audience member brings another, the more awareness you earn the more mass you create and the more gravity you create. 

I’ve been putting this into practice for the last 16 months since our last two films were in theaters in the fall of 2024. 

I’m not keeping it behind closed doors. I’m going to share every bit of it with you so the architects out there can build your own version, and the artists know what to look for.

I’ll share the decisions I’m making in near-real time – the deals, the numbers, and the consequences, good or bad. 

This column will become a user manual for architect-builders in indie film.

Next time, we start with the investors, and the discovery that there is capital out there, stranded, unable to invest in indie films because there currently isn’t a responsible way to put it there.

Daren Smith is a Utah-based indie film producer and founder of Craftsman Films, an independent studio established last year to finance, develop, produce, market, and distribute values-based, family-friendly indie films that spark conversation and change people for the better. The first film he helped produce premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and was acquired by IFC Films. His next film, “Brotherhood – A Cinematic Musical” films in April and is targeting an October release.