Distributor ‘gamble’ on Slumdog pays off

Nick | 23 Feb 2009, 21:47

When Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire swept the board the Oscars last night, not many were surprised. However, in many ways it might have also been a somewhat unlikely contender.

How Slumdog nearly ended up being distributed direct to DVD is one of this awards season’s most told anecdotes, but as Variety journalists Pamela McClintock and Ali Jaafar note: “Slumdog Millionaire is the ultimate independent film, proving a bonaza for foreign distributors gambled on the project even when [its] domestic release was in doubt.”

Produced for $15 million, box office watchers now believe Slumdog is heading for an international take of $200 million. An executive at Fox Searchlight, which stepped in as a distributor when Warner Independent Pictures pulled out, comments: ”These films are important because they defy conventional wisdom and show that someone can do something completely original and succeed, when so much of the movie industry has been commoditized.”

The commercial challenges aside, Marc Graser notes: “The awards are [also] significant because Slumdog’s dominance this year points to the increasing globalization of Hollywood – and the Oscars. Pic’s director, Danny Boyle, screenwriter Simon Beaufoy, and producer Christian Colson hail from Britain, it has a mostly Indian cast and it found its first success in America. One-third of it is in Hindi and thus makes the first claim for a foreign-language film to take the best pic prize.”

Slumdog’s path to success, via rave reviews from early screenings at the Toronto Film Festival, demonstrates how difficult it can be for investors in the creative industries to evaluate risk. It also highlights the importance of industry networks and word-of-mouth in making sure the right projects get the attention and investment they merit, wherever they are in the world.

- UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown commented this morning on British Oscar success:

“I am incredibly proud of the Oscar success of Slumdog Millionaire and Kate Winslet, and I congratulate everybody who has contributed to the success… Britain is showing it has the talent to lead the world. I think we should be very proud of what are great British successes. It shows that Britain is leading the world not just in film but fashion, music and design - and long may that be the case - as a result of the great talent that we have,” he said.