The producers of All About E intend to open the lesbian love story/ road trip/ thriller on about 40 screens next year, all via cinema-on-demand platform Tugg.
Formerly known as The Trouble With E, writer-director Louise Wadley’s film follows a beautiful, sexy DJ named E, who goes on the run after she stumbles on a stash of cash.
Adelaide actress Mandahla Rose plays the title role with NIDA graduate Julia Billington as Trish, E’s lover, with whom she has a messy break-up.
The cast includes fellow NIDA grad Brett Rogers as Matt, E’s gay best friend who marries her to get a visa, Kim Antonios-Hayes as her mother Nadine, Lex Marinos as her father and Simon Bolton as Johnny Rock, a villain who runs a nightclub as a front for peddling drugs.
The first feature from Wadley and her producing partner Jay Rutovitz’s Girls’ Own Pictures, it will have its Australian premiere on February 21 at the Mardi Gras Film Festival.
The producers are looking at an April release, working with David Doepel’s Leap Frog Films, which has a co-venture with the US-based cinema-on-demand platform Tugg.
“We have 40 screens across Australia planned,“ Wadley tells IF. “A minimum threshold is agreed for each cinema of, say 50 seats, and once that number of seats is pre-booked then the screening goes ahead. If they are not booked by the cut-off the cinema goes ahead with its standard program. It is very different from four-walling, which most small outfits cannot afford to do.
“The Tugg distribution concertinas people who want to see the film into one or two nights, so it really is a win-win for cinemas and independent film. I suspect it will take over as the cinema release of choice for anyone who doesn’t have a blockbuster.
“All you need is a good understanding of your core audience, and, of course, a film that people want to see. Trying to fill a cinema for a one-or-two week season needs a P & A spend that most of us don't have and is disproportionate to the revenue that can be generated.”
After raising $220,000 from private investors, the producers generated nearly $94,000 via crowd-funding site Pozible from 437 supporters last year.
“We have our supporters in those 40 city and regional centres who have followed us from the start and are waiting for the word to organise screenings when we are ready,” Wadley says.
As IF has reported, the producers received certification for the producer offset on the basis of an in-depth marketing plan with the intent to distribute via Tugg.
Doepel says the cinema-on-demand platform is the preferred supplier to members of the Independent Cinemas Association of Australia and it has booked screenings at Hoyts, Reading and Event Cinemas.
Doepel is working with Mago Films, producers of The Waler: Australia’s Great War Horse, to release a theatrical version of the documentary which tells the story of the horses that served Australia in the Middle East during WW1, in cinemas next year.
View the trailer here: https://vimeo.com/112680560