Sony Pictures Classics Picks Up On a Film

http://deadline.com/2014/09/toronto-sony-pictures-classics-buys-still-alice-to-launch-this-oscar-season-833397/

This article is about an independent film called, Still Alice, being picked up by Sony Picture Classics. The film, staring Julian Moore, Alec Baldwin , Kristen Stewart, and Kate Botsworth is about a cognitive psychologist who faces early stages of Alzheimer's. The film is being picked up and set to be released just in time for Oscar season, a move by sony who hopes the independent film will gain Oscar success much like other indy films like Little Miss Sunshine. Deadline reports the deal for Still Alice to be somewhere in the low seven figures. What caught my eye about this particular article is that it was a film being picked up by Sony Picture Classics, who is known for picking up indy films. When I saw that it was set to launch during Oscar season, I knew that the studio must've seen something worth while in the Toronto Film Festival to pick up this particular film. It seems like there are less and less independent films being picked up so seeing this piece of news really caught my attention. The impact this has on me as a student is something I didn't expect. I see less and less independent films being picked up and that has always made me think how people choose career paths. There was once a time where filmmakers would fund their own films and studios would constantly pick up excellent films, but now in a world where we get the fourth Transformers movie, that's simply not the case. Economics are changing and the sure bet is the only bet Hollywood, and other industries are willing to make. Fewer students are willing to risk getting a degree in the arts and not finding work so they opt for a more secure field, suchlike Hollywood who has keeps it safe. A film like this being picked up is like a ray of hope telling us that there is still hope out there for people, like the filmmakers Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland, who followed their dreams. As a consumer, it gives me something other than the next Marvel movie or the third Spiderman. Theaters are inundated with remake after remake so a film that is outside the mold will certainly get my money. As a filmmaker it lets me know that there is still a great deal of importance to the original screenplay. Yes, some remakes are great but nothing in film can replace an original story. It's what Hollywood was built on and it is great to see a film still being picked up for it's merits as a story. The question it raises to the industry is that if films like these win awards and gain more and more success, will they finally catch the audience's attention over the fifth remake of a Ninja Turtles movie or will people continue to crowd the theaters to watch these regurgitated stories instead of giving an original film a chance? And if filmgoers finally get fed up with so many remakes and comic book adaptations, will Hollywood finally give independent films the chance they deserve?