@Mark – totally agree. Find the quality people and let them rise to the top and do their thing. Don’t put hoops to jump unless they are hoops of creativity.

@Maha – definitely; I see a two-pronged approach, perhaps with different studios picking one or the other model. But keep in mind that costs are going down for *everything.* Transformers cost $150 million to make and District 9 only $30. Give special effects ten years and how much would District 9 have cost? Now, 3D is ridiculously expensive, but it’s only a matter of time before it goes mainstream. There will still be big budget movies, whether budgets justified by Special FX, period pieces, or celebrities.

As far as I know, these houses are doing well. A quick look at their recent films, though, shows budgets ranging from $8mil to $20mil, with some (Juno!) dipping down to $6.5mil. There is evidence that they are taking advantage of better technology and being squeezed by lower revenues. I see this trend continuing – less cost of making a film and less profit of films; less big bucks to the top, and ideally more of the film world will look like a community of artists rather than Goldman Sachs.

On the question of big studios investing in independents, didn’t all the big studios go out and start units to do just that a few years ago? What happened to those projects?

Ps get tickets to “alcatraz at night” its sick esp w/the san fran fog!