Paramount Pictures, the parent company that turned on it’s own indie division, essentially flat-lining the great indie label Paramount Vantage (once going by Paramount Classics) and artificially keeping it alive as a moniker for sporadic, non-studio Paramount releases such as Like Crazy, Jeff, Who Lives at Home and Not Fade Away, have figured that their is some coin to be made in having a diverse VOD line-up.
Tapping Syrinthia Studer as SVP, Marketing and Acquisitions and a film buff with great taste, in former IFC Films acquisitions Jeff Deutchman (pictured above) who’ll oversee film fest pick-ups, Paramount make their announcement without a clear cut new, robust identity or label name (we figure that an official TIFF announcement is in the cards). According to this press release, they’ll leave the theatrical side of the business plan to others and simply compliment releases via VOD market. Critical and audiences favorites There Will Be Blood, No Country for Old Men, Into the Wild and Babel were once the pride and joy of indie film distribution until the parent company decided to turn a new page in the shaky indie market and run Vantage into the ground. We’re happy that there is one more player in the distribution game, but this division appears to be headed toward a Focus World type venture; as it “will allow Paramount Home Media Distribution to further explore possibilities in the VOD arena“. They’ve already partnered on Sundance preemed Anne Fontaine’s Adore (formerly Two Mothers) (three star review), A.C.O.D. and horror-comedy that we’ve never heard of in Ghost Team One.
