Exciting SNOWPIERCER Film Club Updates!

Have you gotten a chance to watch Snowpiercer yet, the best movie ever made about a post-apocalyptic #AmtrakResidency? If not, you have a little more time: we’re going to chat about what it has to say about money and class on Friday, July 25th, instead of the 24th, so that — huzzah! — ‘Folder Anne Helen Petersen can join us. She has Feelings about this movie, guys. Feelings she’s excited to share.

According to IndieWire, producer Harvey Weinstein calls Snowpiercer “a smart movie for a smarter audience.” Like, as opposed to a dum-dum movie for everybody. That’s the reason that he experimented with releasing the film to viewers via Video On Demand, iTunes, Amazon, and other outlets after it had only been in theaters for a couple of weeks, as we mentioned. He didn’t think an uncut version would please a broad audience, interested less in the politics and more in the axe fighting. The gamble seems to have paid off:

The theatrical marketing — a fraction closer to $5 million than $25 million — provided the launchpad for VOD. “We’ve devised a multi-platform model,” says RADiUS’s Quinn. “We’re here to crack that no man’s land between a boutique movie and a blockbuster where there’s no middle ground.” “RADiUS did it perfectly for a giant financial success,” boasts Weinstein. “We’ve done $2 million in a week on VOD. We’ve never done that much, it’s our biggest weekly number. I think we wind up grossing $4–5 million theatrical beyond VOD, which makes for us all with ancillaries like TV very profitable. That’s the reason I brought in Tom and Jason to TWC, to do an amazing job. I’m not just an old theater guy, I want to be innovative and make movies work.”

More information about how to rent the film from the comfort of your own couch here, or go see it in a theater if you can and show Harvey Weinstein that smart people go to multiplexes too. But, um, you might not want to watch it alone. It’s like Wall-E meets Brazil, okay? It’s dark. You need a hand to hold / arm to grab, or at least I did.

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