Britdoc, film-maker Franny Armstrong launch new distribution website

UK funding body Channel 4 Britdoc Foundation has joined forces with The Age Of Stupid director Franny Armstrong to launch a new film distribution website which allows the public to hold their own screenings of social action documentaries and keep the profits after paying a licence fee to the film-makers.

There are 8 films currently available on the Good Screenings website, which launched today, including Rupert Murray’s The End Of The Line, Berlinale award winner The Yes Men Fix The World and Matt Whitecross’s documentary about Burmese refugees Moving To Mars, as well as Armstrong’s McLibel and The Age Of Stupid.

The website is an extension of Armstrong’s own initiative for the release of The Age Of Stupid in 2009, which saw 1300 screenings being booked in the first six months after its release.

Potential distributors will pay a licence fee to screen the films in their schools, churches, museums or other locations. The licence fee, which will be calculated according to where they plan to screen and how many viewers they are expecting, will then be split between the film-maker and a new production fund set up by not for profit organisation Britdoc for future projects.

Organisers can then keep the revenues from ticket sales for their own campaign or cause.

More films will be added to coincide with Britdoc’s Good Pitch forums which take place at festivals, including Tribeca, throughout the year.

Jess Search, CEO of the Channel 4 Britdoc Foundation, said: “Finding new ways for important films to reach the right audiences is one of the Foundation’s key aims.Great films have long lives and, even better, as they continue to be seen, the profits will enable new films to get funded.”