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Trois- A New Take on Four-Walling
By Carla Robinson
If you want to navigate the future, sometimes you must look to the past.
That’s what the creators of Trois, the first Black, self-distributed, major
theatrical release in recent history, did. Writer/director Rob Hardy, along with
co-producers William Packer and Greg Anderson (the trio behind Atlanta-based Rainforest
Productions), refused to let their film linger in the can when Hollywood failed to
distribute it.
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© Rainforest Productions
Rob Hardy
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Short Cuts
Trois Review
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In the grand tradition of pioneer Oscar
Micheaux, they opted to distribute Trois themselves. “By doing some research on how
he promoted his films through schools, service organizations, and urban social
clubs,” said Anderson, “we were able to modernize our approach and gain a
similar success.”
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Hardy noted that the film’s subject matter, which
involves a married couple embroiled in a twisted sexual liaison, “helped generate
word of mouth marketability.” Rainforest’s strategy was to open the film in a
particular group of cities and travel along to promote it. The trio nicknamed its
distribution vehicle the Cinematic Motown Revue, because it drew inspiration from the
musical tours of old, Motown and vaudeville.
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The strategy paid off when, in its first
phase of distribution, Trois grossed over a million dollars on just 50 screens. According
to Anderson, “We gained support in neighboring cities and states before our film
arrived there." Hardy, Packer and Anderson managed to cover more than 30 cities,
which Packer considers an advantage over the behemoth Hollywood studios. “We are
smaller and faster,” he said. “A larger studio wouldn’t be able to devote
as much individual attention.”
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© Rainforest Productions
Greg Anderson |
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© Rainforest Productions
William Packer |
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Although Rainforest had some success when
it distributed its first film, Chocolate City, over the Internet, it pulled a coup by
garnering screen time at first run theaters such as AMC and Loews for Trois. Such theaters
are “extremely difficult to break into,” Packer said. “Most multiplexes
would rather have 21 theaters showing Chicken Run than devote one to an independent
film.” Thanks to carefully forged relationships with exhibitors, the filmmakers were
allowed “the opportunity to prove we had an audience.”
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If relationships with exhibitors were helpful, then those
with investors were crucial. Trois’ investors, 50 African-Americans, were savvy
enough to know that “with a little patience and additional funding, independent
distribution could work,” Packer said.
As Rainforest prepares Trois for cable, video, and international release, Hardy’s
best advice to those wishing to follow suit is to “just do it. Lots of people
complain about not having the funds to make a film, but we manage to find money to buy
clothes and rims. So we can do the same with film.”
M
August 2000
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