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A Pirated Clip, 40 Million Views, and a Call from Netflix

What building ISLE CHILD's distribution taught me about the broken indie playbook

Hey, it's Thomas!

As I'm prepping my second feature film, STARING AT THE SUN, and Crowd-Equity consulting on various projects like THE HUNGRY ONE, I've also been neck-deep in navigating distribution for my first feature, ISLE CHILD... and it's been a real slap in the face. 🙃 

But before I tell you why, let me share a story that you'll find fascinating:

One of my great filmmaker friends (keeping him anonymous, you'll see why) made an awesome $700K indie feature. It didn't hit Sundance or the Cannes of the world, but it got good reviews, went through the traditional festival circuit, did the whole thing. I'm super proud of him, and I love the movie.

But loving a movie doesn't guarantee box office success. Theater chains saw it and passed. Netflix and streamers saw it and passed.

Then one day, someone pirated a clip of the film and posted it to YouTube Shorts.

Naturally, he started freaking out and began filing copyright takedowns. But as he was scrambling to get removed, the views just kept going up. First, a million… then ten million… then 20… now it's sitting at over 40 million views on YouTube Shorts.

Then Netflix AND one of the biggest independent theater chains in the US emailed back. and a few weeks later, his movie was acquired by both of those giants.

what does this tell you?

Once you finish your movie, the value of it is already set in stone; it's worth X amount of dollars, which is determined by the quality and star power of the film. There's nothing you can do to make it MORE valuable for buyers and viewers…

Unless you raise the PERCEIVED VALUE of your movie (or any product for that matter) through great “branding” or “acquired eyeballs”… even if you get those eyeballs through the very thing that we fear (someone pirating our movie).

I used to think that distribution was something that you figured out after the film was made. You make a great movie, you get it into great festivals, and you let the buyers come to you… but what happens when you can't get into great festivals?

Well then you need to find a way to leverage other undervalued forms of attention, to again, raise the perceived value of your movie.

And to be honest, even getting into great festivals won't give your film as much “value” as you think it does (or as it used to).

At Sundance 2024, about 60 films came looking for buyers. Sixteen sold. Seven had big names attached. First-time filmmaker without stars? Nada.

At Sundance 2026, most films still left without a distributor. Netflix, Neon, A24, Searchlight, Focus, plus a bunch of new buyers, all on the ground. Still not enough.

One of our producers on ISLE CHILD, Roger Mancusi, produced the Sundance film BUNNYLOVR. That film premiered January 2025 with Rachel Sennott and real buzz. It didn't land a theatrical distributor for over a year.

Or look at RICKY. Won the Sundance Directing Award in 2025. IndieWire called the director a "major force." Distribution offers came in, but the producers walked away from all of them because the deals would've locked up their rights for 20+ years with terrible minimum guarantees and little upside. So they went independent, launched a Kickstarter for marketing funds, and are self-releasing theatrically.

We have to get creative if we want to stay alive. Not just with our camera and scripts, but with how we distribute and how we get our art out to the masses.

These aren't obscure films. These are Sundance winners struggling to find a path that actually works for the people who made them.

What We're Building for ISLE CHILD

So here's what we're doing. Three lanes, all at once.

Lane 1: Legacy distributors. Still knocking on doors. A24, Neon, Focus, the new Warner Bros. indie label. If one of these works out, amazing. But we're not sitting around waiting.

Lane 2: Fee-only distribution. This is the big one most filmmakers don't know about. Companies like Blue Harbor Entertainment charge you a service fee and handle the full rollout: theatrical, digital, streaming, TV. The difference from traditional? With a traditional deal, you hand over your rights for 25 to 30 years and hope to see backend money after they recoup. Most filmmakers never do. With fee-only, you keep your rights and capture the revenue. The catch is you need a marketing budget before selling, but it is an interesting option that most of us don't know about. New aggregators like BitMax also open the door to affordable, one-time fee distribution to VOD services.

Lane 3: Build the audience yourself. Newsletter, social, YouTube, community screenings, whatever you've got. This is the lane my friend accidentally stumbled into with a pirated clip. He didn't plan for 40 million views… but what if he had?

The aha-moment for me was that momentum in one lane creates leverage in the others. When you bring proof of audience to any conversation, you stop groveling to be chosen by the hand of Netflix, and you start being courted. Haha.

The Film Itself Didn't Change

It's not like Netflix suddenly liked my friend's film more the second time they saw it. The film was the same, frame for frame. What changed was the proof that people wanted to watch it.

The takeaway? We should all start building that proof now, before the film is finished. Budget for marketing in pre-production. Talk to fee-only distributors while you're still in post. Run all three lanes together and let them feed each other, slowly but surely.

Waiting to be discovered is the most expensive thing a filmmaker can do in 2026.
Go build your lanes.

— Thomas Percy Kim

📌 Thomas’s Bookmarks

My favorite links of the week to help you be wiser and more creative.

• BookPlayer (iOS App) – Found this free app that lets you import audiobooks you've downloaded online. Started listening on the subway in place of podcasts, and it’s been a game changer. All the world's knowledge is sitting in these dang books; we just have to give ourselves the space to pick them up. Audiobooks don’t replace the real thing, but better this than nothing at all.

💾 Community Plugs

Resources for filmmakers, content creators, and industry professionals.

• 🎬 Community Spotlight: The Alfie White Project – One of our community members just launched a Seed & Spark campaign for his new film. If you've got a minute, go show some support!

  🎬 Crowdfunding a short film? The Short Film Crowdfunding Playbook is live – a step-by-step guide to raising funds outside your personal circles. If you're thinking about running your own campaign (like the one above), this is where I'd start.

• ✍️ Looking for cast or crew? If you're a filmmaker searching for someone to help you fill a role, reply with a short description of your project, location, and job description — I'll try to connect you with someone in the community!

• 💡 Community spotlight: If you've recently wrapped a short, locked a feature cut, or hit a milestone you're proud of — reply and tell me about it. I want to highlight community wins here. :)

📹 Behind the Scenes

I starred in the next episode of Digital Spaghetti – Jack Conte's show where he sits down with creators and breaks down how their videos come to life. In this one, we get into some of the craft behind my YouTube videos. It's scheduled to drop next Tuesday, March 17th, let me know here if you end up checking it out!

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