IFC reduces its dependence on independent films

Suppose you run a cable channel dedicated to showing art house films. You wake up one day and realize that the independent film industry isn’t making that many truly independent films anymore. You notice your audience is as fervent about video as it is about film. You sense viewers are no longer satisfied with you selecting the film lineup; they want to do it themselves.

If you’re the Independent Film Channel, you’ve clearly got some identity issues.

Over the past year, IFC has faced up to the challenge with an overhaul centered on increased original programming, along with aggressive media and educational campaigns catering to its small but avid and digitally hip audience.

In the process IFC hopes to embody the future of television and redefine the cutting edge of popular culture, according to Evan Shapiro, IFC’s executive vice president and general manager. The trick, he said, is for IFC to remain true to its core audience even as it courts the new one.

One result is a new mix of cherished vintage films like “Wild Strawberries” with newer, more popular fare like “Reservoir Dogs.” “The aficionados will discover more mainstream stuff; the mainstream will come in for ‘Reservoir Dogs’ and discover Kurosawa,” Shapiro said.

Another change is more original programming produced in the style and spirit of independent short films. IFC is developing, for the first time, several original unscripted series to air in a block in August. Among the shows being developed are an animated series by actor-director-writer producer Bob Balaban (“Gosford Park”); and a live action series by comedian and writer Laura Kightlinger (“Will & Grace”).

“We’re trying to stay true to our brand and treat them less as traditional sitcoms and more like original independent shorts that happen to be serialized,” Shapiro said, speaking by phone from his office in New York.

The rebranding was inspired partly by the decline of the independent film industry. “There are virtually no independent studios left,” Shapiro noted. Most “independent” films are produced by divisions of major studios like Fox Searchlight or the former Miramax. Movies like “Sideways” or “Napoleon Dynamite” that once would have been defined as small independent films have been embraced by the mainstream, he said.

Because movies are increasingly expensive to make, they are becoming “loss leaders” for video/DVD sales, he said. That segment of the industry grew nearly 20% last year, he said.

Media researchers confirm that today’s channel-surfing, mouse-clicking generation likes its entertainment in shorter, more continuous clips than previous generations. Television networks of all types, with hours of time to fill, are looking away from movies and toward other types of programming, said Tom Adams, president of Adams Media Research, an entertainment industry research and consulting firm.

Now that the post-Tivo generation watches practically anything it wants, any time it wants, Shapiro said, “You have to respect their authority and give them something that is unique.” Last year, the network produced the most original programming of any year in its 10-year history, including the reality show “Film School” and the Henry Rollins movie-chat vehicle “Henry’s Film Corner.”

IFC is owned by Rainbow Media Holdings, a part of Cablevision. Currently sold on satellite and cable’s digital tier system, IFC has grown quickly the past three years. IFC is now available to 35 million homes, up from 12 million. That is less than half the 88 million homes reached by ad-supported basic cable channels such as A&E;, Lifetime or TNT but similar to premium channels HBO and Showtime.

Shapiro, a former marketer, spends much of his time getting to know IFC’s upscale audience and figuring out how to use the channel’s marketing to hit his viewers’ sweet spots. He says, for instance, that they are 300 times more likely than the average cable viewer to buy a digital video recorder, and they refuse to read TV listings, relying instead on the on-screen program guide.

After a survey showed IFC viewers repeatedly used the word “uncut” to describe what they liked about the channel, he came up with the tagline: “TV Uncut.” Hoping to capture young audiences with the spirit of creative freedom found in independent film, IFC adopted the Green Day anthem “Jesus of Suburbia” as its signature sound in promotions.

He also wants to educate the next generation of film fans about why independent film and freedom of expression matter. This year, IFC’s quiz show “Ultimate Film Fanatic” traveled to malls across the country, letting film fans compete with one another and sometimes with critics in public. A new “Film School Project” features a filmmaking curriculum that will be available to 5,000 high schools.

Stretching for a way to describe his and his staff’s devotion to the cause, Shapiro came up with a surprising parallel. They were as fervent about promoting free expression, he said, as Charlton Heston was about gun rights.

“If someone has the freedom to carry a gun, we should all have the freedom to listen to what we want to, to see and watch what we want to every day,” he said.