{"id":11312,"date":"2025-01-17T08:00:44","date_gmt":"2025-01-17T15:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/schaeffersghost\/?p=11312"},"modified":"2025-01-07T15:43:13","modified_gmt":"2025-01-07T22:43:13","slug":"the-future-of-media-1-microbudget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/schaeffersghost\/2025\/01\/the-future-of-media-1-microbudget\/","title":{"rendered":"The Future of Media 1: Microbudgets"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a>
Image: Hallmark<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

As the media landscape changes<\/a>, one thing that is already underway is the rise of the microbudget films. No, I don\u2019t mean the ones that are funded on Indiegogo or Patreon or whatever (though those certainly exist as well, and are filling up platforms like Tubi). I mean bigger budget than the $30,000 raises through crowdsourcing, but far, far under the $100 million range small-scale blockbusters put to work.<\/p>\n

Specifically, we should expect to see the return of the $10-$50 million dollar films. So when I say \u201cmicrobudget\u201d I really mean that from the perspective of the studios with deep pockets, not from, you know, my\u00a0<\/em>perspective. We\u2019re already seeing some of this with the return of the RomCom<\/a>, and of course the Hallmark Channel has always been with us. But as bigger budgets continue to fail to make money for studios, they\u2019re going to have to turn to alternative budget models (and I know that \u201calternative budget models\u201d isn\u2019t the sexiest line in the world, but it\u2019s true nonetheless).<\/p>\n

I suspect the studios have known all along that they couldn\u2019t just keep shoveling larger and larger piles of cash at films, even if they were making money. Now that they\u2019re not, this approach simply doesn\u2019t work. Once people stopped watching Rings of Power\u00a0<\/em>(very quickly, as it happened<\/a>) it became much less likely that Amazon is going to spend another\u00a0billion\u00a0<\/em>dollars on another TV show\u2013however large the fan base. So what will they do instead? Spend less money on product that (hopefully) is still okay.<\/p>\n

Smaller budget means one thing for sure: the focus will have to shift from action and special effects (notoriously expensive in film and TV) and onto quality writing and acting. This is good news for us as viewers, because it\u2019s been a while since we\u2019ve had those things in any meaningful quantities.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t get me wrong, there will always be someone willing to spend a billion dollars on something\u2013and we\u2019ll never get away from attempts by studios to recapture the success of the MCU or the James Bond franchise. But studios also have to be realistic, and between large rolls of the dice I think we\u2019ll see more and more these kinds of microbudget films forming the meat and potatoes of the visual media industry.<\/p>\n

Dr. Coyle Neal is co-host of the\u00a0City of Man Podcast<\/a>\u00a0an Amazon Associate (which is linked in this blog), and an Associate Profess<\/em>or of Political Science at\u00a0Southwest Baptist University<\/a>\u00a0in Bolivar, MO<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the media landscape changes, one thing that is already underway is the rise of the microbudget films. No, I don\u2019t mean the ones that are funded on Indiegogo or Patreon or whatever (though those certainly exist as well, and are filling up platforms like Tubi). I mean bigger budget than the $30,000 raises through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1469,"featured_media":11300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,424],"tags":[1439],"class_list":["post-11312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-films","category-tv-show","tag-future-of-media"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Future of Media 1: Microbudgets<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"As the media landscape changes, one thing that is already underway is the rise of the microbudget films. 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