Jaman brings 3,500 indie, international films online

LOS ANGELES--The online movie distribution company Jaman has made a niche for itself in the online film distribution market, focusing on indie and international films rather than big Hollywood hits.

The site offers 3,500 films--the kind that do well at film festivals, like The World's Fastest Indian and Redacted. Films can usually be rented for $1.99 or purchased for $4.99, and some can be watched for free with ads. Jaman CEO Gaurav Dhillon, who spoke with Andy at OnHollywood, said he expects free ad-supported content to be the more pervasive business model in the future.

So while Apple, Wal-Mart, Netflix and Amazon compete over online distribution rights for mainstream films, Jaman heads to the film festivals to make deals. Many of the films on Jaman's site don't get distributed at all in the US, so there's not as much competition.

Dhillon invested $3.5 million of his own money to start the company in 2006. The company has attracted a number of notable advisers and investors, including top Hollywood agent Jeff Berg, former senator Bill Bradley, William R. Randolph Hearst III and the celebrated Hollywood producer Ed Pressman.

Jaman's platform called Cascade makes it possible to transfer and watch the videos on different devices, including computers, iPhones, TiVo and DivX.

--Kelsey Blodget, Associate Producer

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Speaking of distribution, Duke City Shootout founder Anthony DellaFlora has partnered with local information technology businessman Dan Latrimurti to create a new company aimed at proving online distribution for independent filmmakers. Launched just this month, the Filmmakers Channel (www.thefilmmakerschannel.com) hopes to give the thousands of filmmakers who may never get their movies screened in a theater or on TV the chance to get their work out to the world. DellaFlora admits there are a lot of online movie distribution sites these days, but insists his is different because it puts the welfare of the filmmaker first. The Filmmakers Channel will feature a streaming, non-buffering video platform for movies that can include a pay-per-view option. Filmmakers will pay a monthly fee for broadcast minutes and channels, starting as low as $10 a month. The Filmmakers Channel has also partnered with Albuquerque filmmakers Rob Ellis and Michael Palumbo (producers of the video Got Art) to create a sister site, Big Window Video (www.big-window-video.com), which will provide educational tutorials teaching people how to write screenplays, shoot on green screens and use the latest digital video equipment. Currently, three short documentaries by DellaFlora and his partners are available through the Filmmakers Channel. Stay tuned (so to speak) for additional content.