In 2002, bemoaning the fact that only a small number of the wonderful films I was seeing at the Montreal World Film Festival would ever be available for an American audience, I wrote this:

“I look forward to a day when digital technology will make it possible to disseminate movies around the world in a theatrical (large-screen) format without the prohibitive expenses of theatrical distribution of cumbersome 35mm prints. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if a group of people in a place like, say, Buffalo who were interested in seeing a film from Bulgaria or France or South Korea that Miramax didn’t feel would be profitable could rent a theater space, then make arrangements with an international booker for a one-time download in projectable format of that film?”

Emerging Cinena founders, left to right, Ira Deutchmen, Barry Rebo, and Giovanni Cozzi

Well, that day is here. Maybe not the part about getting to dial up a film of your own choosing (yet), but the digital era of film’s future takes a big step forward this week with the arrival of Emerging Cinema, which has installed state–of–the–art digital screening capabilities in one of the theaters at the Market Arcade Film and Arts Center and which will provide it with a regular menu of new independent, documentary and foreign films.

As anyone who regularly attends the popular Tuesday night Buffalo Film Seminar screenings knows, the MAFAC has had digital projection capabilities for several years now. Going back even further, the Screening Room in Williamsville has been showing digitally-projected movies for nearly a decade. But there are business restrictions to these systems. Only movies that have been commercially released to home video can be shown, and then only if the rights can be negotiated (an apparently cumbersome procedure that can cost the theater the same as renting a print, despite the savings in shipping costs.)

Emerging Cinema was founded in 2002 with the aim of doing for distribution what the digital camera did for filmmaking in general. These days it takes very little to make a movie: a consumer-model camera and a computer for editing are all the tools a talented and determined storyteller requires. (Not having to purchase film stock alone shaves off most of the usual costs.) And if you can’t afford a camera, NPR recently reported on an upcoming Ithaca competition for movies made using cell phones.

But if getting a movie made is no longer prohibitively costly, getting it shown outside of the festival circuit still is. Striking a film print and marketing are so expensive that distributors won’t risk acquiring a good movie unless they feel it has broad enough potential to pay back those costs. Plenty of aspiring filmmakers come away from Sundance or dozens of other festivals with good reviews, maybe even an award, and no better hope that people will see their work than a home video release.

Emerging Cinema founders Barry Rebo, Giovanni Cozzi and Ira Deutchman believe that there is an eager and potentially profitable market in the new independent features and documentaries that traditional distributors are unwilling to handle (or unable to promote outside of large cities). They argue that while “arthouse” theaters account for fewer than 3 percent of all American screens, they return between 5 to 7 percent of the total box office.

The Passenger

Their goal is a network of digital screening locations that will be centrally booked, with movies delivered via broadband download. With the substantial savings from not having to strike and ship prints, they can take far greater risks than film distributors—in fact, they can even work with distributors to get their films into markets that would normally not run them. And they can do so concurrent with their release in New York and Los Angeles, without having to wait the six months it can take the limited number of prints to work their way around the country.

Buffalo isn’t typical of the cities that Emerging Cinema, which hopes to be on 400 screens in the next three years, is aiming to build in. With half of the 21 screens operated locally by Dipson Theaters regularly showing “arthouse” fare, along with programming from alternative venues Hallwalls and Squeaky Wheels, we get to see a broader range of films than many larger cities. But with the bar of Hollywood quality sinking lower by the week (when Big Momma’s House 2 is the number one film in America, do you think it encourages the studios to make better films?), more alternatives are always welcome.

And if their first month of programming available locally is any indication, the EC house at the Market Arcade looks guaranteed to be a regular weekly destination for any local film lover. Along with the three reviewed on this page (all opening in the next week: going outside the traditional system means they can run movies for one day, two days, a week, or however long they feel is appropriate), February offerings include the newly restored release of Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1975 film The Passenger, starring Jack Nicholson; Steven Soderbergh’s controversial new Bubble; Music From the Inside Out, the highly acclaimed documentary about symphony musicians; and Cowboy del Amor, a comic documentary about a cowboy matchmaker who pairs Mexican brides with American men.

Cowboy del Amor

The fact that I’ve never heard of Cowboy del Amor makes it the most appealing one on the list, by the way. EC’s resident programmer is co-founder Ira Deutchman, who has a history going back to the mid-1970s of acquiring and promoting films for distributors like United Artists Classics, Cinema 5, Cinecom and Fine Line Features. If he thinks something is worth seeing, I’m inclined to want to see it.

Another exciting opportunity comes from agreements EC has developed with several film festivals to expand their programming by making it select films available in EC theaters at the same time they are having their festival premiere. Upcoming months will bring packages from the Full Frame, the US’s largest documentary festival, indieWIRE’s “Undiscovered Gems” series, and LatinBeat, programmed by the Film Society of Lincoln Center.

Technology that actually benefits the consumer. What a concept!