Indie, Inc.: Miramax and the Transformation of Hollywood in the 1990s

Alisa Perren

Published by University of Texas Press 2012

Indie, Inc.

Miramax and the Transformation of Hollywood in the 1990s

Alisa Perren

In the series Texas Film and Media Studies Series

https://doi.org/10.7560/729124

Overview
Contents

About this book

During the 1990s, films such as sex, lies, and videotape, The Crying Game, Pulp Fiction, Good Will Hunting, and Shakespeare in Love earned substantial sums at the box office along with extensive critical acclaim. A disproportionate number of these hits came from one company: Miramax. Indie, Inc. surveys Miramax’s evolution from independent producer-distributor to studio subsidiary, chronicling how one company transformed not just the independent film world but the film and media industries more broadly. As Alisa Perren illustrates, Miramax’s activities had an impact on everything from film festival practices to marketing strategies, talent development to awards campaigning.

Case studies of key films, including The Piano, Kids, Scream, The English Patient, and Life Is Beautiful, reveal how Miramax went beyond influencing Hollywood business practices and motion picture aesthetics to shaping popular and critical discourses about cinema during the 1990s. Indie, Inc. does what other books about contemporary low-budget cinema have not—it transcends discussions of “American indies” to look at the range of Miramax-released genre films, foreign-language films, and English-language imports released over the course of the decade. The book illustrates that what both the press and scholars have typically represented as the “rise of the American independent” was in fact part of a larger reconfiguration of the media industries toward niche-oriented products.

Author / Editor information

Alisa Perren is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at Georgia State University. She is the coeditor of Media Industries: History, Theory, and Method and Coordinating Editor of In Media Res, a MediaCommons project that experiments with new forms of online scholarship. Her work has appeared in a range of publications, including Film Quarterly, Journal of Film and Video, Journal of Popular Film & Television, and FlowTV.

Reviews

Perren’s account is a corrective to the juicier journalistic record, particularly the gossipy standard narrative, Peter Biskind’s Down and Dirty Pictures (Simon and Schuster, 2004). Biskind’s popularity is probably safe: Perren’s style is that of someone turning on the lights at a party, and her informative, eye-opening argument is intentionally deflating and unromantic…She busts myths, and persuasively so...

— Film Quarterly

In her book Indie, Inc., Alisa Perren masterfully explores the myths and realities behind the Weinsteins' rise, their cunning self-mythologizing of their enterprise, and the subsequent decline of the company's cultural influence and commercial viability.

— Journal of Popular Culture

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Chapter One. Finding a Niche in the 1990s Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Chapter Two. The Rise of Miramax and the Quality Indie Blockbuster (1979–Fall 1992) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	16
Chapter Three. The “Secret” of Miramax’s Success: The Crying Game (Winter 1992–Spring 1993) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	54
Chapter Four. Corsets, Clerks, and Criminals: Miramax in the Age of Disney (Summer 1993–Spring 1995) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	78
Chapter Five. Another Dimension to the Miramax Brand: Kids, Scream, and the Teen Audience (Spring 1995–Spring 1997) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	113
Chapter Six. Majors, Indies, Independents: The Rise of a Three-Tier System (Winter 1996–Spring 1997) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	144
Chapter Seven. Who Says Life Is Beautiful? (Summer 1997–Spring 1999) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	176
Chapter Eight. Maxed Out: Miramax and Indiewood in the New Millennium Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	208
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	235
Selected Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	285
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	291

Language: English
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 320

eBook

Published: May 15, 2012
ISBN: 9780292737150