Talking with Larry Namer of EUROCINEMA: The Home of On-Demand Foreign Films

By Terry Keefe

It was approximately 8 years ago when I was at the Laemmle 4-Plex in Santa Monica on a Wednesday night and saw a huge line around the block for a screening of an Iranian film called Two Women. According to the usher, the film had been selling out every night, without the push of a major distributor behind it. A local, very small distributor (whose name I do not have, unfortunately) had booked the engagement and had an extensive mailing list of names in the Persian community of greater Los Angeles. I don’t know if this was accurate or not, but the usher said the film didn’t even have subtitles. And it certainly didn’t have a large ad budget. But here it was, kicking the box office behinds of films in the other theaters which had the likes of Miramax behind them. It was clear just from watching those tickets sell that there was a potentially huge business in exhibiting foreign films stateside to true niche audiences, but it seemed to be a business predominantly for the theatrical and DVD markets. Cable would likely be harder, as the audience numbers probably weren’t there to justify running Two Women or the equivalent on HBO or Showtime. Video On-Demand (VOD) technology has changed all that now, and one of the major players in the VOD space is Eurocinema, which specializes in providing foreign films On-Demand at $3.99 each on many of the major cable systems across the country, including Time Warner, Direct TV, Mediacom, and Atlantic Broadband. And, interestingly enough, one of the films Eurocinema is showing happens to be Two Women.



Eurocinema's Larry Namer

We had a chance to talk with Larry Namer, senior advisor and head of operations for Eurocinema, about the company. Namer’s resume in media speaks for itself, as he was the founder of a little cable network called E!, along with Comspan Communications and Steeplechase Media. On the origins of Eurocinema, Namer says, “[Chairman and CEO] Sebastien Perioche was the person who had the idea originally, to pursue being the HBO of foreign films. I came out of the cable world and I’m not a great believer in the longevity of mainstream networks, particular for niches. I suggested rather than being a 24-hour network, have Eurocinema be on-demand. My whole thing these days is how all this technology has created fundamental changes, and potential smaller niches were being born. We could target audiences as we go. Sebastien liked that idea and so we went VOD.”




Eurocinema feature Two Women


As we mentioned at the top, the economics of VOD are a nice fit with smaller foreign films, which would have a difficult time getting a theatrical booking these days. It’s not difficult to see that art houses are disappearing everywhere and the studio “indie” labels are dominating the bookings at the few theaters which have survived. Says Namer, “In N.Y. or L.A., you can still find the theaters [showing foreign films], but there aren’t a lot of them. Typically, it’s the Academy Award nominees, and you won’t get the real depth of foreign film beyond that.” The VOD model, though, allows for films that wouldn’t get seen theatrically, or on cable, to find an audience. Explains Namer, “With a company like HBO, with all of its overhead and infrastructure, to justify putting a movie on for 2 hours, it has to achieve a certain rating. It’s hard to find foreign films that can sustain that. By using the on-demand tech, we only offer 15 movies a month, but that’s more than enough to feed the appetite of the most voracious foreign film fan.” The VOD technology has also allowed Eurocinema to keep operating costs low. Says Namer, “For the size of our operation, we’d need 40-50 people working if this were a traditional network. With on-demand, we’re a company of 8-9 people.”



Eurocinema feature Kira's Reason

Eurocinema launched in 2005 and has quickly been adding cable systems carrying the brand. Says Namer, “We’ve been growing amazingly well.” With all the cable systems that have added Eurocinema, the company is able to deliver its films to a potential audience of some 20 million subscribers. Some of the current offerings on Eurocinema include the films Kira’s Reason from Denmark and Gille’s Wife from France. Two Women will be screening again on Eurocinema in May, as will Twilight, another Iranian film.

When I brought up my experience in seeing the audience that turned out for Two Women in the theaters, and will likely follow it to Eurocinema, Namer says, “That’s a great example. What we’ve found is that there is an incredible secondary audience, in addition to the traditional foreign film fans. There are lots of immigrants here from Bulgaria and Sweden and eastern and western Europe, and they want to hold onto their identity. It’s different from the previous generations. My parents’generation had the attitude of ‘Our children will be American.’ My father spoke Spanish, but they always spoke English to us. That’s changed unbelievably in the last 20 years. This whole new wave of immigrants want to hold onto their identity and to learn about the culture they came from. And films are a key way of doing that.”

Check out the Eurocinema website at http://www.eurocinema.com/, as well as their Myspace page.