The demise of Premiere Magazine is certainly a sad thing as it was part of the institution of Hollywood for so many years. It was, in fact, Entertainment Weekly before Entertainment Weekly in that it was a place to find a certain kind of film journalism that covered films coming out, reviews, who was hot and who was not in an easily digestible manner that both your granny and your kid sister could enjoy. In an age, however, of EW which covers all media from what is on in cinemas to what books are out to plays and DVDs, Premiere lost its way a bit in the competition for shelf space. Why would consumers spend money on one magazine for each of the media that they enjoy when they can get what they want, how they want in a weekly offline (and online) format that is quick and easy to read and looks pretty. Premiere writers have gone on to "bigger" and better things e.g, Anne Thompson the former Wext Coast editor for Premiere for many years is now a staple at the Hollywood Reporter writing a blog about what is going on in the business of Hollywood.

What is interesting to me about the whole thing is that it brings to fore the idea that though publications like EW cover indie film, there really is not a publication that currently exists that covers indie and foreign film in that vein that appeals to the average moviegoer. Fantastic online and offline pubs like Filmmaker, indieWIRE, and Sight&Sound often do amazing and informative coverage of these type of films but their coverage is geared for the most part, towards filmmakers or people actually working in the film industry NOT the average moviegoer. The one thing that we, at indieIN, have tried to do since we started was to offer information about indie and foreign film in a format that was appealing to the most amount of people possible. The tagline "because there's more out there" is not only about the fact that there are more than just the movies that the studios put out but also, and perhaps, more importantly, about the fact there is more than just an audience of cinephiles, critics and filmmakers who are/can be interested in indie and foreign film. This fact is demonstratedby the fact that there are over 1000 film festivals in the US alone. All of those festivals were not started and do not continue to run successfully because they are run solely by film afficionados. The large majority of people who run AND attend these film events are above all regular people who are just a comfortable seeing Spiderman 3 as they are Little Miss Sunshine or Half Nelson.

In the coming months, one of the things that we will be focussing on is developing indieIN's editorial content. We will be expanding our profiles and creating new features to give our faithful readers - that means you- a bit more meat to bite into. You will see more and therefore be able to make more informed choices about what to see, where to see it and a bit of the context of the industry. As we go through ths process, I would invite you to write to me or Michelle with any suggestions that you may have to improve our coverage. We are here to serve, you, the audience so anything we can do to make the experience better, please do not hesitate to let us know.

Keeping it indie,
Julie