A Brilliant Indie Movie That’s Accidentally Getting a National Release
When I interviewed the director Eliza Hittman on March 10 about her new movie, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, we gently bumped elbows as a greeting. It was our only real acknowledgment of the country’s brewing coronavirus crisis. On March 13, the film opened in limited release, but three days later, New York’s cinemas officially closed, with most others in the U.S. following suit within the week. The film grossed $16,565 before the country’s box office dwindled to zero. Now the movie has been released to a national audience, available on demand for a $19.99 rental—the same strategy applied to other releases blunted by quarantine efforts.
[Read: Say goodbye to movie theaters]
Hittman’s film follows Autumn (played by Sidney Flanigan), a 17-year-old girl from a small town in central Pennsylvania who travels to New York City with her cousin, Skylar (Talia Ryder), to get an abortion without having to notify to further restrict access to abortions during the pandemic, the timeliness of is indisputable. Because of the temporary loss of theaters, the only way most people will be able to see it is online. Its rent-on-demand release is a milestone of sorts, providing instant national access to an indie movie that might never have received such attention through a traditional release.
