AFM 2026: Indie Film Faces a Tougher Market — But Theatrical Breakouts Offer Hope

The indie film biz head into this year’s American Film Market amid one of the industry’s most tumultuous periods in recent memory. The completion of Paramount Skydance’s merger with Warner Bros. Discovery and Netflix’s leadership shake-up have triggered a wave of layoffs and cuts within the last month, while streamers across the board are becoming much more selective about acquisitions.For indie producers, sales agents and distributors, the upheaval means fewer buyers and projects, and an increasingly competitive marketplace. Yet the business has also been reshaped in ways that give reason for optimism. Theatrical is once again the engine of the indie economy, and Gen Z audiences are driving some of the year’s surprise hits, from “Obsession” to “Backrooms,” and, most recently, the nearly three-hour doc “You Can See Everything.”“We’re going to see so many more of these stories dominating in the box office. It’s what audiences want to see. If you look at the data and you look at what’s happening in the industry, the strongest, the best-positioned players in this sector are the independents,” says Jackie Brenneman, a former top executive at the National Assn. of Theatre Owners, who in January was appointed president and CEO of the Independent Film & Television Alliance, which organizes the American Film Market. Brenneman is preparing to oversee her first AFM with an expanded program aimed at attracting more filmmakers, financiers, exhibitors and technology companies to “show the broader industry why independent films are incredibly investable and why you should be bullish on independent film.”AFM also faces fresh competition from Toronto’s new market, but accreditation numbers for the L.A.-set event are on par with last year, with more than 80 countries represented among registered buyers. The U.S. leads, followed by Germany, the U.K., South Korea, Spain and France. China is also returning after several years of limited turnout.Heading into AFM, the mood among buyers and sellers is hopeful but cautious, with several predicting a busy market. “There are a lot of people crossing their fingers that it’s a strong market and there’s a lot of stuff there. I think the appetite is there for movies, especially after Toronto. The projects just need to be there,” says Scott Shooman, head of IFC Entertainment Group.Fabien Westerhoff, CEO of London-based European sales outfit Film Constellation, describes the current mood as a “dual, conflicting emotional state.” On one hand, he points to over-indexing specialty titles such as his company’s queer adult animation “Jim Queen,” which grossed $3 million at the French box office, and the doc feature “The History of Concrete,” which just passed $2.5 million in the U.S. Such hits, he says, have reinvigorated specialty distributors after years of “streaming hegemony.” On the other hand, Westerhoff says the “box office is extremely polarized around a handful of films, which isn’t healthy.”Domestic box office reached $8.28 billion from Jan. 1 through Oct. 28, up 20.8% from the same period in 2025, according to Box Office Mojo, but at the same time, fewer films are getting a real shot, as only 68 features had wide releases through summer 2026, down 14% from the same period in 2019, according to Rentrak.For David Atlan-Jackson, chief operating officer of European distribution group Vuelta, the business has narrowed to a single question: Does the film work in cinemas?“We’ve entered an increasingly binary, black-and-white market. Either a film gets a theatrical release or it essentially disappears. Television broadcasters have pulled back considerably, and everything now depends on theatrical success,” says the executive, whose banner is behind Bertrand Bonello’s next film “Santo Subito!,” starring Mark Ruffalo and Charlotte Rampling, which is in post-production and has yet to land a U.S. deal. “Every other revenue stream has become a multiplier of theatrical performance. If your film doesn’t succeed theatrically, you’re facing a real commercial failure. There’s very little middle ground anymore,” says Atlan-Jackson.A soft opening in theaters isn’t always fatal, though, points out Nick Shumaker, head of AC Independent, the sales and finance arm of Anonymous Content. “Look at the success of ‘The Apprentice’ on VOD: It got released, but it certainly didn’t solicit the theatrical numbers that I think some people would have really wanted it to, but it over-indexed on VOD in a huge way without ever finding a streaming home for obvious reasons,” he says. He hopes the same will be true for Alex Gibney’s “Musk,” which has struggled in theaters but is he says “is second only to ‘The Odyssey’ in VOD preorders on Apple. … We’re already seeing the Elon Musk film over-index on VOD pre-orders and it’s a four-hour film,” he says. Shooman agrees, pointing to three IFC releases this year, “Forbidden Fruits,” “Over Your Dead Body” and “Motor City,” which didn’t turn out to be box office hits but went on to perform well on VOD. The films that do break through are also proving harder to predict. A24’s “You Can See Everything” has become one of the year’s most improbable B.O. sensations, bolstered by social media buzz. It grossed $15.6 million during its opening weekend and has since climbed to more than $45 million domestically. Creator-driven films such as “Obsession” and “Backrooms” have also shown the appeal of projects built around online audiences. “What’s exciting is knowing success can come from anywhere: a found-footage horror, a politically socially relevant documentary, or a classic historical melodrama that moves you to tears,” says Westerhoff. Buyers, he says, “want films that can be eventized, generate word-of-mouth and fandom.” Shooman says the year’s surprises haven’t changed his thinking. “Does it make me rethink what’s a commercially viable film? No. I think the same holds true in that if you have a unique perspective, great access, a filmmaking talent, a story that people want to talk about, that still is, I think, at the core of moviegoing,” he says. “And when you look at the box office this year, three independent films had a bigger second weekend off of the semi-wide first weekend, being ‘Buddy,’ ‘You Can See Everything’ and ‘Obsession.’ So I think there is an appetite for audiences to come back. They want something that they can talk about.”The breakouts of “Backrooms” and “Obsession” have also sent buyers scrambling for the next creator-filmmaker.“I think everyone this summer suddenly said, ‘Oh, we have to scrub the internet for YouTubers because of ‘Backrooms’ and ‘Obsession.’ But the reality is the younger audience is a lot more welcoming to genre films, and YouTube is just where a new generation of filmmakers who have a phone and a laptop and can create content on their own are exhibiting their art,” says Shooman, who also notes that the biggest deals at major festivals consistently are genre films, citing “River,” “Leviticus,” “Talk to Me” and “Obsession.”Brenneman is looking to bring digital creators into the AFM fold with the launch of the Global Screen Economy Summit, which will feature a dedicated creator-economy discussion with executives from Spotter, Kynetic Media Ventures and Bamboo Bridge, along with creator entrepreneur Tyler Chou.“Some creator filmmakers are going to just be filmmakers, and some of them are going to want to become studios and sales agents. And those are the ones I need to ensure are part of IFTA. They are not a threat, they’re more people making and selling content across borders,” she says. “So anyone who is in that business belongs at AFM, belongs in our tent, and belongs on our stages.”Financing is getting more complicated and with pre-sales harder to come by, the money behind independent films is also changing. “Equity has stepped in,” says Westerhoff. He adds that equity brings “downward pressure” on budgets and more reliance on soft money to limit commercial exposure. “That’s why we structure our projects around European shoots, leveraging equity against international and U.S. rights.”Pre-sales remain essential above a certain budget, says Shumaker. “You just have to be really specific about the films and realistic about what the expectations are in terms of the necessity of presales to greenlight certain types of films. We’ve been happy on Mia Hansen-Løve’s new film [‘If Love Should Die’] in terms of the presales on that. So again, it really just depends on the film. If you’ve got a $50 million or $60 million action film, you need to pre-sell a whole bunch to greenlight that film.”In Europe, ambitious projects increasingly get financed through multi-territory co-productions, with the budget raised from several countries and production spending allocated accordingly. That’s the case with “Santo Subito!,” which is produced by Mandarin in France, with Vuelta co-producing in Italy, where much of the film is being shot.While the U.S. box office rebound is good news for international players, they’re lamenting the scarcity of buzzy American projects available for indie buyers and the growing difficulty of securing domestic distribution.If a film doesn’t get a U.S. theatrical release or ends up going directly to a streaming platform, “it becomes much harder for us to establish it in our territories,” says Atlan-Jackson.Shumaker points out it’s always been hard to find distribution in the U.S. “There’s a paradigmatic shift that has been happening for quite some time where a lot of distributors either want to be involved in third-party films earlier, or they are developing their own material. So as a result, they’re not buying as much at the completed film stage, with exceptions,” says Shumaker, citing Netflix’s acquisitions of “La Bola Negra” and “Gentle Monster,” which were unveiled at Cannes.Powerhouse indies, such as A24 and Neon, are in the position to not only acquire worldwide rights and but also handle international sales themselves.“I consider them studios. They’re not just producing their own films. They’re also acquiring films and controlling their international distribution, and when they resell the film internationally, they charge significantly more than the original sales agent would have,” says Atlan-Jackson. He uses “Club Kid,” Jordan Firstman’s Cannes breakout, as an example: A24 bought worldwide rights for $17 million from UTA and Charades at the festival after a bidding war.“‘Club Kid’ became much more expensive for independent distributors through A24 than it had been through Charades,” says Atlan-Jackson, noting that “they handle the marketing, the awards campaigns, the theatrical release — everything. They give the film real value. And naturally, they want to capitalize on the value they’ve created. That’s why they can resell a film for three, four or five times the original price.”Yet for international buyers balking at pricey U.S. packages, Shooman has a ready answer.“International buyers tend to complain all the time, and all it takes is them having pre-bought an ‘Obsession’ or a ‘River’ or a ‘Backrooms’ or a ‘You Can See Everything’ for that thing they felt like maybe they paid too much for to end up being a fantastic deal,” says Shooman.Alex Ritman contributed to this report.