What once felt fringe is now being named as essential.
A new reality for indie film in 2026 was beautifully articulated this week in Dana Harris-Bridson’s recent piece in IndieWire that the business of film is not separate from the art. It is part of the creative act itself. Funding, framing, distribution, and relationship-building are not administrative chores to be handled later. They shape the work from the very beginning.
In this “new reality,” audience, awareness, and community are no longer optional. They’re foundational.
For some, this may feel like disruption. For us at For Impact, it feels like affirmation.
Because this is the philosophy that has guided our work for years:
Community is the strategy.
Community is the strategy whether you are building an ecosystem of resource support for a project or cultivating an audience in relationship with the work’s release into the world. Community is not a byproduct of success. It is how success becomes possible.
For years, our work at For Impact has been guided by a simple, and often countercultural, belief that films don’t succeed in isolation. They succeed in relationship. We’ve seen this again and again. Bringing audiences and ecosystems of support into the process early, and staying in relationship with them throughout a project’s life, is how films achieve real impact artistically, commercially, and socially.
Whether it was engaging nonprofit advocates and subject-matter specialists during the script stage of THE TALE, or building a funder base for LILLY from a wide range of individuals committed to the film’s thematic of equal rights, the presence of a real community was crucial to each project’s journey. These relationships didn’t appear at the end. They were woven into the work from the very beginning.
At For Impact, we treat an artist’s creative vision and their way of carrying that vision into the world as inseparable. From the earliest stages, we ask questions like: Who is this work for? How are you inviting people into relationship with it? What structures will actually support this work being made… and mattering?
Because impact does not live in just one lane.
It is not only artistic excellence or commercial sustainability.
And it is not only social resonance.
Real impact emerges at the intersection of all three when vision, strategy, and community are woven together intentionally. This is what we call the “trifecta of impact”:
Artistic impact — the integrity, craft, clarity, (& sometimes acclaim) of the work
Commercial impact — the structures that allow the work to be funded and sustained
Social impact — the resonance, dialogue, and real-world change the work invites
When any one of these is ignored, projects struggle. When all three are considered early and held together throughout the process, the work has a chance to live fully in the world.
Alas, when artists are supported to articulate not only what they are making, but who it is for and why it matters now, something shifts. Funding conversations change. Partnerships deepen. Momentum builds before the work ever reaches a screen. And the artist no longer carries the project alone.
The future of independent film will not be saved by better algorithms, louder marketing, or a savior funder.
It will be shaped by artists who understand this:
Community is the strategy. Community is how work comes alive.
Community is how it endures. Community is how impact becomes real.
This isn’t a trend we’re chasing.
It’s the philosophy that has guided our work for years and the one we believe will carry independent film forward.