Attend Theatrical Marketplace, an online platform on which independent filmmakers and distributors book their films directly with US cinema operators, went live on Wednesday 11 November at the American Film Market in Los Angeles, the company said. It was created by The Fithian Group, led by John Fithian, the former head of the National Association of Theatre Owners, with the rights and revenue management company Titlepool.
The idea is simple to state and hard to execute. Independent films struggle to reach cinemas without a distributor, while exhibitors have spent years asking for more commercially viable titles to fill the gaps in the studio calendar. Attend is betting that local audience data, matching software and standard paperwork can bring the two together without a middleman.
Key facts
- Platform: Attend Theatrical Marketplace, created by The Fithian Group with Titlepool; launched 11 November 2026 at AFM
- Fee: 11% of the filmmaker’s gross share of film rental, with no other marketplace charge, according to Celluloid Junkie
- Launch slate: four curated films planned for release in 2027, Honeyjoon, Mouse, Spoke and Censurada
- Exhibitors: “several thousand” screens at launch, the company says, including Cinemark, Marcus Theatres and Warehouse Cinemas
- Target: the “vast majority” of US screens on the platform by the end of 2026, according to the launch release
How it works
Filmmakers enter their film’s details, formats, proposed terms, audience information and marketing budget. Attend then uses machine learning, census demographics for the area around each cinema and evidence of demand to recommend specific venues and build a release plan. Exhibitors are notified of films matched to their locations, can browse the catalogue and can accept, decline or counter the proposed terms. The platform also handles the unglamorous work that eats a small distributor’s week: DCP delivery, in-cinema marketing materials, rental contracts, box-office reporting, invoicing and collection.
In a demonstration for Celluloid Junkie, Titlepool chief executive Charles Beale showed the system proposing an opening in 17 cinemas across eight markets for a sample title, and flagging a rival horror release on the same date. Films without a track record may be steered towards four-walling, in which the filmmaker rents the auditorium outright, to build the data that supports wider bookings. Fithian told the outlet that Attend is negotiating for access to historical box-office data, and is in talks on larger titles that could open on as many as 1,000 screens from July 2027.
Who is behind it
Fithian and Patrick Corcoran helped run NATO, now Cinema United, for decades before founding The Fithian Group. Its third founding partner, Jackie Brenneman, became president and chief executive of the Independent Film & Television Alliance, which runs AFM, earlier this year, and remains on Attend’s board alongside them, Celluloid Junkie reported. Corcoran presented the platform at the AFM House on launch morning, on a panel moderated by IndieWire’s Brian Welk with Beale and Honeyjoon writer-director Lilian T. Mehrel, whose film won Tribeca’s AT&T Untold Stories award.
Before the software was ready, the group tested its approach by handling releases by hand. You, Me & Her opened in about 250 cinemas on Valentine’s Day 2025. Lost & Found in Cleveland went out on more than 500 screens in November 2025 at the filmmakers’ insistence; Fithian told Celluloid Junkie it played strongly in parts of Cleveland, reasonably elsewhere in Ohio and poorly in much of the rest of the country.
What is not known
Attend has not named most of its exhibitor partners or given an exact screen count. Nor has it said whether filmmakers will have to pay a minimum guarantee once the platform opens beyond its curated slate, though Corcoran told Celluloid Junkie that such a requirement is possible.
Our reading
The 11% fee is the figure to hold Attend to. It buys access, matching and administration, not a marketing budget or a sales team: the filmmaker still funds the campaign and carries the risk. That makes the platform most useful to producers who can already show where their audience lives, and the lesson Fithian’s team drew from Lost & Found in Cleveland is the platform’s real pitch. The aim, Fithian said, is to find not only the right cinemas but “the right theatre count”.
The promise to sign up most US screens within seven weeks is the claim to watch, because a marketplace with few exhibitors is only a database. The first proof will be whether the four launch titles hold their screens in 2027. For the exhibitors’ side, see our reports on third-quarter results at Cinemark and Marcus Theatres. For a buyer-led answer to the same supply problem, see the Lokia network of 12 distributors formed before AFM.
Sources
- Attend Theatrical Marketplace, launch release: Attend Theatrical Marketplace launches at AFM (11 November 2026, via Celluloid Junkie wire)
- Celluloid Junkie, After years in development, Attend opens a direct path to cinemas (11 November 2026)
- IndieWire, Attend, the first marketplace connecting filmmakers directly to theater owners, launches (11 November 2026)
- American Film Market, session: The Attend Theatrical Marketplace and how technology will transform independent film distribution (11 November 2026)
- Boxoffice Pro, Attend Theatrical Marketplace launches at AFM (11 November 2026)