I went along to a screening at Paddington Town Hall last night - was a bit of an unexpected film experience - not only was the film screening as part of a conference on home birthing (!) attended by hundreds of gee-d up women ready for a revival meeting, but Ricki Lake was also in attendance! (Yes, she of Cry-Baby, Hairspray and ‘The Ricki Lake Show’ fame). Sounds weird, but Ms Lake was the erstwhile executive producer (and one of the subjects) of said film. It was called The Business Of Being Born, an engaging documentary about ‘home birthing’ versus ‘hospital’ births. The film made a great argument for the former, intimating that hospital births were more an industry serving the bottom line of hospitals, doctors, drug companies and share holders than the health and welfare of mothers and babies…

Although not the focus of the night, one really interesting thing that did come up in the post-film Q&A was that producer Amy Epstein - also in attendance - was a small discussion about the virtues of self-distribution via the net, and localised community screenings. This thing is getting bigger… Like Four-Eyed Monsters, Iraq For Sale and Loose Change, The Business Of Being Born joins an ever-growing list of features and documentaries using the net as a legitimate and lucrative means of distribution. The idea being to target grass roots audiences and communities, encouraging people to buy a copy of the film and screen it in their neighbourhood, as a way to (in this case) get the message out, make money back and/or market the movie. The Business of Being Born is taking this path first before moving into more traditional means of distribution (cinema, DVD, TV).

The net can’t be ignored. If you’re interested in contributing to this very conversation come along to Week 3 of DestFest.