Distributors Rarely Fund Full Production Budget

Screen Australia has recently conducted a comprehensive analysis of 197 narrative production applications submitted between January 2023 and October 2025. The findings shed light on the importance of marketplace contributions in financing projects, revealing that while they are a consistent presence in finance plans, they are rarely enough on their own to fully fund a project.

The data, which was gathered from 119 feature film, 59 adult television drama, and 19 children’s television drama applications, was compiled by Screen Australia’s Market & Audience team. The aim of the analysis was to provide producers with insights to benchmark realistic expectations for distribution advances, minimum guarantees, presales, and gap financing.

In the realm of feature films, the analysis revealed that 97% of applications included an ANZ distribution advance, albeit most representing less than 5% of total project budgets. Additionally, 96% of applications had a rest of world (ROW) sales agent attached, with 48% of those agents providing a minimum guarantee (MG) upfront. While most MGs were below AUD500,000 ($345,000), some higher-budget titles secured guarantees exceeding AUD2 million ($1.38 million).

Gap financing was a key component in 34% of feature film applications, particularly in the AUD5 million-AUD15 million ($3.45 million-$10.35 million) budget range, where roughly half of projects required it. Interestingly, 70% of projects that utilized gap financing had gaps greater than 10% of total production costs.

When it comes to television, adult drama projects relied more heavily on distribution advances than presales. Eighty-one percent of adult TV applications secured an international distribution advance worth at least 10% of the budget, with 51% landing advances between AUD500,000 and AUD1 million ($345,000-$690,000) per broadcast hour. In contrast, presales were less common, appearing in only about 5% of the sample.

Children’s television projects, on the other hand, had a different financing landscape. Over half of the projects had budgets between AUD5 million and AUD10 million ($3.45 million-$6.9 million), with 53% securing a distribution advance worth 10% or more of the budget. Presales were more prevalent in children’s television, appearing in 42% of applications, with 38% of projects securing presale contributions exceeding 10% of the budget. Additionally, 16% of children’s projects had co-production partners, all of which also had presales in their finance plans.

Screen Australia emphasized that the findings highlight the importance of combining multiple funding sources for projects, rather than relying on any single marketplace commitment. This approach, they noted, is key to successfully closing finance plans for projects with commercial scale and international appeal.