As someone who lives in Los Angeles and is mostly surrounded by people in film/tv, the indie film industry is a LOT bigger than many people outside of the know realize. And I’m so thankful for that, because that’s where the “things that don’t scale, … original ideas that are difficult to translate to movies, etc” flourish. In a way, the indie movie scene is in better shape than it ever has been— with well-known big name actors even hopping in now and then.
You could argue the indie scene is similar to the startup scene in SV. You have investors/producers pretty much funding these films based on team/talent and a pitch alone, with the festival circuit (could be considered an analog to SV demo-days or investor powows) essentially serving as a way to get bought by big studios for potential wide release, limited-release runs (which can still make a lot of money for those involved), or teams hired/screenplays bought and adapted by other studios. You can even make it big right out of college (or in college) [1] with little-to-no connections, though of course even more-so than SV a name and pedigree gets you further faster.
There’s so much in LA (and NYC) that gets released in theaters only locally, and the city is better for it. It’s the wide-release that, almost by definition, must serve lowest common denominator in order to make its 8/9-figure budget back in a span of months (tech companies get years!!). It’s sad that SF and LA, so close geographically, have industries so socially polarized to each other in every way, since there’s really a lot of overlap when you get down to it (and each industry could definitely learn things from the other)
[1] https://variety.com/2022/film/news/apple-cha-cha-real-smooth...