The Cinema Quarterly · Volume IX · Brand Partners Edition
Mid-roll only · No pre-roll Contextual rotation Reg. cap: $2k–$500k
Advertise on Cinema · For Brand Partners

Ads that respect the work.

You don't need to interrupt people to be remembered. You need to be in the room when they're paying attention.

Cinema is a streaming network for independent film and series — funded by viewers, owned by viewers, watched by viewers who paid to be there. We sell mid-roll and intermission inventory only, and every spot is approved by the creator whose work it sits inside. No pre-roll. No sidebar. No retargeting trail. Buy attention, not impressions.

Apply to advertise → See the dashboard
94%
avg. view-thru
2.1M
monthly viewers
$32cpm
premium mid-roll
0%
pre-roll inventory
No. I

Three rules we don't break

a manifesto, of sorts
i.

Mid-roll only,
at the breath

Spots run at the natural break — between act two and three, or at the end of a chapter — not slammed in front of someone trying to start the film. The director picks the in-point. Ads load when the viewer pauses for a sip of water, not when they hit play.

Pre-roll, mid-action, sidebar · One break, one breath
ii.

Context, not
category bidding

Spots rotate against programmes by editorial fit — outdoor against slow-craft + nature docs, not against war reportage. We publish the eligibility rubric. House review clears every spot for category & tone before flight; filmmakers earn 35% of the spend their title carries, so they're paid for the audience they bring.

Programmatic auction floor · Contextual rotation
iii.

No tracking
past the spot

We measure what plays inside Cinema — view-throughs, completion, engagement on the brand card after. We don't drop a cookie, build a graph, or sell you a retargeting pool. The viewer leaves the spot the way they came in: a person, not a profile.

Pixel networks, identity graphs · First-party, post-spot reset
No. II

Inventory on the slate

three formats — that's the whole catalogue
Mid-roll · Format A

The Intermission

— A 30 or 60-second spot at the natural break.

Plays once, between acts, on long-form film and 40-min+ episodes. Skippable after 5 seconds, but rarely skipped. Includes a brand card with one CTA — visit, redeem, or RSVP — that stays on the pause screen for 8 seconds after the spot ends.

Length
:30 or :60
Inventory
~1 per film, ~1 per episode
Skippable
after :05
Targeting
title-level, genre, region
$32 cpm
premium
title-level pairing
Sponsorship · Format B

The Programme Note

— Editorial sponsorship of a season or collection.

Sit alongside a curated season — "Brooklyn shorts, 2024" or "the second-album problem." Your name appears on the collection page, on the player intro card, and in the sleeve PDF. No spot mid-film. Pure association. Six-week minimum.

Length
6-week / 12-week / season
Inventory
1 sponsor per collection
Format
logo, intro card, sleeve note
Targeting
full collection audience
$8.4k
flat / collection
6-week minimum
No. III

How a buy actually goes

from intake to live · ~2 weeks
01

Intake call

30-minute call with our partnerships lead. Tell us what you sell, the brief, the budget, and what films you'd want next to.

Day 1–2
02

Slate match

We propose 4–8 titles and collections. You approve a shortlist; we send the spot brief and length spec to those creators.

Day 3–6
03

Spec-check & house review

Auto spec-check is instant — loudness, length, captions, banned-category overlay. House review (humans) clears tone & context within 24 hours.

Day 7–8
04

Live

Spot goes live with title-level pacing. Real-time dashboard, weekly reads, end-of-flight wrap. Pay net-15 on flight close.

Day 11+
No. IV

Who's actually watching

2.1M monthly · self-reported, opt-in only

The Cinema viewer, in aggregate

Skews 28–44, college-educated, urban-dwelling, deliberate. Pays an average of $14/mo and holds an average of $2,400 in member-owned shares. Watches 4.2 titles per month and reads the sleeve note 71% of the time. They read the credits.

Age 25–34
38%
Age 35–44
31%
Age 45–54
18%
Age 18–24 / 55+
13%
College+
78%
Urban / suburban
84%
Avg. household $90k+
62%

Top metro markets

— viewers per month, self-reported region.

Brooklyn / NYC312k
Los Angeles241k
London / UK186k
Bay Area142k
Chicago98k
Berlin / DE76k
Toronto68k
Mexico City54k
Tokyo42k
Other881k
We bought one season's sponsorship of the Brooklyn shorts collection on Cinema. We got thirty-eight emails from viewers. Thirty-eight! Names, not impressions. None of our other media buys this year delivered a single email.
ME
Mireille Eklund
Brand Director, Patagonia
No. V

The advertiser dashboard

live preview · what you'll see
cinema · advertise · Patagonia · Spring '26 Flight day 14 / 42 · Net-15 invoice on close

Flight performance

Live
Impressions
412k
▲ on pace
View-thru
94.2%
▲ vs. flight target 88%
Card clicks
8,720
2.12% CTR
Spend / Pacing
$13.2k
42% of $32k
PACE TARGET IMPRESSIONS · DAILY
DAY 1
DAY 14
The Last Meridian
A film by Joel Carrera
148.2kimpressions
96.1%view-thru
Hollow Bay
A series by Sam Arden
112.7kimpressions
93.4%view-thru
The Tenants
A series by Lena Ostrov
87.5kimpressions
92.0%view-thru
Brooklyn Shorts '26
Programme Note · 12-week
63.6kimpressions
95.2%view-thru

House review queue

5 / 7 cleared
JC
Joel Carrera
approved · 14 May
✓
SA
Sam Arden
approved · 14 May
✓
LO
Lena Ostrov
notes returned · review
…
DA
Devi Atwell
approved · 13 May
✓
MV
Mira Vale
passed · pairing too commercial
✗
TR
Tomás Reyes
approved · 12 May
✓
● Note from Lena Ostrov

"Love the brand. Could you swap the second cut for the V2 jacket-on-trail shot? My pilot has a lot of close-up kitchen work and a slow-mo countertop spot reads better with my pacing."

No. VI

Get on the slate

apply for an intake call · 30 minutes

What we'll cover.

The intake is a real conversation, not a pitch. We want to know if Cinema is right for what you're trying to do — and we'll tell you when it's not.

  • ✓
    Brief & Brand fitWhat you sell, the campaign, who you're trying to reach. We'll flag if Cinema's audience is wrong for the brief.
  • ✓
    Slate matchWe'll suggest 4–8 titles and collections that suit the spot. You veto, we narrow.
  • ✓
    Spec & spec callLength, format, brand-card CTA. We can also recommend production partners if you don't have a spot ready.
  • ✓
    Pricing & pacingIndicative CPM, flight length, end-of-quarter availability. Honest answers on what's sold-through and what isn't.
  • ✓
    What we don't doPre-roll, retargeting, overlays, banner remnant. We'll make sure you're buying the thing you think you're buying.
No spam. We answer in < 48h, or not at all.
No. VII

The fine print

questions, asked and answered
What's the minimum spend?
$2,000 for a one-title mid-roll test. $8,400 for a 6-week programme sponsorship. We don't run sub-$2k experiments because the house-review workflow has a fixed cost we can't amortize below that.
Can I bring my own creative?
Yes — :30 or :60 ProRes / H.264, 1080p min. We'll pass it to creators as-is. If you don't have a spot, we have a short list of production partners who've cut for our slate.
What categories do you decline?
Gambling, weapons, MLM, payday lending, AI-generated content brands, products with active class actions, and political ads. We're conservative because the creators are the ones living next to your spot.
How is this different from MUBI or A24's newsletter?
MUBI is a curated SVOD with no advertising. A24's newsletter is a list. Cinema is the only place you can buy mid-roll inventory inside independent narrative work where the creator co-owns the spot decision.
Do you do brand integrations?
Inside the films? No. That's an editorial line. We can pair you with creators who want to make a custom branded short — separate from the slate, sold as its own product.
What about measurement & brand lift?
We report impressions, view-thru, and card-click CTR per title and aggregated. For lift studies, we run pre/post brand surveys with our research partner Quill on flights $50k+. Add-on, $2,400 per study.

Buy the room,
not the impression.

One conversation. Forty-eight hours.

Apply now → Or see what's playing