The weekend numbers are in before your coffee. The producer update is drafted. Every cinema has the right poster, and the rental invoices went out on time. FilmHQ is where Baltic distributors run their films, from the script on your desk to the rental in your account.
A release is a hundred small decisions made by different people over six months. FilmHQ keeps them on the same film. Follow one sample title, Harbour Lights, from the script to the rental. All names and figures are made up.
Nothing important ever arrives as a new subject line. The delivery slipped a week in reply eleven. The key art changed in a thread that opened with “Hope you’re well”. The KDM that never came is three messages under a question about parking. FilmHQ reads every thread, lifts out the line that changes the release, puts it on the film with a date, and tells the one person who needs to know. When it can’t wait, it goes to their phone.
| From | Buried in the thread | What FilmHQ did with it |
|---|---|---|
| The labThu 08:12 | “RE: RE: RE: Harbour Lights delivery — sorry, DCP now lands 8 Oct” | Delivery moved to 8 Oct on the film. That is the day before opening, so the booker knows now, not on Wednesday. |
| The producerMon 16:40 | “RE: key art — v3 attached, please use this one from now on” | v2 retired. Marketing gets a review task; cinemas get v3 the moment you approve it, and never v2 by mistake. |
| Harbour CinemaTallinn · Thu 17:20 | “RE: RE: screen 3 — still no KDM, first show is 18:00” | UrgentOn your phone and the booker’s within the minute. Stays open until the key is confirmed. Nobody finds out from the audience. |
| Daugava ScreensRiga · Tue 10:05 | “RE: Harbour Lights week 2 — we’ll go from 6 to 4 shows a day” | Booking change ready for your yes or no. The week’s plan and the rental estimate already show both versions. |
Q is not the assistant who waits for a question. He is the one in the basement with the gadgets: the tech nut who turns up with the thing you didn’t know you needed. A clash warning before the cinema rings. A full read of a script fifteen minutes after it lands. The ad channel to cut, with the number attached.
He is built into FilmHQ, and he knows your films, your numbers and your market.
Prefer your own assistant? Q’s tools work with Claude, ChatGPT and other AI assistants.
Pay attention. Iron Tide just moved to 23 Oct in Latvia, straight into Midsummer Run’s opening weekend. Against the eight films most like yours, a clash like that costs about 18% of the opening.
Two ways out: hold the date and add screens in Riga, or move a week to 30 Oct, where only Paper Moons opens. Both booking plans are drafted.
Move it. What do I tell the producer?
The note is written and waiting for your sign-off. So is the list of 14 cinemas to call, Riga first. Do try to bring the budget back in one piece.
Approve a poster or confirm a showtime once, and everyone who needs it has it: your team, the producer, the agency running your ads, and the family deciding what to see tonight. Nobody emails you for the file.
Films, dates, bookings, money, campaigns, artwork, news and reports. Each person sees the part of the work that is theirs.
Distribution · marketing · finance · bookingProducers, rights-holders and cinemas get a portal of their own: results by market, rental statements and the artwork they need, whenever they want it.
Invited and approved by youA media agency can plan and run paid campaigns for several distributors from one place, with each client’s numbers kept apart.
Google · Meta · TikTokA site for moviegoers in each country with every film and every showtime, plus a page for each film your ads point to. Built for phones, installs like an app.
Your brand · your domain · your languageOne week you hold a studio title under embargo: artwork nobody may see before the date, and a studio that wants every number the moment it exists. The next week it’s a local film with a co-producer, a festival premiere and terms that change per cinema. Both live in the same HQ, under different rules.
Every weekend, FilmHQ shows the whole market around your film: who else opened, who held, who fell away. Your estimates, your comparisons and your date decisions rest on what actually happened here, not on a gut feeling from 2019.
| # | Film | Admissions | Market share | Wk |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Harbour LightsNorthlight · you | 7,140 | 29% | 2 |
| 2 | Iron TideStudio release | 5,380 | 22% | 1 |
| 3 | Paper MoonsIndependent release | 3,210 | 13% | 2 |
| 4 | The OrchardStudio release | 2,450 | 10% | 4 |
| 5 | SnowboundIndependent release | 1,690 | 7% | 6 |
Whole market 24,620 admissions · 19% of it outside the top five
Every title has a profile: genre, origin, season, screens, results. The eight films most like yours are one click away, not a week in spreadsheets.
Trade news and date changes are gathered and sorted by what they mean for your slate. You read what matters and skip the rest.
Q does not wait to be asked. He flags the clash, the drop and the overspend, and turns up with the fix already drafted, within an AI budget you set for your company.
The big tools treat the Baltics as a footnote. FilmHQ was built here, around how films are actually released, booked, translated and paid for: in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania first, and wherever you release next.
Your team, your partners and your audience each see FilmHQ in their own language, and every film carries its local titles.
Weeks start on Friday. Net box office uses each country’s VAT. Rental terms follow how Baltic cinemas actually sign: sliding percentages, guarantees, fees per show and free-ticket rules.
Your films and your numbers are yours. Other distributors on FilmHQ never see them, and neither do we without asking. Hosted in the EU, under GDPR, with two-step sign-in for your partners.
Your team’s workspace, the partner portal, the consumer sites and the film pages all run on your own domain, in your colours, with your logo.
FilmHQ is an independent software company. It was built alongside working Baltic distributors, our first clients, on real releases: the artwork that arrives on Thursday night, the date that moves, the report that needs numbers from three places. They still run their releases on it. They are clients on the same terms as you. Our story
