This article examines how the story of the making of the independent Spanish feature film The
Cosmonaut resembles traditional narrative structures and story elements. It relates the ongoing
sharing of the film’s production process, and argues that this sharing provided the basis for the
film’s audience-building. Independent films no longer have to be standalone products that are
marketed only after their creation. Related events or products allow the story of the making of
a film to transcend the film’s temporal boundaries and even the limitations of its medium. The
paper concludes that telling the story of a film’s making while it happens (a) helps to create
communities and audiences, who (b) individually experience the making of a film and (c) view
a film merely as an end-product while “watching” takes place over an extended period of time.
Such ongoing storytelling allows continuous audience growth that helps the filmmaker to selfdistribute.