This is quite the twist on the usual song and dance regarding the evils of illegal downloading and pirating. Jamin Winans, director of the indie movie INK, sent an email to his fans actually giving credit to Bit Torrent for the exposure the movie has received through the illegal downloading service.

After just a few days of being pirated, more than 400,000 have Torrented the film, making it one of the most downloaded movies of the week. The results of this free publicity have been kind of amazing. The film reached #16 on IMDb’s movie meter and DVD sales actually increased. This is what Winans told the Torrent Freak blog:

“We made this film in Denver, CO on a budget of $250,000 and have fought to bring it to 15 cities ourselves over the past ten months. Hollywood has claimed that they don’t know how to market the film or that it doesn’t have an audience, and what BitTorrent has done in the last four days is prove, unequivocally, that Hollywood is wrong.”

Read on to see the letter to his fans.

“Dear Fans and Friends,

Over the weekend something pretty extraordinary happened. Ink got ripped off. Someone bit torrented the movie (we knew this would happen) and they posted it on every pirate site out there. What we didn’t expect was that within 24 hours Ink would blow up. Ink became the number 1 most downloaded movie on several sites having been downloaded somewhere between 150,000 to 200,000 times as far as we can tell. Knowing there’s absolutely nothing we can do about it, we’ve embraced the piracy and are just happy Ink is getting unprecedented exposure.

As a result, Ink is now ranked #16 on IMDb’s movie meter and is currently one of the top 20 most popular movies in the world.

This all started as a result of the completely underground buzz that you’ve each helped us create. We’ve had no distributor, no real advertising and yet the word of mouth that you’ve generated has made the film blow up as soon as it became available worldwide. So many of you came to see the movie multiple times, bringing friends and family and many of you have bought the DVD and Blu-ray from us. All of this built up and built up and suddenly it exploded.

We don’t know exactly where this will all lead, but the exposure is unquestionably a positive thing.

Ink hits Netflix, Blockbuster, iTunes and many more tomorrow! Remember to get your signed copies, t-shirts and posters at the Ink Store.

Thank you so much for the constant love and support.

Jamin and Kiowa
Double Edge Films”

Of course, as is usual with cases like these, INK is probably the exception and not the rule. I’m definitely not saying that all movies should be pirated in order to make more money. That business model would probably not work. What’s interesting about this case is that the makers of the movie have been able to start a mini-grassroots movement with the aid of Bit Torrent, Twitter, and movie blogs like this one, and it gives hope to young directors who, beyond making money, just want their work to be seen and enjoyed.

INK tells “the story of a brutal mercenary who appears in the dreamscape of a comatose 8 year old called Emma.” You can head over to the film’s site, where you can purchase the movie or simply donate a few bucks if you’re feeling generous. If want to see the movie before you donate, it’s available, of course, on your favorite Bit Torrent site.