Also in my research into full rights, I took heart in this from snippet from http://www.marklitwak.com/articles/film/indie_filmmaker.html)
" Many motion pictures are meant for initial exhibition in theaters, the theatrical media. The time period, or "window," during which the movie will play in theaters will be short for a flop, while a blockbuster can play for many months.
After the theatrical release, a picture may be distributed and exploited in the so-called allied and ancillary markets, which includes home video, non-theatrical (colleges, community groups), pay television (HBO), network television (ABC) and television station syndication. The film may also generate revenue from merchandising, publication of a movie novelization and a sound track album. The nomenclature may be misleading because the so-called "ancillary" media now generate most of the revenue. In the United States, home video revenues are about five times theatrical revenues.
A theatrical release is still primary in one important respect. Although the theatrical release may not generate net revenues - because of the considerable cost of print duplication, advertising and shipping - the theatrical release creates public awareness for the film. It is the engine that pulls the train. When consumers visit video stores, the cassettes they rent or buy first, are the movies they learned about from the advertising and publicity accompanying their theatrical release.
Ancillary media tend to be much more profitable than theatrical media. When a distributor releases a film to television, there are minimal expenses. If you license a film to CBS, for example, the expenses incurred are the manufacturing cost of one video sub-master and expense of shipping it to CBS. The distributor does pay for advertising, as CBS will promote the movie. Thus, most of the revenue from television licensing flows to the bottom line.
Because a theatrical release is often not profitable, and because the ancillary media frequently are profitable, most domestic distributors will decline to acquire only theatrical rights. They do not want to take the risk of a theatrical loss, without the offsetting revenue that can be obtained from the ancillaries. Consequently, filmmakers need to exercise caution. If they license home video and television rights first, they may find they cannot obtain a domestic theatrical release."
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