Oscar season is here and, unless you're a proactive cinephile, there's a good chance you missed more than a few of this year's nominees. If your tastes run beyond the average blockbuster, it becomes slightly harder to find a film. While some Oscar films, like Million Dollar Baby and Sideways are out in wide release, other films, like Hotel Rwanda and Vera Drake are playing only in limited engagements. But with more than 10 theaters scattered throughout the Seacoast, why is it so hard to catch all the critically acclaimed, "artsy" flicks? According to local theater owners, the problem often lies with the studios themselves.

When it comes to deciding what movies to show, independent theater owners have to take into consideration a host of factors, from the number of prints available to the potential commercial appeal of the film.

"Small theaters like myself cannot get every film," said Roger Detzler, owner of the Ioka Theater in Exeter. "I have to make choices, and by the time the films I do book play out to contract, I may not be able to get the films that I missed as second runs."

Here's how the distribution system works: for every film that comes out, a studio makes a certain number of prints, ranging anywhere from two to 2,000. Large theater chains, like Regal, deal directly with studios when selecting films they want to run; independent theaters, like the Ioka, Spinelli or Hampton Cinemas, have to work through booking agencies that, in turn, get the movies from one of the handful of major distribution companies. This means a small, independent theater in a non-metropolitan market will have a very hard time getting a non-mainstream movie with a low number of prints.

But that isn't the only obstacle. Theaters often have to pay studios a percentage of the gate, or ticket sales, in exchange for rights to show the film. In a film's opening week, this can be as high as 90 percent, with the amount falling over subsequent weeks. When booking a film, theaters are often contractually obligated to run the movie for a certain amount of time.

"It's not until we get into the third or fourth week of a film that ticket sales mean anything to us," Detzler said. "People don't understand why they have to pay $5 for a small popcorn-that's why right there."

Other factors, like the theater's demographics, also come into play.

"I rarely ever book an R-rated film, mostly due to the demographics of our town," Detzler said. "My job as a theater owner is to maximize ticket sales, and the class of people most interested in R-rated movies is not in my demographic."

Tim Barnes, director of operations for Spinelli Cinemas, agrees.

"As a general rule, a lot of those types of pictures we typically do not pick up until they become more of a crossover picture," he said.

Barnes said if a specialty film can draw one out of 100 people to the theater, it would succeed in a populous city like Boston, but tank in a smaller market like Dover.

"Basically, it's an uncertain gamble; once in a while, you might find a Sideways out of the batch," he said.

While independent, "specialty" movies are a gamble for some theater owners, others embrace critically acclaimed, but commercially uncertain, films. Venues like the Newburyport Screening Room and The Music Hall in Portsmouth often screen only independent, limited release films.

"Our films are based more on what we think we should play, demographics be damned," said Andrew Mungo, co-owner of the Screening Room.

Mungo said he reads eight or nine trade publications a week and is likely to pick a film "when we see a consistent string of quality reviews" attached to a movie. Quality films don't always bring in a plentiful audience, though.

"We always make mistakes. Every one of our programs has mistakes in it, films that will just not draw anything but a tiny, dedicated core of filmgoers," he said. "We're serving a higher quality audience."

This tiny audience, along with a largely volunteer staff and low overhead costs, has kept the theater in business for over 20 years.

"I think we're just pure heart and somewhat obsessive even if it's not in our own interest to be so," he said.

However, even large theater chains have difficulties when it comes to booking specialty films.

"It's more of a supply question," said Russ Nunley, communications and marketing director for Regal Entertainment Group. "There are only so many prints of a film available and the distributor is making decisions where they want to go and when."

Regal operates theaters in Portsmouth, Newington, Concord, Manchester, Bedford and Hooksett.

Nunley said films are distributed to "designated marketing areas," or, DMAs. For example, Regal's Newington theater is considered part of the Boston market. If a distributor is providing only two prints of a film for the Boston market, the film is usually placed where there's a history of specialty films doing a large amount of business, Nunley said. A film like Bad Education opened on Nov. 21 on three screens in the entire country; since then, it's broadened out to 100 screens. Bad Education was at The Music Hall two weeks ago and is currently showing at the Screening Room.

"Typically, as a film becomes popular and more prints are produced and there's a wider release, prints start moving and migrating around the country," Nunley said. "It's mainly based on studio trying to do best guestimate where they're going to have their biggest box office payoff."

Nunley added that while it is easier and more profitable to fill cineplexes with blockbusters, theater chains still have an eye on specialty films. Regal has a "cinema art" division that tracks small, independent films.

"Would we be more attuned to Spider-man 2 than a smaller film coming out on four screens? It would take a different amount of resources to manage that process, but it's not at all that we're distracted by that and not paying attention to art films," he said.