Independent cinema became fully co-opted by studios in the indiewood era

Evidence

Following the success of Sex, Lies, and Videotape (Steven Soderbergh, 1989) and the commercialization of independent film, the term indie started being used to encapsulate the symbiotic relationship between Hollywood studios, “mini-majors,” “major independents,” and smaller firms. In the “Sundance-Miramax era” of the 1990s, many of the entertainment conglomerates formed or acquired subsidiary divisions that specialized in small or mid-tier films that appealed to adult audiences through attributes like quirkiness, cool, cult following, prestige, and awards. By the late 1990s and early 2000s, indiewood was used to describe a more fully institutionalized relationship, in which co-optation was complete and conglomerates began to shed their specialty divisions. — Andrew deWaard, Derivative Media, 268