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Netflix is not replacing Christopher Nolan's films anytime soon. This isn't a battle for the blockbusters, it's a battle for the little and medium sized films.

Netflix is not replacing Christopher Nolan's films anytime soon. This isn't a battle for the blockbusters, it's a battle for the little and medium sized films. The bigger movies will have a place in cinemas for a long time because they have wide appeal. For smaller, niche, films that have a potential audience of 2 million people that are spread across the world, there is no way to make good content for them and deliver it to theaters. It makes absolutely zero sense economically. Netflix can make that same movie and recommend it to the 2 million people that they know will like it. Movie theaters that show movies to hundreds of people at a time can't ever compete with that. Medium sized movies are the true battleground right now, which is and the Academy is trying to put a stake in the ground to help the movie theaters. It is not going to work because the economics are not as compelling, and they will only get less compelling over time. This move will mean that comic book movies will rule the Oscars one day. At least until the Academy realizes they are just being a bunch of old fogies.

Thlom 9y ago
You would think that in the age of digital cinema niche films would have a boost. If you are creating a film for distribution, creating a dcp for cinema is trivial. The dcp can be shipped to cinemas on a physical copy, via satellite or over the internet and be delivered straight into the cinemas system. For the cinema owner there’s literally zero effort involved to schedule a few shows of a niche film. For the bigger chains most of it is automated anyway. All you have to do is schedule the shows in your point of sale system and the backend systems does the rest like building the playlist transferring content to the correct auditoriums and so on.
- dumbfounder 9y ago
  Zero effort, but also next to zero reason. You are assuming that people will seek out these films and go out of their way to see them at odd times. The cinema is missing out on the money it would make showing a blockbuster. There is a reason why the big movies show on a ton of screens at once, they bring in more people than all the other movies combined on big weekends.

Thlom 9y ago

You would think that in the age of digital cinema niche films would have a boost. If you are creating a film for distribution, creating a dcp for cinema is trivial. The dcp can be shipped to cinemas on a physical copy, via satellite or over the internet and be delivered straight into the cinemas system. For the cinema owner there’s literally zero effort involved to schedule a few shows of a niche film. For the bigger chains most of it is automated anyway. All you have to do is schedule the shows in your point of sale system and the backend systems does the rest like building the playlist transferring content to the correct auditoriums and so on.

dumbfounder 9y ago
Zero effort, but also next to zero reason. You are assuming that people will seek out these films and go out of their way to see them at odd times. The cinema is missing out on the money it would make showing a blockbuster. There is a reason why the big movies show on a ton of screens at once, they bring in more people than all the other movies combined on big weekends.