This is a couple days old, but Warner Brothers Studios has announced it will make all of their 2021 releases available on HBO Max the same day they are released in theaters. This includes such releases as Tom and Jerry and Wonder Woman 1984. They will be available at no extra charge to subscribers.
A couple of caveats: This applies only to films released in 2021. They will evaluate the success of this plan before deciding to carry forth this policy beyond 2021. All new releases will also be available for only one month.
A lot of the squawking about this mentions the “theatrical experience.” Isn’t that up to the audience? The movies are going to theaters and homes, so people can choose the theatrical experience if they want it. If they don’t - which seems likely given its declining quality and rising risks - should Nolan and other artsy types be allowed to force the issue on us Philistines?
Many directors are obsessed with the “theatrical experience”, and Christopher Nolan is perhaps the most vocal. All of his recent films – Dark Knight, Interstellar, Dunkirk, Tenet – were shot primarily in IMAX. Nolan has gone so far as to disparage digital IMAX, and insist that the declining 70mm IMAX film format is far superior.
He may have an esoteric technical point, but when you consider that IMAX film reels are absolutely huge (the “70mm” refers to the film width, but unlike regular 70mm movies, the images are across the length of the film, and the gigantic reels have to be mounted horizontally) it’s a tremendous cost for marginal gain. Digital IMAX can be stored on an ordinary hard drive, and is projected simultaneously with two high-res digital projectors.
I think this is a good move, though theater owners will be in revolt. But it gives films a wide audience early on and may be good for business in the long run. Theaters have been fearing that television would undermine their business since at least the early 50s, but with large-screen high-def TVs and home theater sound systems their fears may have finally come to pass. Today it’s only a matter of a fairly modest amount of money to be able to equip a home with 4K projection on a 10-foot screen and theatrical-quality sound.
I think it bodes the end of the multiplex, but there will still be the specialty theaters, like the ones with special seating that serve food and booze, and places that show Imax and 3D. The minority of movie-goes that want a nice experience will get a better one, and the morons that want to talk on their phones and such get to do so at home (where they thought they were anyway).
Honestly I don’t think that matters at all. This is 100% because of the pandemic and the billions of dollars they have lost this year alone. With theaters being closed for 9 months now and no end in sight, it’s not like they have many other options. Let’s see what happens once all of this is eventually(?) over and people actually have the option of going to theaters again.
It’s happening now because of the pandemic, but it could well be permanent. It used to be that if you had the choice between watching at home or watching at the theater, there wasn’t much to recommend either over the other, and you might end up choosing the theater just because that’s what you’ve always done. But after people have a year of getting used to seeing everything at home, that “what we’ve always done” factor is gone.
True enough, but as @Chronos said, some of the changes induced by the pandemic may become permanent. This is in part because the pandemic may have just accelerated things that were already happening – in this case, more people watching at home, and more movies (or miniseries) being funded by cable channels like HBO and streaming providers like Netflix for their own distribution channels.