Sony: 'The Interview' Will Have a Limited Theatrical Release

New submitter clovis writes: It's not over until it's over. Sony Pictures has announced that The Interview will be getting a limited theatrical release after all. The Texas-based Alamo Drafthouse Cinema chain has authorization to show the film, and The Plaza Theater in Atlanta will show it as well. It's not yet clear whether the major theater chains will choose to show the movie despite the threats against them. Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Layton said, "[W]e are continuing our efforts to secure more platforms and more theaters so that this movie reaches the largest possible audience." There are unconfirmed reports that Sony will make the movie available over video-on-demand as well.

Comments

Limited Theatrical Release

[future assassin]

aka we need to do whatever we can do still cash in on this other wise they just release it as normal.

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[BarbaraHudson]

aka we need to do whatever we can do still cash in on this other wise they just release it as normal.

Sony wasn't the one who pulled the plug - it was the 5 major movie chains. Now that "the ice is broken", maybe some of them will step up as well. After all, they know they'll have packed theatres and extra showings to fill the demand.

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[NatasRevol]

Uh, Sony pulled the plug too.

It may have been after the major movie chains did so, but Sony didn't let it go to anyone else either. Until now.

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[jeffmflanagan]

We've been cowardly for a long time. Remember how America shit its pants over 9/11, and went on a fear-and-hate-based killing spree in the middle-east?

Americans believe a lot of things about themselves that are absurd lies. "Land of the Free" is another one, despite the insane war on users of politically incorrect drugs.

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[BarbaraHudson]

>After all, they know they'll have packed theatres and extra showings to fill the demand.

Will they? This movie looks terrible, and there's only so much that a controversy will do to market crap.

Hey, Team America World Police was crap, but that didn't stop it. The English Patient should have been put out of it's misery after the first 20 minutes of nothing going on, but people watched it. Some of the Austin Powers stuff is "like, really, is that all you've got?" but people loved it. I'd rather watch Spaceballs a dozen times than any of them. (then again, any excuse is a good excuse for watching spaceballs :-)

A century ago HL Mencken said "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." Nothing's changed.

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[Chelloveck]

"Wait a minute... If we don't do a theatrical release before the end of the year, this thing can't get nominated for an Oscar! Quick, call up some rinkydink art houses, let's get this nominated for 'Most courageous expression of free speech in the face of a terrorist threat'! Because God knows it's not going to get nominated for the writing or acting."

Re:Limited Theatrical Release

[bledri]

Uh, Sony pulled the plug too.

It may have been after the major movie chains did so, but Sony didn't let it go to anyone else either. Until now.

Actually, 9 out of the top ten chains pulled the movie. Only #6, Marcus Theaters, didn't. They are less than half the size of #5 (Cineplex Entertainment). They have about 3% of the screens of the top five.

It's hard to have a "blockbuster" release by opening only in the midwest on a limited number of screens. So Sony pulled it until they could negotiate with enough small players to make it worthwhile. I don't get all the hate toward Sony over this. It just seems like mob mentality to me, along with conflating Song Pictures with Sony BMG.

Dear SONY:

[bmimatt]

Go fuck yourself.

Re:Dear SONY:

[bledri]

Go fuck yourself.

Because some douchebags hacked them? Or because they have a sibling company (which they have no control over) that created a rootkit? Or because the five largest theater chains (which they have no control over) are too chicken shit to show their movie? Or because the large on demand streaming services (which they have no control over) are afraid of getting hacked and won't show the movie?

All this hatred directed at Sony Pictures is ridiculous.

Re:Dear SONY:

[orgelspieler]

Most of us hate various branches of Sony for different reasons, but remember, Sony Pictures is not the same as Sony BMG, is not the same as PlayStation. I personally don't have a beef with Sony Pictures, except that their DVDs tend to crash MTR.

Re:Dear SONY:

[bmimatt]

Why? Hmmm... let's see.
- trying to demonize "hackers", while
- trying to break DNS, while
- trying to stir up political agenda.
Also, because SOPA, DRM, etc.

This should help you get out from under the rock: http://slashdot.org/index2.pl?...

Re:Dear SONY:

[grumpy_old_grandpa]

How about because they are part of the MPAA cartel? Suing grandmas and kids all over the world. But yeah, their dubious "family members" (aka Sony Music, Sony Computer Entertainment) doesn't really contribute to their reputation, whether Sony Pictures have control over them or not.

Watching Sony bleed has really been the greatest xmas gift of this year.

Re:Dear SONY:

[EuclideanSilence]

Why though?

Maybe because today isn't the first day everyone has heard of Sony? They have a history of being assholes. They get away with illlegal or should-be-illegal behavior and product characteristics directed at their customers that makes us all hate them. If they weren't protected by an army of lawyers with chains of patents and copyrights, they would be out of business long ago.

And now they "oh, we're just going to show you a little bit of our crappy movie, hurry or you'll miss it!"...pass.

And. Fuck those guys.

Re:Dear SONY:

[bledri]

How about because they are part of the MPAA cartel? Suing grandmas and kids all over the world. But yeah, their dubious "family members" (aka Sony Music, Sony Computer Entertainment) doesn't really contribute to their reputation, whether Sony Pictures have control over them or not. Watching Sony bleed has really been the greatest xmas gift of this year.

I don't think it makes much sense to hate Sony Pictures because of the actions of Sony BMG. And I don't think it makes much sense of hate Sony Pictures because 9 out of 10 theater chains are chicken shit.

SOPA, MPAA, DCMA, copyright extensions, etc. are excellent reasons to hate the entire industry (Sony included). I just think singling out Sony is a bit ridiculous, as is the general over the top hatefest. So we can all pretend we're "shoving it to the man" when we watch a movie by some other major corporation doing the same shit. Or people pretending that pirating a movie is some nobel act rather than just being cheap and bored.

They realized how badly they screwed up

[gurps_npc]

The movie probably sucks. But bowing down to pressure from North Korea is ridiculous.

I am sure Hitler did not like The Great Dictator, but if he had tried to blackmail a US company into cancelling it, we would have laughed at him.

Sony should have done the same. I don't care what they got from the stolen emails, the only way to deal with terrorists demanding obedience is a bullet to their head, not a bow to to their feet.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[edawstwin]

I honestly hope that this has The Streisand Effect and breaks every box office record ever. I know that that won't happen, but it would be nice. I was on the fence about seeing this movie before all of the hoopla (Rogen and Franco can be funny, but they can also be not funny at all), but now that some asshole of a dictator says I can't, I'm going to pay for it at least twice. Thankfully, The Plaza Theater (yay Atlanta!?!) has stepped up so that I can.

America! Fuck Yeah!

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[Sowelu]

If you listened to the interviews from the very beginning, the Sony Pictures CEO's line has basically always been "Guys, I can't _officially_ say that we're still releasing it until we negotiate more, but I swear to god it's still going to happen unless the theaters are even dumber than I thought". Dude sounded really pissed and barely restrained by his PR department; I'm convinced that it was 100% playing hardball with distributors and 0% international politics.

Honestly I'm amazed at the reporting on this. THEATERS caved. Sony said "uh, we're not going to open the show in like two theaters nationwide", theaters took about a week to snap out of "oh god horror the turrists" mode...but it seemed pretty obvious from the beginning that that was going to be the timeline here.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[wolfgang_spangler]

The movie probably sucks. But bowing down to pressure from North Korea is ridiculous.

I am sure Hitler did not like The Great Dictator, but if he had tried to blackmail a US company into cancelling it, we would have laughed at him.

Sony should have done the same. I don't care what they got from the stolen emails, the only way to deal with terrorists demanding obedience is a bullet to their head, not a bow to to their feet.

How tough would you be if a foreign government had you singled out and was threatening your kids or spouse?

Just curious internet tough guy.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[bledri]

The movie probably sucks. But bowing down to pressure from North Korea is ridiculous.

I am sure Hitler did not like The Great Dictator, but if he had tried to blackmail a US company into cancelling it, we would have laughed at him.

Sony should have done the same. I don't care what they got from the stolen emails, the only way to deal with terrorists demanding obedience is a bullet to their head, not a bow to to their feet.

Sony is not who bowed down to pressure. The 5 largest movie theater chains refused to show the movie out of fear, not Sony. Why can't anyone understand this? I was listening to an interview with the CEO of Sony Pictures and he made this perfectly clear, numerous times. But the interviewer kept coming back to "won't people see this as Sony backing down to terrorists?" And then the CEO would repeat, "we are looking for other ways to release the movie, but the large streaming services are afraid of getting hacked, etc..."

Just because it's popular to hate Sony, does not change the actual facts. Sony wants to release the movie. They want to make back the money they spent on it. But they can't force theater chains to show the movie and their normal model is to do release in a ton of theaters at once and have a big openning weekend. It looks like enough independent chains have come forward that Sony gets a Christmas present.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[gurps_npc]

Wrong. That is Sony propaganda. Everything the Sony CEO said was in service of his own cowardice. Yes, some theaters backed out. Others major movie theater chains BEGGED Sony to release the film.

More importantly, Sony could have released it direct to Video, to HBO, etc. You don't need to 'look for other ways' and if Netflix, HBO, and Hulu were 'afraid of getting hacked' They could simply have given it to the Pirate Bay.

This was a decision made by Sony, not anyone else. You on the other hand have fallen for a pack of lies.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[jeffmflanagan]

>now that some asshole of a dictator says I can't, I'm going to pay for it at least twice.

That's what Sony is counting on. Don't fall for it and pay to see a crappy movie just because of a controversy.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[bledri]

But they can't force theater chains to show the movie

Uh, yeah that can. They had contracts with the theaters to show the movie with penalties for the theaters if they backed out.

The theaters backed out anyway, and Sony waived the penalties for doing so. Sony caved, no matter what their rootkitting CEO wants you to think.

You're an AC, so I shouldn't bother. First, but Sony Pictures is a different company from Sony BMG. Second, Sony could try force theaters to show the movie but all they have to do is say the withheld it for the public safety and odds are Sony would lose the legal battle. And if someone stubbed their toe during a showing of "The Interview", or a gun tooting wack-o has a hayday, Sony gets sued into oblivion.

Re:They realized how badly they screwed up

[Free Censorship]

You have a bigger chance of getting into a car accident. Does no one understand risk management? It seems that everyone is afraid of extremely improbable threats for no reason.

not quite

[s.petry]

It simply demonstrates the sham that we were told a week ago today. There is no threat from the DPRK, just fear mongering typical political spin for an agenda the people are not privy to see. The Intercept has an article hinting at what I'm sure others guessed here.

Wired had the article last week demonstrating how week the link is to the Sony hack and the DPRK.

I normally enjoy Seth Rogan's movies, but in this case I'll wait for the TV edition. I don't need to pay for the propaganda machine willfully.

Re:not quite

[future assassin]

Well you can easily tell its a farce by how much special commentary a story gets on the news networks besides its being about North Korea (its like a episode and Pinky and The Brain). Unfortunately the ratio of seeing through the bullshit people vs omfg they're taking away out freedom people is 20/80 so....

Great marketing

[SkunkPussy]

About 40x as many people know the name of the film now than if they hadn't dramatically pulled it.

Re:Great marketing

[meta-monkey]

That's been my take from the beginning. There's no way they're canning the movie. They want money. Even if the bomb threats had teeth (which they don't), Sony does not give two fucks about people being blown up.

So they pretend to cancel it. Internet freaks out. Senators and the goddamn President of the United States say "you guys should release this movie!" And now their middling picture that barely anybody would have seen or heard about is the most talked about picture of the year. So after some soul* searching, chats with their spiritual advisors, and a big-girl cry, Sony will "bravely" release their mediocre movie to thunderous applause and ticket sales.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuckkkkkkk yoooooooooouuuuuuu Sony.

*lololololololol as if anyone at Sony has a soul!

In other news...

[jddeluxe]

Larry Flynt has announced that Hustler is making a porn version of The Interview:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bus...

Becuase Freedom!

Re:In other news...

[edawstwin]

Called 'The Inner View'?

Drive in theaters?

[thedarb]

To bad most of our drive in theaters are gone. I am thinking it would be harder to attack a drive in theater.

Re:Drive in theaters?

[Translation Error]

To bad most of our drive in theaters are gone. I am thinking it would be harder to attack a drive in theater.

Totally. What terrorist activity could someone possibly perform while driving a car into a crowded area?

Torturing is OK. But don't touch Hollywood !

[Stuyvesant]

This story has so many crazy angles, it will make a nice movie of itself in a couple of years! One of the things is the extremist protection of 'intellectual (*cough*) property'. It's OK that the Norks have a Hitler-like regime, that they put little children in concentration camps and have slave camps. The hunger & starvation is no problem. It's also OK that they abduct civilians of South Korea and Japan, sink enemy ships, make nuclear weapons or trade rockets & launchers with Iran. No, the real problem starts when they (alledgedly) hack a media company. Course, you know, the worst of the worst people are *pirates* and *hackers*. That's how powerful the intellectual property complex has gotten.

Re:Bukkake on Kim Jong-un

[DarkOx]

Maybe with like an Eric fischl style water color filter, that would make it tasteful.

Where is your white tipped cane?

[s.petry]

Nowhere do I even imply that this is about money for Sony. This is about demonizing the DPRK, not money. It's about bringing back CISPA/SOPA legislation, and demonizing hackers in general. It's politics, not money driven.

Before you attempt to make a false claim the answer is "N", I'm not a fan of the DPRK Government and don't intend any implication that they are the good guys. Quite the contrary, if everything we are told is true they are a despicable dictatorship. At the same time, lying to topple dictators for a political agenda has not turned out well anywhere else. Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan are easy examples of lies to topple Governments that have been horrific for the populations living in that country. We don't conquer to establish a better Government for them, we topple to destabilize and exploit resources.

Further, we can't topple the DPRK without pissing off China and suffering severe consequences.

Re:Where is your white tipped cane?

[halivar]

I would like to know what the lies used to topple the Taliban in Afghanistan were.

I suspect there is a high correlation between Sony-works-for-the-CIA and 9/11 Trutherism.

Re:Where is your white tipped cane?

[s.petry]

So the US Media and Politicians never switched the blame from the GOP who claimed responsibility for the hack to the DPRK never happened? The shift in blame is all black helicopters and "hookey"? Really now, I think you need a reality check, because this is not a casual link but _WHAT HAPPENED_.

Perhaps you are considering that the CIA did make changes to Sony PR information is also just a casual link, even though the emails prove this. More black helicopters and casual strands right?

Believe everything you are told by our Media, they have never lied before. Same goes for the politicians, and remember Saddam really had mountains of yellow cake and dirty bombs.. GW told you so, and it has to be true.

Re:Where is your white tipped cane?

[AK Marc]

Further, we can't topple the DPRK without pissing off China and suffering severe consequences.

Sure we could. Ask China what cash payment they'd like. The cost of paying off China in cash is much cheaper than a war (economic or military) with or through them. China has a problem because they expect DPRK refugees to run north, not south.

Re:Where is your white tipped cane?

[AK Marc]

It'd never happen, spending $1T on war gear gets bribe-kick-backs from the makers, and a cash payment to China wouldn't put anything in the pocket of the legislators.

Re: As someone pointed out on the radio...

[jmac_the_man]

9/11 times 20,000?

But that's...

That's...

16363.63

Re:Comfort Women Documentary

[TapeCutter]

Why should modern Japanese still be paying for the sins of their grandfathers? - Also, if you applied similar logic to the UK/US "empires" and banned them from criticising every nation they have invaded/occupied during the 20th century, they would only be allowed to criticise each other.