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Studios Push for $50 Early Home Movie Rentals (variety.com)

Posted by msmash on from the shape-of-things-to-come dept.

As many as five major Hollywood studios have been working with cinema owners to shrink the traditional release window and allow consumers to rent movies on-demand in as little as 17 days after they hit theaters, reports Variety. From the article: Warner Bros. and Universal have been the most aggressive in pursuing an arrangement that would see certain movies receive a premium video-on-demand release within weeks of their theatrical premieres, but now other studios are joining the discussions. Twentieth Century Fox has also begun to talk early releases with theater owners, while Sony is having its own separate talks with exhibitors and is trying to devise its own plan. Paramount, which previously did a pilot program with AMC and a few other exhibitors to release "Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse" and "Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension" on digital platforms early, has continued to seek a similar strategy. Though different studios are exploring different scenarios, the plan that has gathered the most steam would involve offering up movies for $50 a rental some 17 days after their theatrical opening. Those rentals would be available for 48 hours. The latest round of discussions began roughly 18 months ago.

34 of 248 comments (clear)

  1. Why stop at $50? by JoeyRox · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why not make it $500, at least if you're intention is to charge a wishful price that nobody is going to pay anyway.

    1. Re:Why stop at $50? by fred6666 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well if you go to the theater with a group of friends it can add up quickly to $50 or more especially if you buy pop corn and the movie is in 3D.

    2. Re:Why stop at $50? by ranton · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Why not make it $500, at least if you're intention is to charge a wishful price that nobody is going to pay anyway.

      You must not have young children (who need a costly babysitter), rarely go to a movie with friends or family (thus reducing the price per viewer below movie theater pricing), or perhaps live in a low cost area where tickets aren't pushing $15 per person. Because otherwise you wouldn't think $50 for this service was wishful thinking on the part of the studios.

      I would gladly pay $50 for a dozen or so movies per year so I don't need to spend $50+ per night on a babysitter.

      --
      -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
    3. Re:Why stop at $50? by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

      You have to have 5 people watching the movie to get any value out of this service. Many theaters are less than that, around $8-9/ticket - now you have to bring over more than 6 people to get the value. I'm sure some people find comfort and possibly value in the possibility of sitting in their underwear while lounging and watching the latest movies

      If you're lounging with 6 people in your underwear, you're probably not paying that much attention to the movie.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    4. Re:Why stop at $50? by Solandri · · Score: 2

      If you have a large family, it makes sense. For most people, this is gonna be a miss for them.

      There's no rule saying you have to be related to watch the movie together. It makes sense for most people if 4+ of them (at $13/ea ticket prices) are willing to get together and watch as a group. I have a 5.1 home theater system with a projector that throws a 12' x 7' image, and that's exactly what my friends and I occasionally do.

      The fly in the ointment isn't the price. It's the entire concept of watching movies at home. When movies only came out in theaters, you had to watch it while it was still in theaters. Home video, subscription cable, and and now streaming has changed that - you can now watch a movie which hasn't been in theaters for months or years any time you want. My queue over all streaming services is about 100 movies long (never mind the episodic TV shows). I'm more than content to watch other stuff while I wait for hit movies to show up on the streaming subscription services. The only exception I can think of is the reason my sister gave for taking her son to watch The Force Awakens on opening night - so he wouldn't be left out of conversations when the other kids in school talked about it.

    5. Re:Why stop at $50? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Informative

      HDMI capture card. Watermark is useless when payment was with a disposable/stolen card.

      The guys who do these rips and releases have been doing it with other streaming services for years.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    6. Re:Why stop at $50? by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      If you're lounging with 6 people in your underwear, you're probably not paying that much attention to the movie.

      You were thinking of a bunch of hungover students in digs at 4 in the afternoon, right? right?

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    7. Re:Why stop at $50? by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Dear god no more superhero movies. Marvel and DC should go on a 10 year sabbatical.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    8. Re:Why stop at $50? by Rakarra · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I don't blame Marvel or DC for milking that cow, but I don't understand why audiences haven't lost interest.

      Because most of them are actually quite decent as movies. I didn't watch Ant-Man and will probably skip yet another Spider-Man reboot, but Doctor Strange was mild fun, Deadpool was great, and Civil War pretty great too.

    9. Re:Why stop at $50? by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 2

      At the very least, very high quality cam recordings would come out of this.

      --
      She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  2. So 16 days after they hit piratebay? by HornWumpus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    No thanks. I'll just keep not seeing them. Yeah, not seeing them, that's the ticket.

    I'm really disappointed with Scottish pirates. Trainspotting 2 has been in release in Scotland for weeks and there are no torrents on piratebay.

    --
    John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
  3. Re:Dinner and an Other Movie for less. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I used to be able to do that too. Now three kids later, $50 for an evening out: dinner OR movie is well over $50. No way we're all doing both.

    Turns out though that homemade pizza, popcorn, and movies in the living room (with a blanket fort or two as well) are much more fun.

  4. Not that expensive by ranton · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Considering I spend about $35 on two tickets plus concessions, $50 is not that bad to be able to watch new movies without leaving the house. I often see blockbuster movies with 2-4 friends or family members, so then its a bargain. And in my current situation I need a babysitter to see a movie in the theater, so this would cut the cost of a movie in half for my wife and I right now.

    I certainly wouldn't call it cheap, but the price is about what I expected.

    --
    -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
    1. Re:Not that expensive by Altus · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Yeah but it would be way cheeper to pirate a copy uploaded by someone who rented it and cracked the DRM.

      --

      "In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson

    2. Re:Not that expensive by JonnyCalcutta · · Score: 2

      But if all you get out of going out to watch a movie is watching a movie, why not watch an older movie for nothing? Does the newness of a movie really mean that much to you?

    3. Re:Not that expensive by fluffernutter · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The thing is, unless you have seen everything you would possibly want to see in older movies available for $10, why would you pay $50 for the same home experience? Unless it's a movie you really want to see NOW it will make more sense to just get an older movie for now and wait for the price to come down.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    4. Re:Not that expensive by JesseMcDonald · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The thing is, unless you have seen everything you would possibly want to see in older movies available for $10, why would you pay $50 for the same home experience?

      Yes, I have seen every decent older movie I care to see.

      This may seem a bit obvious, but new movies turn into older movies at exactly the same rate that new movies are released. It's not as if "older movies" were a fixed set. If you make a policy of only watching movies that are at least X years old, you'll end up with the same amount of "new" (to you) content each year as if you watched every new blockbuster on opening night at several times the price.

      --
      "The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
    5. Re:Not that expensive by TooManyNames · · Score: 2

      I agree that $50 is a bit ludicrous (unless you have a lot of people you're taking to the theater, and have a good setup of your own), but why the snarky response to this guy? It's not like he's complaining about the cost; he's saying that he'd be in the market for what they're offering, and is happy to shell out $50. What's wrong with that?

      --
      "Is not a sentence" is not a sentence. Well damn.
    6. Re:Not that expensive by TooManyNames · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Everybody has some sort of stupid, costly activity that they nonetheless enjoy; I'm not an exception to that, and neither are you. Clearly, this guy doesn't *have* to watch a brand new movie, but he seems to enjoy it, so why complain about his particular stupid, costly pursuit? If you don't want to validate movie companies' approach, don't buy into it, but don't begrudge those who actually do want it. If it's successful, there will still be more traditional options available to you, and if it isn't successful, then ranton can make due with what is available.

      --
      "Is not a sentence" is not a sentence. Well damn.
    7. Re:Not that expensive by radarskiy · · Score: 2

      "to watch new movies"

      Except they're not new movies. The article says "some 17 days after their theatrical opening". At that point, might as well wait until they are $1 at Redbox.

    8. Re:Not that expensive by lgw · · Score: 2

      The thing is, unless you have seen everything you would possibly want to see in older movies available for $10, why would you pay $50 for the same home experience? Unless it's a movie you really want to see NOW it will make more sense to just get an older movie for now and wait for the price to come down.

      For most movies, I'm content to wait for the DVD from Netflix. But for about 1 movie a year, I want to see it soon. I don't like the theater when it's busy, so I usually wait a couple weeks anyway. I'd definitely prefer my home theater to the cinema.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    9. Re:Not that expensive by sexconker · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Fifth, again... how does this hurt you? If you don't want to pay to see new movies, don't watch them; nobody -- including ranton -- is forcing you to do that or even see any studio movies in general.

      If this is successful:
      They'll delay the release of the bluray/whatever a bit more to capitalize on the home rentals.
      They'll delay releasing it onto Amazon/Google/etc. for pay and to Amazon/Netflix/etc. for free for the same reason.
      They'll use their rental streaming infrastructure to set up shop on their own and avoid popular services users already have (Amazon/Google/Netflix/etc.)
      They'll eventually jack up the price or try to introduce shitty DRM to detect the number of people watching.
      They'll inject ads, ads, ads before and probably during your rental.

      If this is unsuccessful:
      They'll throw a hissy fit and blame piracy.
      They'll jack up the costs of blurays and streaming/download licensing, ostensibly to pay for the failed experiment, but really the higher prices will just be the new normal.

    10. Re:Not that expensive by AlanBDee · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It may come as a surprise, but some of us actually don't want to pirate anything. For me it's more an ethical decision. The creators do deserve to be paid for their work. Lets also remember, the more we pirate, the more convoluted their DRM becomes. That may not affect you much but as a paying customer it's a pain in my posterior.

    11. Re:Not that expensive by reboot246 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I just wait until the movie is shown on one of the premium networks that I pay the cable company $$$ to watch. I haven't been to a theater in years - big flat screen television, great sound system, bathroom mere steps away (and CLEAN), no idiots around me talking or using their phones, and snacks bought at much lower prices.

      I don't understand the need to be one of the first people to see a movie. When I see people lined up around the block to see a movie the first day it's released, I have to fight back the urge to tell them that the damned movie will be shown tomorrow and the next day and the next day, etc.

      Fifty bucks? Count me out.

    12. Re:Not that expensive by ranton · · Score: 2

      This may seem a bit obvious, but new movies turn into older movies at exactly the same rate that new movies are released. It's not as if "older movies" were a fixed set. If you make a policy of only watching movies that are at least X years old, you'll end up with the same amount of "new" (to you) content each year as if you watched every new blockbuster on opening night at several times the price.

      But a large part of the enjoyment from movies is discussing them with others. Similar to sports and other forms of entertainment, they are shared experiences. It only takes a few weekends for coworkers to assume anyone who cares about a movie has already seen it and spoilers are fair game.

      --
      -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
    13. Re:Not that expensive by LostMyBeaver · · Score: 2

      Agreed... my DVD/Bluray collection was well over 2000 discs before I packed them away and stored them in a closet where they'll be forgotten until I no longer have anything left to play them on (pretty sure that's soon).

      I used to buy the discs and them immediately rip them to hard drive and store them on a server in my closet so we could watch them on any screen in the house.

      These days we have a few alternatives

      About 150-200 films and 2000 TV episodes on my iTunes library at this time... I was able to remove DRM until about 3 months ago without re-encoding. Now, I have to find a new place to buy since I don't have Apple Devices everywhere and HDCP restrictions limit my ability to playback on some of my screens that I connect via SDI instead of HDMI. I only buy films if I can strip the DRM to allow playback wherever I need it.

      We have Netflix, but it's selection is nice for Netflix originals, but they are missing nearly every film I've searched for recently... for example Full Metal Jacket. So, I don't even bother with Netflix for anything other than a once in a while thing.

      Youtube... I'm not 100% sure if it's always legal, I'm counting on Google to manage that, but we often find stuff like Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, etc... and such on there.

      Finally, there's the torrent sites.

      I end up at the torrent sites because I have an iTunes Movie or DVD I can't play on a device or screen which I paid for. I sometimes feel mildly guilty if I own a DVD copy and I end up downloading the HD version as the studio has had to spend the money to release the HD version and I didn't pay for that. But if I want to watch a film I've bought and I can't because of DRM that's been put in place to deal with pirates, then I will resort to doing what the pirates do in order to be able to watch it.

      The only time in the past 10 years I've watched a movie by straight out piracy was when I missed the last 20 minutes of one of the Hobbit films because the movie theater parking lot was prepay and I didn't realize that after paying about $125 to see a movie, I would have to watch... wait for it.... 40 minutes of trailers and commercials. So I let the wife and kids finish watching while I moved the car to a different parking space. So I came home and downloaded a cam and watched the ending at home.

      I personally would gladly pay the studios $50 for a film... it's a total non-issue. I have absolutely no problem paying "gouging rates" to avoid having to deal with movie theaters. Besides, $50 is just not a lot of money anymore. The middle class (not middle income... middle income IS NOT middle class) should have a joint household income of a minimum of $60,000 a year in 1st world countries. It's far more likely to be between $100,000 and $200,000. I highly doubt the middle class will even notice the $50.

    14. Re:Not that expensive by kuzb · · Score: 2

      Well, not trying to be elitist or anything, but you should make time for A Clockwork Orange if you find you have nothing better to do. It is pretty good. Then again, whatever does it for you.

      --
      BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
    15. Re:Not that expensive by jareth-0205 · · Score: 2

      Because the idea that you *have* to watch a brand new movie is pretty ridiculous and it pretty much validates anything the movie companies want to charge.

      Well if you want to be part of culture now - social conversations about the film, youtube philosophical breakdowns, avoiding spoilers... they yes you probably should see it around when it comes out. You can of course save yourself a little cash and wait months, but then you won't be part of the larger cultural moment, and for many films that's part of the experience.

  5. I'd rather give the $50 to a homeless person by future+assassin · · Score: 4, Interesting

    and watch a pirated cam version.

    --
    by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
  6. Obligatory xkcd by marciot · · Score: 2

    https://xkcd.com/606/

    No, really. This applies to movies too. Why spend more to see it now when you can find it in the Walmart bargain bin a year later?

    1. Re:Obligatory xkcd by jareth-0205 · · Score: 2

      https://xkcd.com/606/

      No, really. This applies to movies too. Why spend more to see it now when you can find it in the Walmart bargain bin a year later?

      Depends on what it is and whether you want to be part of the cultural experience or not. The bigger films are quite often larger events that just the act of physically taking in the entertainment, there's conversations with friends, forums, youtube breakdowns, reviews with spoilers...

      I went to see Star Wars VII on a 1st-day midnight showing, and it was very exciting. I don't care *that* much for Star Wars but it was just really fun going to the cinema with a bunch of people all excited to see something. Yeah it's fake but so is most human experiences.

  7. Re:Movie Time! by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

    Yeah I'm not really into charging friends to come to my house.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  8. Re:Movie Time! by suutar · · Score: 2

    "Movie party! Gonna rent [flick]. Fred, you bring popcorn and milk duds; Larry, bring some sodas."

  9. Re:Definitely not worth it by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 2

    Hollywood: If you want more of my money

    They don't care about your money. They make plenty from other people who are not you, which is the overwhelming majority of people on the planet, as it happens.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk.