Dont Tell NetflixDont Tell Netflix

By George Robbins

Movie releases are perhaps one of the most complicated types of deals that are happening in the world right now because things just aren’t functioning like usual. In particular, movie theaters aren’t functioning properly because they were forced to shut down months ago and it has negatively affected them ever since then. When theaters shut down, they did so to further prevent the spread of the Covid-19 virus, but it isn’t like they really had all too much of a choice in the matter. Public venues of all kinds were forced to shut down after the pandemic began; whether it was restaurants or theaters, they had no choice but to shut down as mandated by the government. The idea was that, eventually, there would be guidelines put into place which would allow businesses to reopen even during the pandemic.

After a couple of months had passed, those guidelines that businesses were waiting for had been put into place and some businesses like restaurants were able to open with limited capacity. The issue that soon arose was the fact that only smaller businesses were allowed to open to any degree. Before that though, any essential businesses like grocery stores were able to be open with limited capacity, but those capacity limits were usually still a lot. What followed was that larger business venues that would get more foot traffic were not given any kind of dates for when they might be able to reopen to the public again. Among those businesses were obviously theaters and theater owners were very vocal about this as they felt like they were bring discriminated against.

What theaters owners were truly getting upset about was the fact that places like malls were able to open to limited capacity, but theaters were not allowed to reopen at all. Theaters already had the new health and safety guidelines in place to allow people back through their doors but they were still not allowed to have their re-openings. This mainly stems from the fact that people were moving around and not being near one another for extended periods of time in other locations. Despite the fact that it is obviously more dangerous to reopen a business where people sit in an enclosed space together for a prolonged period of time, theater owners still tried to sue to reopen. The irrefutable fact that it is clearly dangerous to reopen a business with a model like that made it hard for that lawsuit to go anywhere and nothing happened.

During the summer, it was finally decided that movie theaters would be given the opportunity to reopen their doors to the public, but a strong wave of the virus made that a difficult venture. As a result movie releases were pushed back further and theaters were unsure of just when they would be able to open their doors, especially if they had no new movies to show. Eventually, in an effort to break through the stalemate, AMC theaters decided that they would reopen their doors regardless of what happens come the middle of August. Upon finally reopening, they were given a chance to test the market in the coming weeks when the movie ‘Tenet‘ released, but it was anything but good for them. The movie has managed to bring in around $50 million domestically, but it has been an overall disappointment for theaters.

Theaters were hoping that ‘Tenet’ would be the film to bring people back to theaters, but this ended up not working out the way they had hoped it would. Instead, they found out that people are worried about going out to theaters because they are worried about contracting the virus and that they were going to be losing business all over the place. Thus began the lengthy process that involved theaters starting to shut down and theaters like AMC even possibly going bankrupt by the end of the year. It is due to this that they are now desperate for a way to somehow bring people in so that they don’t have to shut down completely. Movie theaters are in a very precarious situation right now so there is no easy way for them to be able to get out of the situation they have been forced into at the moment.

So what would the answer be for them since they can’t bring people back into theaters; they could try the option that sees them just trying to bring in as many people as possible with different films. If they manage to bring some variety to what they are showing on their screens, they might be able to draw more people in. Thus, they are trying to get as many films as they can even if it means only getting to show films for a shorter period of time before having a VOD release. Universal was the first to make this deal with them and now they only have to show their films in theaters for three weeks before they get to release them to VOD. This deal was also offered up to other studios and some people are definitely intent on making use of that deal. Even if things don’t go as intended with the release, it offers an opportunity to both the studio and the theaters showing the film.

With theaters actually showing films for the first time in months, if they add more to the roster, even temporarily, they can try and get more people in seats. If things don’t work out that way and people still aren’t coming in to watch movies, studios don’t lose out on much because they get a VOD release very soon afterward to try and make that money back. Of course, movies that don’t want a straight to digital release are still delayed into next year, but those going with that release method now have more opportunity. The opportunity to not only try and get more revenue, but to also try and help theaters which could only affect them positively in the long run is pretty great. That is the precise reason that Jason Blum seems to be going with this release method with Blumhouse’s new film ‘Freaky.’

The upcoming Blumhouse film sees a teenage girl and a serial killer swapping bodies and the girl then has to try and stop the killer from hurting people she cares about. The upcoming horror-comedy is in line with the likes of ‘Happy Death Day’ which was also directed by Christopher Landon and produced by Blumhouse. It is certainly a departure from some of the movies being shown in theaters right now and it may help bring people back to theaters. There is no guarantee that this will help theaters in any way whatsoever, so we’ll have to wait and see if the film can manage to bring in customers. All we can do now is wait for the film’s theatrical release and if people don’t want to go to theaters, it will only take a few weeks before it gets its VOD release.