Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX) wants movies to be available online for instant streaming the same day they premiere in movie theaters, an idea that has upset movie theater owners.
Saturday during a presentation at the Film Independent Forum in Los Angeles, Netflix's chief content officer said innovation in the way movies are released and marketed has been stifled by theater owners. "The reason why we may enter this space and try to release some big movies ourselves this way is because I'm concerned that as theater owners try to strangle innovation and distribution, not only are they going to kill theaters, they might kill movies," Ted Sarandos said, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
"These antiquated windows for movies are probably driving global piracy more... than any of these piracy sites everyone is always screaming about," Sarandos said.
The theater owners quickly fired back. "Subscription movie services and cheap rentals killed the DVD business, and now Sarandos wants to kill the cinema as well," John Fithian, president of the National Association of Theatre Owners, told Deadline.com.
For more:
- the Hollywood Reporter had this report
- Deadline.com had this report
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