The streaming giant Netflix recently made a splash at the Cannes film festival, but not necessarily for the reasons they had hoped for. Cinema Puritans and quite a few jury members were outright furious that the online platform dared enter two of their original films for the coveted Palme d’Or, one of the industry’s most prestigious awards.
Why? According to industry purists, Netflix isn’t ‘real’ cinema. According to them, a ‘real’ cinematic experience belongs in a darkened movie theatre engulfed by a 50-foot big screen and the smell of stale popcorn. Not in your living room. And definitely not on your flat screen TV.
2017 marks the first (and seemingly the last) time Netflix has two films in competition for the coveted top prize at Cannes. South Korean director Bong Joon-ho’s Okja and Noah Baumbach’s Adam Sandler dramedy The Meyerowitz Stories are both officially competing. But their inclusion has sparked an outcry from the French exhibitors saying it would be unfathomable for one of the world’s highest cinematic honours to go to a film that never played in theatres.
When the Netflix logo appeared during the screenings of Okja, the crowd reportedly shouted insults and booed at the screen in contempt. Soon after, jury president Pedro Almodovar declared that as long as he’s alive, he’ll be “fighting for one thing that [he’s] afraid the new generation is not aware of…the hypnosis of the large screen for the viewer.”
Then jury member Will Smith rhetorically asked why does it have to be the one or the other? Using his family’s experience as an example, the Bad Boys star pointed out that his children goes to the movies all the time, but also watches them on Netflix at home. “Netflix broadened by children’s global cinematic comprehension,” he told the Toronto Star. Without explicitly stating it, Will inadvertently added fuel to already burning debate on whether an increased use of technology in mainstream movies should be allowed to continue.
Some argue Netflix and other similar platforms like Amazon are giving filmmakers a badly needed new outlet for their projects in a time of ever-constricting Hollywood studios. Netflix admittedly wants to become a one-stop shop for TV and movies, turning itself into a bonafide studio completely in control of both production and distribution. A feat no Hollywood studio can currently lay claim to.
However, for now, it seems the Cannes battle is one that Netflix cannot win. Earlier this month festival organisers announced that starting next year it won’t screen any movies that haven’t had a traditional theatrical release in France first. Various other restrictions are also being implemented that will not only make it harder for Netflix or any other streaming platform to screen their films at the festival, but also to win any awards.
Ironically, soon after the Cannes announcement, Netflix announced it was considering a truce with the industry. The streaming giant announced that it work together with theatres to release some of their films on a limited basis, as it had done before with the 2015 war drama Beast of No Nation and the documentary 13th. Netflix released both these films in order to be eligible for the Academy Awards which requires at the very least a week long limited release in the December preceding the ceremony.
However, other than Cannes, the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences that oversees the Oscars does allow for that theatrical release to coincide with a film’s availability on any streaming platform. Their only requirement is that the film is not available on the platform before its theatrical release. Ever the stickler for tradition, the French does not allow this. At all. There the law requires that a film is available exclusively in theatres for three years before it can be streamed online.
For Netflix CEO Reed Hastings all these restrictions and red tape constitute the “establishment closing ranks” against the streaming service. Nevertheless, the company still insists that “since our members are funding these films, they should be the first to see them.” Adding that they are “open to supporting large theatre chains if they want to offer our films” but only if the release happens simultaneously on Netflix, which a lot of theatres refuse to even consider.
Despite the continued controversy, there seems to be no stopping the streaming giant’s incredible production of original content. Netflix already announced earlier that they’re planning to produce a thousand hours worth of original content this year alone at a cost of $6 billion. This comes after they’ve already spent a whopping $1 billion in producing new shows and movies in 2016.
If history taught us anything, it’s that one technology often subsumes another. We went from the fountain pen to the ball point pen and eventually to the computer. Maybe with their global reach, Netflix is that next big technological shift within the industry. And all anyone could really do is grab a bucket of popcorn and chill.
Because the show is about to begin.
