FILM/TV/TRANSMEDIA BIZ ARTICLE: THE FUTURE OF STREAMING MOTION PICTURE CONTENT A perspective.. By Owen Williams - EmpireOnline Back in 2000, Blockbuster passed up the chance to buy a fledging movie subscription concern based in small-town California for $50 million. It was a catastrophic error. These days Blockbuster barely exists, while Netflix is a world-conquering on-demand viewing platform with north of 50 million subscribers globally. To put another way, thats one customer for every dollar Blockbuster didnt spend. Riding the quickly shifting industry wave from postal DVD rentals to online streaming, Netflix has now moved into production, reviving Arrested Development, creating Orange Is The New Black, Marco Polo and the Wachowskis Sense8, reimagining the BBCs House of Cards, and entering into business with Marvel for four interconnected series centred on Marvels Iron Fist, Luke Cage, Jessica Jones and Daredevil. NETFLIX HAS MADE THE TRANSITION TO FULLY-FLEDGED PRODUCTION HOUSE ALMOST AS QUICKLY AS PARAMOUNT OR UNIVERSAL BACK IN THE 1910s. Were now at the scale where we can economically create original content, and well continue to grow our slate, asserts Netflixs Head of Corporate Communications Cliff Edwards. His bullishness is understandable. Netflix has made the transition to fully-fledged production house almost as quickly as Paramount or Universal back in the 1910s. With each original, we learn more about what our members want [and] about how to produce and promote effectively, adds the PR chief. But Netflix is not the only game in town. HBO – owned by Time Warner and producer/provider of gangbustingly popular series like Game Of Thrones and True Detective – currently works on a similar subscriber-only basis. It also boasts an on-demand service, HBO Go, although HBO adds programming according to weekly broadcast schedules rather than en masse like Netflix. This is helping keep subscription takings high and enabling the cable network to augment its already enviable library with new shows like The Leftovers and Olive Kitteridge. HBOs True Detective Amazon, meanwhile, is flirting with producing multiple pilot episodes for streaming online, which will be picked up (or not) according to audience reaction. All the preview screenings in the world cant deliver Hollywoods studios this kind of pre-testing. Hulu, meanwhile, offers American viewers a mix of its own original content (Seth Meyers The Awesomes and BBC co-production The Wrong Mans included) and access to programmes that have already been tried and tested overseas. Britains Rev and Line Of Duty sit alongside Israels Prisoners Of War (the inspiration for Homeland) in its library. Crowding into the party are web giants Yahoo, which recently unveiled plans for four original shows, and Microsoft, which has plans to make programmes to show on Xbox and via mobile devices. ONLINE STREAMING PROVIDERS ARE STILL RELATIVELY NEW, BUT THEIR REACH IS GROWING AND, WITH IT, THEIR BUDGETS AND AMBITION. Theres no question who the bolter in the pack is, though. Netflix is nearing device ubiquity, says Edwards, meaning that if its got a screen and can connect to the internet you should be able to watch Netflix on it. In terms of technology development, Netflix is based in Californias Silicon Valley instead of Hollywood for a reason. At heart, its a company teeming with engineers who are looking for ways to innovate. So what does that innovation look like and where will the future lead? Perhaps surprisingly, given the ubiquity of handheld, mobile and tablet devices, the majority of the two billion hours of Netflix content streamed globally every month is still delivered via old-fashioned TV sets, albeit through apps on web-connected, menud up TVs, DVD and Blu-ray players and gaming consoles. But can this kind of on-demand model eventually replacing broadcast television altogether? Its a bit of an apple and oranges comparison, cautions Edwards. Nearly every household in the UK has a television, and the broadcast industry has developed over decades to get to the size it is today. Online streaming providers are still relatively new, but their reach is growing and, with it, their budgets and ambition. Netflixs recent European expansion is another big step from an enterprise that began in a California garage 17 years ago. This week Netflix takes on pay TV giants Canal+ and Sky Deutschland by launching on their home soil of France and Germany respectively. Both have their own SVOD (subscription video on demand) services; both have already slashed subscription prices as a countermeasure. Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright in Netflixs hugely-successful House Of Cards. If traditional broadcasters palms are sweaty, the big movie studios might soon share the sensation. September also sees Netflix launch its first theatrically-released feature – a documentary looking at the equally groundbreaking topic of 3D printing called Print The Legend – and it could be the start of the networks foray into filmmaking. Movies are on the agenda, although in what size and shape, Netflix has yet to decide. On the movie side, Id keep my mind wide open to what those films would be and what they would look like, cautions chief content officer Ted Sarandos. But the appeal of film production is obvious, especially when you consider the licensing fees – $1.355 billion in the first quarter of 2013 alone – that Netflix pays film studios to host their movies. THERE ARE MOVIES ID LIKE TO MAKE THAT COST BETWEEN $15 MILLION AND $30 MILLION. IF NETFLIX SAID, WED LOVE TO SEE WHAT YOUD DO WITH THIS..., ID DEVISE THEM FOR HOME THEATRE. DAVID FINCHER Netflix is probably right to approach feature filmmaking with a degree of caution. Others have tried and failed to elbow in on the big studios turf in the past, although few have had its reach, clout or rapport with established directors. That talent drain to television – David Fincher and Steven Soderbergh have led the charge – should also concern Hollywood. When some of your most distinctive voices are taking their talents elsewhere, there may be a problem with the medium. This doesnt mean Fincher will be making straight-to-TV films, but the stigma has already disappeared sufficiently for it to be a viable option. There are movies Id like to make that cost between $15 million and $30 million, he tells Empire. If Netflix said, Wed love to see what youd do with this..., Id devise them for home theatre. And if those directors build relationships with Netflix, HBO or Amazon and then get a great idea for a cinema feature, why wouldnt they take these streaming giants back to cinema with them? And given that the studios sometimes use a cinema release as a sort of loss-leader to push a film into the publics consciousness, relying on home entertainment and ancillary rights over the long term to push them into profit, it might begin to seem economically advantageous for streaming services to follow that example and launch their biggest and riskiest projects in the cinema. That goes even if they want to launch a TV show: ABC launched the very expensive Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. off the back of parent company Disneys huge cinema success with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so if Amazon or Netflix wanted to launch a big, ambitious sci-fi series or fantasy epic – a Dark Tower, say, or a Preacher; something that has repeatedly stymied cinema – it might pay to lure in those new customers with a worldwide cinema launch of the first instalment. To date, the rise of these streaming services has been meteoric; they seem unlikely to limit their ambitions any time soon.
Posted on: Wed, 21 Jan 2015 18:12:14 +0000
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