Cannes Will Ban Streaming-Only Movies from Competition
slate.com
slate.com
Makes sense. I guess they want potential winners to be viewable by the people and not appear to be promoting netflix as the only option.
Is that the right phrase?
Movie production isn't what I would think of as a regulated industry; this seems more like regular lobbying.
>Regulatory capture is a form of government failure that occurs when a regulatory agency, created to act in the public interest, instead advances the commercial or political concerns of special interest groups that dominate the industry or sector it is charged with regulating.
Specifically in this case however, the "public interest" could be described as the preservation and promotion of French culture. Which in this case, could be argued IS served by the regulation that awards can only be given to the product which shows in French theaters.
Since we'd have to note that it also means that it must pass all relevant French classification regulations.
Now, I'm Canadian and we have a series of laws called "can-con" (which stands for Canadian content) where all licensed broadcasters must show a certain proportion of their shows as approved can-con (based on the proportion of the creative staff who are Canadians). This does have an effect on shoring up the difference in culture. I mean - so - maybe that results in Trailer Park Boys - but come on! That episode where Rush shows up? Pure gold.
I think the requirement to restrict to cinema-only is a bit of a sledgehammer solution but I personally see the point and think it's overall a good thing.
There is this thing in France called "l'exception culturelle" which means not that culture is exceptional, but that cultural products (books and movies essentially) should be exempt from normal (international) competition rules that apply to all other sectors of the economy.
The rationale is that cultural products are "special" and that if they're not protected, they'll vanish and be replaced by American ones that are inferior by nature.
In general terms, the bad consequences of protectionism are twofold:
1. It raises prices for the customer by limiting competition
2. It limits exports, as international partners try to do to your products what you do to theirs (keeping them out of their market)
French cultural products are notoriously difficult to export, for a variety of reasons, one of which being language and another being they're generally of poor quality (I say this as a Frenchman), so problem 2 isn't seen as major (you can't harm exports that you don't have).
And problem 1 isn't big either because everyone benefits from high prices which allow high taxes that further finance the cinema, and no one cares about the end user.
Personally I think this is a bad system that is in large part responsible for the poor quality mentioned above.
That said, rules should apply to all. Just because those rules are bad doesn't mean Netflix or Amazon should be exempt from them. We should change the rules -- but that's, like, hard.
In fairness to France, other countries have similar laws too. Australia requires TV stations to broadcast 55% Australian-produced TV shows & films during primetime (6pm - midnight). Even 80% of the TV commercials have to be Australian-produced too. But instead of funding lots of culturally significant TV shows, we tend to get repeated news bulletins, low-cost Australian game shows, current affairs shows & soap operas. [Although Neighbours probably counts as culturally significant to Australia.]
http://www.acma.gov.au/Industry/Broadcast/Television/Austral...
Our homegrown tv and movie industry was never going to be high quality though, because we're a small market and we've never really been a particularly literary people. I'm curious as to what kind of show you would consider to be 'culturally significant', though. The only staples that you haven't listed that spring to mind are sports (plenty on TV), panel shows (ditto), documentaries (small market everywhere) and sitcoms. What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'?
Absolutely. I deleted it from my post, but I was going to mention that on non-primary Australian TV stations that don't have the same content restrictions, we get 2 hours of non-stop Big Bang Theory reruns, or endless repeats of Frasier, Sex And The City, Charmed & Becker.
> What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'?
Glitch is my favorite recent Australian TV show, started on ABC but apparently Season 2 has been sold as a Netflix exclusive. Back in the 90s it would have been shows like Seachange, Frontline, Kath & Kim. Maybe Offspring & Packed To The Rafters are recent equivalents.
(Outside Australia, I'd think of shows like The Bridge, Springfloden, The Killing & Occupied, that have exported Scandinavian culture onto Australian TV.)
well that's see some bias here.
One is that a country should have a lively cultural scene to be interesting to live in. If you lived in a city with a large cultural scene and another one without, you probably see the point.
Another is that a country's culture is a component of its soft power. Not having a lively culture is seen as being culturally under foreign domination.
I'm not a Frenchman, I'm Canadian, and I completely disagree with this, of course this is all about personal taste, but since you use yours to construct your argument I thought I had to contradict.
Compared to the utter crap pop culture the US produces, where every second film is about superheroes in spandex and explosions?
In France, laws are more easily passed and repealed than in, say, the US. Passing a law isn't quite the "enshrinement" one might first imagine.
To wit: laws are passed daily, and they generally have to do with administrative procedures.
In fact, there are so many laws being passed for such a large number of things that we've coined a phrase to describe it: legislative inflation.
Movies are available after 4 months for VOD with per-movie payment, and other delays apply depending on the situation (e.g. 10 months for cinema-specific paid TV-channel with partnerships with cinema orgs, etc).
Source: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronologie_des_médias#Disposi...
It seems strange to say, "Well, a film must be in a cinema" when that's not how most people watch them. (At least not the vast majority of films they watch in any of the countries I've been in.)
It's not that they banned all soulless corporations producing faux art, they just banned a change in watching habits to prop up an industry with poor value proposition.
Film as a medium is a valuable part of culture; theatres aren't necessarily.
Theatres must offer something over sitting on the couch -- and in the US they have, introducing things like bars and food services.
I especially liked the undertone in some pieces (not Slate) that Netflix is 'exploiting' Cannes to promote its movies, as if that was not the actual point of a festival.
David Sedaris goes on at length about moving to France and falling in love with the film culture there, where movies are shown in small theatres very cheaply. This was back in 2000, so things may have changed, but he was very clear on the differences between the American and French theater-going experience.
> Film as a medium is a valuable part of culture; theatres aren't necessarily.
You should probably stop calling it 'film', then. Most theatres can still show actual films; few homes can.
Another point, streaming-only movies have already been shown in the past but they weren't a problem because they didn't threaten the big movie associations. Netflix completely bypasses them and that suddenly becomes a problem.
Can't imagine what a mess all this licensing etc is. Such a non-productive waste of time.
Still seems like many laws and rules about nothing to me.
Theatres should be able to show streaming movies. I'm sure they have the tech for it. Licensing and permissions are always a thorny beast for new tech though.
This seems to harm others more than Netflix. Does an award nomination or win for a Netflix only movie even have a detectable impact on subscription?
How is that gaming the system at all?
People sign up for just a month. Don't cancel immediately after watching the movie they want, because they want to use the paid month in full. After two/three weeks the brain phases out the expiration date and the subscription renews.
"But reminders!" the reader would complain so let me preempt that: not many person actually set reminders for this kind of stuff - part because 'it's only a month' part because not everyone is as phone dependent as techhies and mbas types. For internet and social? Sure. For reminding every little detail in life? Hardly. Especially since outside apple setting a reminder is still a subpar experience.
Thus said watching a movie on a laptop screen in your apartment is hardly the same as going to a proper cinema.
A Chromecast is 35€.
A 7 year old laptop is perfectly capable of streaming and a HDMI cable to plug your laptop into your existing tv is 10€.
I agree it is still reasonable but I feel that a limited release would be better as a subscription for a single film is pretty dumb IMO.
As someone who doesn't live in one of the handful of metropoles that cater to every niche interest, if there's one thing that surely isn't one of the advantages of independent cinema it's availability. I can't count the number of times I was interest in a small film or documentary only to be disappointed by a website that presents me with a list of global screenings I could however count much more easily: On one hand.
I can understand that streaming isn't the filmmakers ideal choice, but unless we're talking about big budget blockbusters I see no point in relying on theatres in this day and age. It's a needless and artificial scarcity and limits the potential audience. At least let me buy the film.
The hype surrounding Cannes was overrated anyways. France isn't even a major market to be making that kinds of demands.
I foresee a major festival/competition for Streaming only media attended by A-list celebrities in the future.
Sounds awful, why would you restrain a festival to only one method of distribution? Cannes is certainly overrated but they focus on authors first and foremost, and that's what led them to their current position.
Content produced for streaming services can be radically different from traditional studio content. Rather than think of it as a restraint it would be a celebration of the difference compared to traditional content.
The "restriction" would allow for streaming only content to be on the forefront than be eclipsed by traditional media which still dominates the charts.
E3 decided that they wanted to be an industry only event and banned the general public and all but a handful of elite media companies. In reaction Penny-Arcade launched PAX as an E3 replacement for the general public, one that also focused more specifically on gaming than E3 had been. PAX was almost immediately a roaring success and E3 continued to slide into obscurity.
It will be interesting if we see a similar dynamic play out here, with say Netflix launching a Streaming Media Festival or something.
Electric cars are the future of transport. If Formula 1 wants to be irrelevant then so be it.
Carving out your niche doesn't make you irrelevant. F1 has plenty of petty rules, yet it's still damn profitable.
Force streaming services to release in French theaters, force customers to pay someone else to watch the movie, and subject the streaming services to draconian french regulations on when they can stream that movie.
So as Netflix, Amazon, and other streaming services take off, cannes will become less and less relevant as more and more movies are funded and produced by streaming services until cannes is that old french indy festival that was replaced with a more modern and movie viewer friendly festival.
Let the dinausores die please.
Taxes?? This is what the Cannes festival decided, not your government.
> Netflix provides way better content than the french industry.
Then watch Netflix? Your government is not stopping you.
Btw: in GER it's ~17.50€ per month per household and the "agency" collecting this money is already talking about raising this to ~20€ in a few years...
Ref: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beitragsservice_von_ARD,_ZDF...
You could argue that french studios also get tax breaks, but those don't actually fund movies, they just increase profits for movies that are profitable.
Governments are an extreme example of any other bureaucracy. They always find a way to spend every dollar they're collecting and usually more than that too.
The problem with socialism is, you eventually run out of other people's money.
"You're losing money on every order?!"
"Sure but we make it up in volume!"
As for the regulations I agree that they are too strict for the digital age but not releasing in the theaters is a pretty bad solution IMO.
If you look at the US market, both providers have significant amounts of content, which, it can be argued, provides a better viewing experience. The trend seems to be going away from traditional cinemas to streaming services. If this is the case Cannes may have just made itself irrelevant to this growing part of the market.
Made-for-TV movies have their own competition and awards, like the Emmy awards.
I don't see how this will make Cannes less relevant. It doesn't make Cannes less relevant that it doesn't award daytime soaps or commercials or whatever. Focus on a specific niche - cinematic movies - arguably will help it stay relevant, as long as cinemas exists.
(Whether cinemas will continue to exist is a different question. I suspect Netflix is a much larger threat to traditional flow TV than to cinemas.)
In any case, Cannes is not "forcing" anybody to do anything. They are just clarifying what kind of movies can be considered for the festival.
That's exactly the nonsense we're talking about here.
Distribution channel doesn't mean anything. There are strong correlations between being able to put on a show and production values, but it's not causative.
Define a movie by its actual qualities. Runtime, dialogue(?), even picture format... But forget about distribution. Lots of people have cinemas in their houses now. Where they don't have to pay £30 to be surrounded by sweaty strangers and sit on uncomfortable and dirty seats. Plus snacks and transport.
If you don't like going to the cinema, why do you care about Cannes at all? It is a film festival which celebrate cinema and the associated mystique and glamour. Nobody is preventing you from watching whatever you want in your home cinema.
Again, I think you need to separate the building from the art.
That's not saying other forms of entertainment cannot have value, just that Cannes is about a certain form.
Conflating "form" with distribution as if the latter affects the first.
No, I'll give you a chance... But how do you think they review these things? It used to be DVD screeners but (ironically, here) Cannes set up an online VOD service for screeners. How do you assess something that has to be available via cinemas, on computer via a wonky streaming service?
This rule is simple (and classic French) protectionism of a distribution channel that is failing to compete.
I think it was David Lynch who said "If you haven't see my movies in a cinema, then you haven't seen my movies".
You may not care for this difference, but why does it anger you so that others do?
They were backed via Kickstarter and promised backers a "pre-release" download. Because they wanted to be eligible for an Academy Award nomination they ended up releasing the movie in LA (and New York I think?) for the minimum run necessary and then waited another couple of months for the official release as digital download.
Because of the Academy Award rules they held back the "pre-release" downloads until just before the release of the digital download version. They angered a lot of backers by saying it was still technically a pre-release because the digital download hadn't been available yet although the film had already been in cinemas and available for private screenings for months at that point.
It's a good example for bad communication. Especially when upset backers were basically told the "pre-release" would happen at the last possible moment to combat file sharing, but that's another tangent.
Quality of product are not determined by the amount of money wasted. Sure the base quality is almost here, but it's why we have sooooo many bad movies but 1% of them are good.
When you get a movie (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_Dynamite) for $ 6,000 that make 40 million, done in 27 days. Hollywood studio should stop scratching their balls.
Imho, watching a movie at home or in a theater are totally different experiences.
At home you can get interrupted by anything (phone call, email, notification), whereas in a theater the risk of getting interrupted by something external are lower. (I agree though, that I could airplane-mode my devices at home.)
Also, the ambience in a theater is much more different than at home, especially for comedy and horror genre.
I don't have any urges to check phone, imdb or anything like that during a movie. I usually have a break in the middle of a movie for more tea or bathroom.
Besides that, a mere $1500 audio setup is enough to beat theater in terms of sound. Screen is the only thing that the theaters have going on, but I've been satisfied with my 42".
I recently upgraded to a 65" 4k OLED and that looks a lot better than the theater. Especially with HDR content.
How could a reaction be wrong?
In general, I don't want to be told what to feel, when to laugh, when to aww. Hearing those audible reactions from fellow audience members kind of conveys the ques to do so to me anyway.
well, in theater you are usually interrupted by _someone else’s_ phone call, email, notification
[edit] I still prefer going to theaters, but choose unpopular time, when it is nearly empty.
It will have the opposite effect.
Alternatively, as those platforms become more important movie distribution venues, it will reduce the relevance of Cannes and other festivals/awards that exclude films distributed by streaming alone (or "not in theaters", which isn't exactly the same thing.)
If all the award ceremonies start excluding streaming movies and the same quality movies are being released I can assure you we will see a Netflix Movie Awards or Streaming Movies Awards come to fruition.
Cannes is almost irrelevant, commercially, while Netflix is one of the most powerful movie promoters.
> From now on, if you want to compete at Cannes, your movie had better be released in French movie theaters
That's quite a bit more specific.
Ps. Yes, I'm protecting theatres ( also small ones) on that. Yes, I have Netflix. No, it shouldn't last 4 months or more after being shown in theatres to stream them, perhaps 2 months at maximum
I'm also not against car sharing, buy a car to share or to have is also a bought car.
Prereleasing a movie in theatres is not that bad for everyone, giving the exclusive streaming rights to one streaming party is much worse.
Ps. Already a lot of movie renters are out of business, but I wouldn't protect them as I do with cinemas.
Filing this under 'terrible ideas'.
It is mostly a non-issue
> The two movies included in Cannes’ lineup this year are slated for theatrical bows stateside, but according to the festival’s official statement, “no agreement has been reached” to get the moves into French cinemas
There is mismanagement of public money everywhere. There are people who abuse their position of power everywhere. I can agree if someone says it is impractical but to say it is evil is just misplaced anger.
Even if Communism is evil, it is still true that the people orchestrating the red scares were evil as well.
Bending over backwards to defend totalitarian regimes like the Soviets or CCP is obviously grotesque, but this kind of blanket pronouncement is about as nuanced as their thinking.
https://www.marxists.org/subject/frankfurt-school/
And Horkheimer is of course famous for saying, "If you don't want to talk about capitalism then you had better keep quiet about fascism."
Oh, if your just talking about Leninist vanguardism a d it's Stalinist, Maoist, etc. descendants, sure.
But that's not all of post-Marx Communist thought, and its a subset that shares common and fundamental deviations from Marx, and it's been criticized by non-Leninist Communists since day one.
USSR bolshevism was just as evil (or even more so) during their 'new economic policy' (free market capitalism) years.
Revolutions establishing de facto dictatorships were just as evil as any other dictatorships, no matter if their economic policy in the end was communism, fascism or free market.
Revolutions creating a one party communist state were just as evil as revolutions creating a one party theocratic state or one of the many cult-of-personality fascist regimes that happened also long after ww2.
Revolutions or coups establishing oligarchies or committees running everything were, again, just as evil no matter what economic policy they run.
The evil of one group gaining power and slaughtering another group is the same no matter if the "othering" happened because of class warfare, religious hatred or ethnic cleansing.
It's just that in the 20th century communism was the most popular cause of regime changes resulting in such dictatorships and single ruling party systems, though nowhere near the only one.