Going into this year’s Cannes Film Festival, one of the biggest stories surrounding the event involved a feud with streaming giant Netflix. After controversy surrounded Netflix taking part in last year’s festival, Cannes took the initiative to enforce rules about films requiring a French theatrical run. This resulted in Netflix pulling out of this year’s festival, but with a warning – the streamer said they planned on being major players in the purchasing game.
READ MORE: Netflix CEO Admits To Making “Mistakes” In The Dispute With The Cannes Film Festival
However, as we approach the end of the festival, it’s pretty much all quiet on the Netflix front. With seemingly endless wallets, as of today, Netflix is only walking away with one purchase, a $30 million acquisition of “Next Gen,” an animated feature starring Jason Sudeikis. And according to The Hollywood Reporter, the lack of Netflix news is for good reason – filmmakers aren’t accepting the big money offers.
The recent report states that Netflix went after multiple films, but was spurned, even after offering larger amounts for the projects. Films like “Birds of Passage,” “Everybody Knows,” and “Arctic” are all high-profile, well-received Cannes premieres that turned down the larger bid by Netflix to go with smaller distributors.
THR spoke with a “top sales agent,” who said the reason for the multiple snubs is because of a desire to own the rights to their work, and not sign over everything to the streaming service. “You’re giving up theatrical and every ancillary revenue for a just slightly better upfront fee,” he said.
And it wasn’t just the films premiering at the festival that were turning down lucrative Netflix deals. The biggest project that had a sales package prepared for the festival is “355,” from actress/producer Jessica Chastain. The female-led spy film signed worldwide deals worth $75 million for distribution, but not before deciding to turn down any offer by Netflix.
As we approach the end of Cannes, the biggest story about Netflix isn’t any big deals being made, but instead, is about how the streamer failed to make an impression on the festival that is known for valuing cinema. It’ll be interesting to see if this string of high-profile films turning down Netflix is a sign of things to come.
Great news for world cinema.
is it? seems like Netflix has supported a lot of small independent film that didn’t have a wide release in the past or had big numbers at the box office and it’s been a way I’ve seen a lot of great films discussed on here but didn’t show up at my theatre. Without Netflix support maybe there’s less funds for small quality films to be made.
While I agree with you, I hate how Netflix buries everything on their website. John Woo’s new movie was released last week and there’s no marketing for it on the page whatsover. They acquired the Big Sundance winner last year ‘I don’t feel at home in this world anymore’ and quickly dumped it in with anything else. I find myself continually stumbling across things that I had no idea were released or streaming on Netflix, and it drives me nuts! They don’t promote or market ANYTHING on their page when they should be. In that sense, they can blow their horns all they want about purchasing these movies at the Festivals, but I know they’ll just end up unceremoniously dumping them deep on their page somewhere. I think that new Scorsese release doesn’t stand a chance with Netflix.
It is. Netflix may buy small movies up but they bury them in their algorithm and release schedule because their business model is about quantity.
Instead of telling people they need to see a new film they’ll throw out a trailer two weeks before release and that’s it.
Look at Roxanne Roxanne. A strong movie. It would have never been a real money maker that reached a wide audience based on the subject matter and what modern audiences are attracted to but it could have found a small dedicated audience if the right distributor put a little faith behind it. Maybe make $10 to $12 million at the limited box office. People would have talked about the film and based on the small success of the film there would be a good chance the director would be offered the chance to do a new film.
Maybe if Netflix changed their system to actually benefit their acquired indie releases so these acquires actually got pushed to people but the system is working fine for Netflix. They pay the filmmakers/producing team a lump sum at the start and then they just dump the movie online and that’s it. I don’t think Netflix did Macon Blair any favors with “I Don’t Feel At Home in the World Anymore.” That’s a movie that could have done some solid business and would have gotten some people interested in hiring Blair for another film. Instead Netflix dropped it in between much more higher profile stand up specials from Louis C.K. & Marlon Wayans or something.
Netflix is good but it is not the savior of independent film some people proclaim it to be. Especially since Netflix (like Amazon) have expressed interest in pursuing bigger projects as opposed to smaller indies.
I mean, I certainly can’t think of any movies actually being “discovered” on Netflix. Once a movie is on there it has a week before it’s lost to the endless list of options and is buried under newer releases.
I agree with you to a point, but I have a feeling you’re in the US? Netflix is the only way a lot of these kinds of movies get released in most countries at all.
Annihilation was released via Netflix outside of NA. Cinema screenings for it here in Tasmania, Australia would have been sparse, if there were any at all.