Nolan did put himself into that awkward position where a VOD decision would make him look like a dumb loser - so WB, behind the scenes, will be all the more raging how to recoup the expected losses.
In the end, no director ever stays in that power position. One or two consecutive flops and Nolan will lose his current status. Or a change in WB leadership, coupled with Nolan not liking the next studio head, taking his business elsewhere, having a flop in the new haven - that’s it. The days of Kubrick are over anyway. No director, not even Spielberg, can rest on his laurels anymore and expect to do everything he wants.
But Nolan hasn’t had those flops yet. I very much doubt that Warners will want to risk losing him to another studio over something that is essentially out of everyone’s control.
Now, if this thing drags on and we’re heading into Christmas with no films having been released in cinemas yet, I could see Warners beginning to rethink things and putting some pressure on Nolan to go along with the idea of releasing to some other format, but as long as no other major film has made the jump yet, and they don’t appear ready to any time in the near future, I don’t see Nolan being the first to jump.
It’s academic at the moment, as long as Trump continues as he is, the virus will keep going in a distinctly upward direction keeping most cinemas closed.
The mythical place called cinema where strangers come together to enjoy a communal enchantment only provided by huge screens and a perfect soundsystem is an illusion, sold by Hollywood.
Sure, we all have that nostalgia for those theatres in which we first saw our favorite films.
But as someone who went to the cinema at least once a week for more than twenty years let me tell you: bad projection, air condition, obnoxious people regularly ruined that enchanting atmosphere. And when multiplexes invested in new projection and sound systems the image still was not automatically sharp and the sound just blasted me into submission.
True, I have fallen out of love with the cinema experience as a consequence. But right now it‘s only the contagious nature of a life-threatening virus which makes me stay away. Sitting there with a mask and the uncertainty of hygiene will not make me fall in love with cinema again.
Personal ideology beats mass health - which ironically is what gave them the ability to sue, as they do cite that churches have the same risk as movie theatres, yet they are being told to open.
It’s like the cinema union saw churches on fire and want to be able to set their theatres on fire too.
Well, people are people. We’re often doing things against our better judgement because of…reasons. Especially when that better judgement is called for we tend to struggle. Brecht called it ‘first the grub, then the morals’ - and that’s perhaps the most fitting line describing this situation.
People usually don’t want to be idiots, assholes or murderous, fanatical freaks. But when you teach them it’s actually okay to be a little bit of the above that’s exactly what you get then, a bunch of folks following what they have been preached.
Nolan’s just being hugely arrogant and snobbish in maintaining he wants Tenet released in cinemas.
Really, in the (hopefully) decades-long lifespan of a film, it will be watched far more on home screens than during the few weeks it spends in cinemas. If a film has good writing, good acting and acceptable production values, it will work.
Most TV are massive, anyway, compared to the ‘rabbit ears’, black-and-white ones of decades past. I didn’t need to see Psycho, North By Northwest, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Goldfinger or Die Hard on the big screen for them to have the intended effect.
Will be interesting to see where they slot the film in 2021, whether they go back to the April spot they were originally shooting for this year or if they go with a different date.
Sadly, it just dawned on me that, had the world not fallen apart, I would have been heading to the cinema later today for Ghostbusters, a film I had waited to see for over thirty years, and had long since given up on ever actually thinking it would make it to the big screen. That’s a gut punch even greater than missing out on Bond this year, I have to say. Thanks Covid.
The November spot doesn’t leave a lot of 2020 already. If they are smart they will want to avoid moving by weeks since weeks are nothing in this situation.
If I were in their shoes I’d aim for summer 2021 - and meanwhile would work on plan s(treaming). There is probably already an offer on the table, it just won’t get any better with time. You can already see all kinds of problems even if the fated vaccine arrives. Calculations for NO TIME TO DIE have to be made from scratch again.
Stocks for publicly traded companies such as AMC and Regal parent company Cineworld have been brutalized as investors have expressed their skepticism about the long-term health of the sector by selling off shares.
Perhaps the shareholders meetings arn’t the best place to get information from…
