Netflix Bows Out Of Cannes After Festival Tells Streaming Services To Get Off Its Lawn (original) (raw)

from the relics-of-a-bygone-era dept

Last month, the folks running the Cannes film festival had a little toddler moment, when they declared that streaming services like Netflix wouldn’t be allowed to win the Palme d?Or. More specifically, Cannes boss Thierry Fremaux stated that streaming services wouldn’t be allowed to win any awards if they didn’t adhere to outdated French film industry release windows. Such windows are increasingly archaic, but the release windows required by France’s cultural exception law are particularly obnoxious, requiring a 36-month delay between theatrical release and streaming availability.

Cannes couldn’t just come out and admit it was having a “damn kids get the hell off my lawn moment,” so it tried to peddle a bunch of nonsense about how this was all about ensuring high festival standards. That, of course, ignores the fact that while Netflix pushes a lot of streaming crap, streaming services in general are increasingly winning both television and film awards. It also ignores the fact that Cannes is trying to dress protectionism up as something more noble than it actually is. Or, that bad streaming content wouldn’t be considered for awards anyway.

In response, Netflix has now stated that the company will be avoiding Cannes entirely, Netflix Chief Content Office Ted Sarandos stating the company will be taking its ball and going home:

“We want our films to be on fair ground with every other filmmaker,? Sarandos says. ?There?s a risk in us going in this way and having our films and filmmakers treated disrespectfully at the festival. They?ve set the tone. I don?t think it would be good for us to be there.”

In a subsequent interview, Sarandos says Netflix learned of its ouster from the media, and was quick to point out that Cannes is really only making itself look stupid here:

“We hope that they do change the rules. We hope that they modernize. But we will continue to support all films and all filmmakers. We encourage Cannes to rejoin the world cinema community and welcome them back. Thierry had said in his comments when he announced his change that the history of the Internet and the history of Cannes are two different things. Of course they are two different things. But we are choosing to be about the future of cinema. If Cannes is choosing to be stuck in the history of cinema, that?s fine.”

It’s all really just another stupid example of how folks love to try to dress up counterproductive protectionism, stubbornness and resistance to natural evolution as some kind of more elaborate ethos. And how countless people, companies and organizations believe they can somehow thwart disruptive technology to try and roll back the clock to the way things used to be. Of course as Techdirt readers are very much aware, that never tends to work out particularly well.

Filed Under: cannes, movie industry, streaming, thierry fremaux
Companies: netflix