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The best thing about Netflix is that when you actually think of a random movie you want to see, or when it comes up in conversation, you can just add it to your queue and not worry about that bound-to-happen moment in the video store when you can’t decide what you want to rent and are forced to just bang your head off the wall as you try to grasp the title of “that movie” that came to mind a few days earlier. The lone drawback to this set-up (aside from the fact that if you do it enough times, the same moment takes place when digging through your queue) is that you are not always near a computer.

Well thanks to http://www.netflix.com/mobile, your queue will always be accessible, so long as you have a cell phone handy. The stripped-down site allows you to check the top-10 movies in your queue, add to the list, and read brief summaries of movies, all from a web-enabled phone or PDA. What a tremendous idea.

Via JK On the Run.

AOL just announced that it will be getting into the movie downloading game, as AOL Video will be offering several movie titles at prices ranging from $9.99 to $19.99. In joining Movielink, CinemaNow, and Guba, AOL becomes the fourth major online movie downloading store.

Presently, AOL is offering movie content from Sony, but deals are in the works with 20th Century Fox, Universal, and Warner Brothers. The Fox and Sony deals will include TV content.

Thanks to paidcontent.org for the scoop.

The relationship between Netflix and the independent film business has generated a lot of discussion as of late. The discussion is often tacked onto a discussion of the “Long-Tail Economics” theory, which more or less predicts that the boom in internet retail will result in a consumer market that is driven not by ‘hits’ but my a diverse conglomeration of a niche purchases (the “long tail”).

While numbers suggest that Netflix’s revenue is predominantly hits-driven, one only has to look at the size of its library to see that these numbers don’t rule out a deep philosophical committment to offering independent and rare films. Recent comments given by Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos in an interview with Wired Magazine (and brought to my attention by Christopher at Deep Structure) strengthen the notion that Netflix is committed to independent film-making.

While Sarandos reveals Netflix’s plan work out distribution deals to someday rent-out every movie screened at Sundance, Hastings one-ups him by revealing that the company’s real goal is to get every movie SUBMITTED to Sundance, not just the ones that get screened. Not surprisingly, Netflix is also reportedly interested in forming its own production company. Don’t forget, Bahman Naraghi (the new VP of Original Content at Netflix) used to be Executive VP of Finance and Operations at Miramax (i.e. the studio that arguably started the indy-film boom thanks to its release of films like “Sex, Lies, and Videotape” and “Pulp Fiction”).

Sometimes media lightning rod Spike Lee’s recently released HBO Documentary “When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts,” got mostly positive reviews following its premiere earlier this week. The documentary tells the story of Katrina’s aftermath, and pulls no punches in criticizing the government for its lackluster response to the catastrophe–which Lee considers more of a man-made than a natural disaster.

It is clear that Lee intends the film to be a “call to action” of sorts, as is most evidenced by his appearance and comments at a screening in Martha’s Vineyard. Social activism is not, of course, foreign to the director of “Do the Right Thing,” “Malcolm X,” and many other, lesser-known films (like the wonderful “Clockers”) that deal with racial issues.

The film has, of course, generated much controversy, given the fact that it gives voice to conspiracy theories which blame the levees’ collapse on intentional governmental action and that it all but ignores local politicians and Democrats in its blame-slinging. A heated discussion of the film’s merits in this regard can be found atWizbangblog, where Kevin Aylward’s negative take on the doc generated quite a response.

Last weekend, the much hyped Samuel L. Jackson vehicle (and aptly-named) “Snakes on a Plane” came in number one at the box office, but failed to generate the gross ticket sales that producers had hoped for. The campy horror flick generated only about $15 million in sales, a far cry from what the amount of internet hype that accompanied it would lead one to expect. Studios had expected opening weekend ticket sales of around $20 million dollars.

The film only cost, however a modest $30 million dollars, which suggests that it will be profitable in the long run. I think that the “it’s so bad it’s good” feeling of this film translates better to DVD anyways. This is the type of movie you whip out at 3am after a long night of drinking, not one you drop 10 bucks and a trip to the theater on. As long as its theatrical release effort breaks even, the publicity its generates should dramatically boost DVD sales and make the whole project a big success.

I haven’t seen the film yet myself, but jelewis8 at FringeBlog says that the film delivers on its promise of cheap, mindless fun. But as always, the quality of the film-going experience says nothing about its financial success. I think that Snakes on a Plane’s less-than-ideal performance this week can be explained by the fact that the buzz it generated basically encapsulated what it is all about. Just TALKING about the film seems to be good enough; there really isn’t much more to be expected from actually seeing it. Marianne Richmond, however, has an interesting take on the success/failure of buzz marketing that Snakes on a Plane exemplifies. See her post on Resonance Partnership here.

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The low-ball offer given by Viacom CEO Summer Redstone to Tom Cruise for the renewal of his recently expired contract with Paramount is itself a sure indication that the company has been dying to get rid of him. But any doubts about this can be easily dismissed by Redstone’s recent comments in the Wall Street Journal.

In response to questions about the end of Paramount’s relationship with Cruise, Redstone is quoted as saying: “It’s nothing to do with his acting ability, he’s a terrific actor…but we don’t think that someone who effectuates creative suicide and costs the company revenue should be on the lot.” Apparently, Redstone blames the relative failure of Cruise projects like “Mission Impossible III” on Cruise’s recently “eccentric” behavior. This behavior certainly got Cruise’s name in the paper, but estimates suggest that it also cost Paramount more than $100 million in ticket sales. Cruise is reportedly planning to set up his movie studio independently with partner Paula Wagner and both are, unsurprisingly, claiming that the break-up with Paramount was strictly their choice.

We all could see this coming. I, for one, was always kind of luke-warm on Cruise; he’s a good and reliable, but not great, actor. I didn’t see MI3, but then again I didn’t see MI or MI2 either (actually, that’s not true; I fell asleep during MI2). The fact that MI became a franchise with two sequels had me confused even without reference to Cruise’s recently exposed insanity. I therefore think that it’s tough to tell if it really was his public nutiness that caused the failure of that film (a meager $393 million globally, which isn’t much, given Cruise’s salary chunk and cost of the film), especially since “War of the Worlds,” which was released right after his infamous Oprah appearance performed much more solidily at the box office ($590 million globally). But I will say that, even though I liked “War of the Worlds,” his off-screen antics made his on-screen presence a bit distracting for at least the first 20 minutes of the film. And any time you have to put that kind of effort into forgetting who an actor is in order to watch a movie, its usually a bad sign for that actor’s career. My guess is that Paramount cut ties before Cruise could do something more embarrassing than what he has already done (i.e. something that takes the audience more than 20 minutes to forget).

So is this the right move for Paramount? Leora at TomKatCrazy.com thinks that it is, but I’m ultimately not so sure. MI3 could have crapped out simply because it was a crappy movie. I do agree, however, with the conclusion reached by I’m Not Obsessed: this is certainly not the death of Cruise’s career. We will assuredly hear from him again, even if only through his soon-to-be-started indy production company.

UPDATE: Click here for an interesting article suggesting that Cruise was fired to cover-up Viacom’s recent overall poor performance.

UPDATE 2: Inside reports suggest that Redstone has grossly exaggerated Cruise’s salary in order to make it look like he was getting an egregious amount of money, thereby justifying his release. See the full story here.

UPDATE 3: Another rumor has Redstone’s wife as a major player in the decision to fire Cruise!

[Original Source]

According to Victor D’Angelo at Revolution Portal, 20th Century Fox will soon be making select movies and TV shows (like “24″) available for download through some of the many sites owned by its parent company, News Corp.

Among the sites that will feature Fox content are IGN.com and MySpace.com.

Even since its June deal with Warner Brothers, the performance of online film content provider Guba’s movie downloading service, much like that of CinemaNow and Movielink, has failed to impress. As a result, Guba has developed a new promotional pricing structure designed to attract new users.

Formerly, movie downloads that were priced at $19.99, $9.99, and $1.79 (depending upon release dates and rental length) are now respectively priced at $9.99, $4.99, and $.99. Guba CEO Tom McIerney contends that the major problem facing the movie downloading model is determining a price that will work for consumers, content providers, and movie studios alike. Accordingly, McIerney thinks that this pricing experiment will be very revealing; he claims that, since the promotion began, traffic on the site has increased by 500%.

I tend to agree with McIerney. The only way that this model will get off the ground is it if offers truly reasonable prices. Consumers are smart enough to realize that, once these sites go up and licensing deals are inked, the only true cost to the providers is bandwidth. These downloads therefore have to be cheaper than packaged, special-features-loaded, DVD

Thanks to Red Herring for the story.

The rumor mill regarding an upcoming iTunes-like Apple movie store has been operating at full power for some time now, on this blog and on many others. Even the editors of MacWorld have gone back and forth on the issue.

Lions Gate CEO John Feltheimer has finally presented us with concrete evidence that lends credibility to all our mere speculations. During a financial earnings conference call, Feltheimer announced that the studio has reached movie downloading deals with CinemaNow, Movielink, and, lo and behold, iTunes. Studio president Steve Beeks also mentioned that iTunes downloads should be available by the end of the year.

It’s tough to say whether or not Apple–which prides itself on innovative ad campaigns and surprise announcements–will be happy about this leak. Brandon Hill at Daily Tech, for one, thinks that Apple CEO Steve Jobs will not be pleased.

But then again, I think it is safe to assume that the whole world knows that iTunes-driven movie downloads are coming sooner or later. The question was always only: When? Assuredly conscious of this, Beeks’ comments show a wonderful level discretion: “In terms of iTunes movie downloads, I think most likely some time before the end of the year. We know when they are planning on launching, but since they have not announced it publicly, I do not think it is our place to say anything more about that.” Way to keep it quiet Steve.

Thanks to Engadget for the scoop.

If you have ever wondered what goes on inside a Netflix warehouse, then you may want to take a look at Susan Sheehan’s recent article in the New Yorker. I’ve always pictured the inside of a Netflix warehouse (a new one of which just opened in Portland, Maine) to be a lot like the inside of Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. I’ve heard that, much like Wonka’s factory, Netflix warehouses have intentionally non-descript exteriors because the company doesn’t want people showing up to drop off movies. These bland facades must hide something fantastic.

No warehouse or factory, of course, is anything like Wonka’s, with happy little elves singing and dancing their ways through the day. A Netflix warehouse is no exception. But the efficiency of a Netflix shipping operation is amazing in a different sort of way.

According to Sheehan’s story, 40 workers start at 6:30 am and, by lunch, have finished processing all of the returned disks that came in earlier that morning (and yes, they do actually check the comments you scribble on the back of the envelope). After lunch, the workers stuff the envelopes with disks to be shipped out (a good “stuffer” can finish about 1,000 disks per hour). The disks then go to a machine to be electronically addressed and sorted by zip code (which is a major reason why it enjoys cheap shipping rates) before being sent to the post office by 8 that evening. The warehouse workers are generally finished by 5:30 pm (the machines keep working till around 7) and put in around 40 hours a week. The result is the absolute model of efficiency that Netflix subscribers have come to enjoy.