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This seems like a good time to look past the scary headline of "HBOMax gets the 2021 theatrical slate" & think about 2022...
... when devastated theater chains can be sold for pennies to the studios, who can now legally own them again for the first time since 1940.
... when devastated theater chains can be sold for pennies to the studios, who can now legally own them again for the first time since 1940.
To really understand this, you have to look to the earliest days of cinema - where studios owned the entire production, distribution, and exhibition pipeline. They made the movies, they sold the movies, they distributed the movies, they showed the movies.
They were the theaters.
They were the theaters.
If you're thinking "wow, that sounds like an antitrust violation and was probably bad for everyone except the studios," you would be correct.
The 1948 Supreme Court agreed w/ you.
Thus: The Paramount Consent Decrees, which demanded theaters get out of the exhibition biz.
The 1948 Supreme Court agreed w/ you.
Thus: The Paramount Consent Decrees, which demanded theaters get out of the exhibition biz.
We only have the theatrical model that we all grew up on - independent theaters, chain theaters, theaters that showed movies from more than one corporate monolith - because of the Paramount Consent Decrees.
They were objectively good for culture AND the economy.
Until 2020.
They were objectively good for culture AND the economy.
Until 2020.
Like, imagine a world where your one local movie theater is owned by, say, Disney. And thus you only get Marvel movies, Star Wars, and whatever prestige pictures they made that year. Where you paid $20 a pop for everything you watched on Disney+.
That's what theaters used to be.
That's what theaters used to be.
And since August of 2020, they can be that again.
Streaming platforms, which mostly operate exactly like the old theatrical model, have somehow given cover to make it look like the industry has "changed" and thus the decrees are "out of date."
Bullshit. https://deadline.com/2020/08/paramount-consent-decrees-justice-department-2-1203007221/
Streaming platforms, which mostly operate exactly like the old theatrical model, have somehow given cover to make it look like the industry has "changed" and thus the decrees are "out of date."
Bullshit. https://deadline.com/2020/08/paramount-consent-decrees-justice-department-2-1203007221/
So, under the guise of "changing times", the Justice Department under Trump gutted the Decrees. They re-legalized an anti-trust issue at the EXACT moment the theater chains were struggling the most.
Studios have a place to survive until the pandemic is over.
Theaters don't.
Studios have a place to survive until the pandemic is over.
Theaters don't.
Do I think they should be showing movies in theaters right now?
HELL NO.
Am I excited to watch some big movies on my teevee?
SURE!
Do I think this is a perfect storm of deregulation that could easily lead us in a literal circle to the antitrust crimes of the 1940s?
YUP!
HELL NO.
Am I excited to watch some big movies on my teevee?
SURE!
Do I think this is a perfect storm of deregulation that could easily lead us in a literal circle to the antitrust crimes of the 1940s?
YUP!
So, what to do about this?
GET CONGRESS TO PASS ANTI-TRUST REGULATION ON PHYSICAL DISTRIBUTION OF FILM MEDIA.
Don't protect the theaters bottom line - we'll have to do that together in 2022 - but do protect their right to exist at all in a landscape dominated by megacorps.
GET CONGRESS TO PASS ANTI-TRUST REGULATION ON PHYSICAL DISTRIBUTION OF FILM MEDIA.
Don't protect the theaters bottom line - we'll have to do that together in 2022 - but do protect their right to exist at all in a landscape dominated by megacorps.
(sidenote, the Obama admin should have initially extended the decrees so that the studios had to work with new streaming platforms and generate millions of new jobs rather than consolidating under giant monolithic streaming services but WHOOPS TOO LATE WE LIVE IN CYBERPUNK NOW)
If we don't do something legislatively, we are all looking at a 2030 media landscape where the only living theaters chains are Amazon Cinemas and Disney Theaters and Hulu-But-You-Watch-It-In-A-Big-Room-With-Other-People.
And you'll pay them all for the privilege.
And you'll pay them all for the privilege.
Anyway, RIP the Paramount Consent Decrees.
Let's hope we can find an alternative before we define cultural rebellion as having a membership to the Alamo Drafthouse.
Let's hope we can find an alternative before we define cultural rebellion as having a membership to the Alamo Drafthouse.
I leave you with this image of the Year of Our Lord 2020, hurling consequences at us for the rest of our conceivable lives.
