At a gathering of the television industry in London, Netflix boss Ted Sarandos explained that he did not feel the commercial need to recoup its investment in movie theaters. He clarified: "This is unique to Netflix, but we can spend $200 million on a movie and have enough audience to put it directly on Netflix without trying to recoup some of it through the theater economy, which I think is a pretty inefficient way to distribute some movies."
Understandably, Netflix relies almost exclusively on its advertising and subscription revenues to finance itself. He continued: "Today, our subscribers can watch a world of entertainment for a fraction of the price of a Sopranos box set in 2007. And they don't have to wait two months for all the episodes of a series to be released or for a movie to finish its theatrical run. The public doesn't care about viewing windows at all, they never talk about it during dinners with friends."
Netflix, the McDonald's of cinema?££££
No doubt, a point for Sarandos. But what would also be nice is that during the famous dinner with friends, it wouldn't take three hours to agree on something nice to watch on Netflix. And it is also almost certain that most of Netflix's $200 million films would have no success if they were released in theaters since, on the one hand, they are not aimed at the same audience, and on the other hand, they are far from having the same script and production requirements as most big-budget American films that are released in theaters. It's a bit like saying that Red Notice (3/10 rating at AVcesar) and Oppenheimer (8/10 rating at AVcesar) are the same thing.
It would be a bit like pitting a McDonald's menu against a 3-star menu. So yes, of course, cinema and streaming can coexist, but with all due respect to Mr. Sarandos, they simply don't sell the same thing and don't target the same audience.
The insurmountable algorithm for all "real" creatives...££££
And what about Netflix's editorial line (if we can call an "algorithm" an editorial line)? Between the HBO/Max catalog (the channel that dared to produce The Sopranos in 1999) and that of Netflix, there's no comparison. Yet they are both streaming platforms. Things would certainly be different if, on Netflix, the writers were better paid, the producers were better regarded, and if everything did not systematically go through the algorithm box before receiving a go from the decision-makers. Artistic audacity and Netflix unfortunately still have a lot of trouble coexisting. If today, a writer brought the Sopranos project to Ted Sarandos, it is not at all certain that the series would pass the algorithm test. In France, let's not even talk about it. You really have to be a speleologist to find a nice French film or series produced by Netflix, and at the same level as The Sopranos, it's a horizon that moves further and further away as time goes by. A fantasy, at most... The reality is that between making money or good cinema, Netflix has chosen its side. So yes, McDonald's is nice, but from time to time, a little gastro or homemade food is not to be refused.
