Disney will deprive the French of its Christmas movie “Avalonia”in dark rooms. It will be available for free on Disney+.
In protest against the rules in place in France, Disney has announced that its great Christmas movie Avalonia, Strange Journey (Strange World in its original title) will be offered directly on Disney+, bypassing theaters in France. And the American giant issued a statement to Deadline, in which it sharply criticized this well-known and so controversial media chronology.
Disney will deprive the French of its Christmas movie “Avalonia”in darkrooms
Weird World will be available to all Disney+ subscribers in France prior to its release in French theaters. While we support French cinema – which we have been doing for decades – the new and very tedious media chronology works against consumers, ignoring the evolution of behavior over several years and exposing us to an increased risk of being hacked. We will continue to make our decisions film by film in accordance with the conditions specific to each market,” a company spokesman said.
French law currently requires studios like Disney to wait 17 months before they can offer their films on Disney+ after darkroom release, four months later for digital purchase, and six months for Canal+ exclusivity. Disney+ can then only keep them for five months before movies can be streamed on free channels like TF1 or France 2 for 14 months. After this period, 36 months after release, films return to Disney+.
It will be available for free on Disney+.
Before the new law was passed a few months ago, the situation for streaming services was even worse, with even longer delays. Disney strongly protested as the new rules favor Netflix by giving it a shorter 15-month window before films can return to the streaming platform. The American giant also said that this law does not take into account the new reality of content consumption in the age of Covid-19.
“We believe that the media chronology is unfavorable for consumers and does not set a balanced or proportional framework between the various players in the French audiovisual ecosystem. This is especially frustrating as we have increased our investment in creating original French content while supporting French cinema through our theatrical releases,” Disney said at the time.
The National Center for Cinema and the Moving Image (CMC), run by the Ministry of Culture, should meet the needs of cinemas, studios, streaming services and consumers. At the same time, it tries to encourage local production and original French content in general. This has paid off lately, for example, with the filming of Emily in Paris, and original French series such as Lupin or Dix for a Cent have become international hits.