Richard Gere’s latest movie may herald “the wave of the future,” said Richard Brody in NewYorker.com. Arbitrage, which chronicles the fall of a contemporary Wall Street tycoon, grossed only $2 million at the box office on its first weekend, but that was enough to establish its opening as the best ever by a film simultaneously made available to home viewers via video on demand. And that small success builds on others: The raunchy comedy Bachelorette, given a VOD release in August, racked up $4 million before it even arrived in theaters on Sept. 7, setting a few records of its own. As more and more independent releases hit the home-video market on or before their theatrical release dates, some critics will complain about what’s lost when viewers aren’t converging before a vast silver screen. Yet “something is gained, too.” Movies for adults used to play a bigger role in the national conversation, a role more like that of today’s best TV shows. VOD could put movies back in that game.
Viewers shouldn’t expect that the major studios will soon jump on the VOD bandwagon, said Adam B. Vary in EW.com. The money that a big movie makes during its theatrical run is still crucial to the studios’ business model, and the theater chains have balked at any hint that a major release might be made available for home viewing while it’s still playing in multiplexes. But distributors of small films see VOD as a way to grow revenues. “Not only does VOD service overbusy cinephiles” who can only get to the theater so many times each month. It finally allows “heartland audiences” a chance to stay as up to date as a New Yorker on the “buzziest” festival-circuit flicks. Viewers won’t take chances on movies they haven’t heard of, but put a star in the mix—Gere in Arbitrage, Kirsten Dunst in Bachelorette, Jennifer Garner in Butter—and the word of mouth created by an early VOD release might even boost old-fashioned ticket sales.
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