This year’s Oscars will admit streaming-only films, in what the Academy insists is a covid-induced one-off
are off in many Florida businesses. But after dark, the glow of the Ocala Drive-In’s 90-foot screen can be seen from a quarter of a mile down the highway. With half the parking spaces in its seven-acre plot fenced off to allow for social distancing, the Ocala has room for 240 vehicles—and it is full every night. “We’re the only thing going right now,” says John Watzke, the owner.
That may be longer than some cinemas can wait. Already indebted after years of investing in reclining seats and the like, they face four months without revenue, followed by only a slow return to business as usual. The world’s largest chain,, which has around 1,000 theatres, the bulk of them in America, last month borrowed an emergency $500m, which ought to tide it over until November.
Cinema bosses are naturally horrified by this breaking of the 90-day window in which films are normally shown exclusively on the big screen;says it will no longer show any Universal films, adding with a suitably theatrical flourish that this is “not some hollow or ill-considered threat”. Cineworld says it too will boycott films that break the window. But Universal is not the only studio going online. Warner has arranged a digital-only release for “Scoob!”, which was due in theatres on May 15th.
It isn’t yet time for the credits to roll for the cinema. This year’s biggest titles, from James Bond to Wonder Woman, have been postponed rather than put online. Universal itself has delayed the latest in its “Fast and Furious” series until next April. Given that previous “Furious” films have taken as much as $1.2bn at the worldwide box office, it cannot afford to miss a theatre run.
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