Every movie on the 2021 Warner Bros. release calendar -- including big-budget extravaganzas like "Suicide Squad 2," "Godzilla vs. Kong," "Dune" and "The Matrix 4" -- will arrive simultaneously in theaters and on the HBO Max streaming service in the United States, WarnerMedia said Thursday.
HBO Max subscribers will get instant access to 17 movies in total, a slate that easily represents more than $1 billion in production costs.
In explaining why an entire year's worth of movies would not receive exclusive runs in cinemas (a significant break from Hollywood's traditional business model), WarnerMedia, which is owned by AT&T, pointed to the coronavirus pandemic.
Even with a widely deployed vaccine, which is expected in the coming months, the company does not believe that moviegoing in the United States will recover until at least next fall, a gloomy assessment that stands in sharp contrast with what other major movie studios have signaled.
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"We know new content is the lifeblood of theatrical exhibition, but we have to balance this with the reality that most theaters in the U.S. will likely operate at reduced capacity throughout 2021," Ann Sarnoff, the chief executive of the WarnerMedia Studios and Networks Group, said in a statement. "We can support our partners in exhibition with a steady pipeline of world-class films, while also giving moviegoers who may not have access to theaters or aren't quite ready to go back to the movies the chance to see our amazing 2021 films."
She called it a "unique one-year plan."
But it will likely be impossible to go back to the old way of doing things. For a start, audiences trained to expect immediate gratification may not want studios to return to the days of giving theaters roughly 90 days of exclusive playing rights. AT&T also wants to continue expanding HBO Max. Two weeks ago, the company said that "Wonder Woman 1984" would simultaneously arrive in domestic theaters and on HBO Max on Christmas Day.