Is Streaming Killing Big Screen Films?

Steaming is devastating for people who want to make films for the big screen, says Dame Helen Mirren.

19:29 19 April 2018

Dame Helen Mirren has said that the rise of watching films on streaming services, such as Netflix, is killing the communal experience of cinema.

 

The award-winning actress, who is married to Director Taylor Hackford, said: "It's devastating for people like my husband, film directors, because they want their movies to be watched in a cinema with a group of people," 

 

"An audience, a movie, and you're all in it together," she said. "You're frightened, you laugh, you cry all together. So it's a communal thing. And that's beginning to disappear."

 

However, recent figures have suggested that despite the rise of streaming services, the attraction of the cinema is not waning. Last year, UK cinemagoers spent a record of £1.38billion on tickets, which represents a 6.1per cent increase on the previous year.

 

Meanwhile, Netflix films have been banned from this year’s Cannes Film Festival, which has decided that starting this year, all films in competition must have a cinema release.