With streaming now the favored option among U.S. TV audiences, it’s become a critical distribution consideration among movie studios as they evaluate strategies to best engage their key audiences—and when. And as buzz builds around the upcoming 95th Academy Awards, we can see that streaming distribution has evolved into a complement to theater releases rather than an alternative.
Compared with just a few years ago, releasing a movie to theaters and a streaming service at the same time is no longer unusual, if for no other reason than the audiences that streaming attracts. In 2022, Americans streamed more than 19 million years’ worth of content—up from almost 15 million years’ worth in 2021. And from a movie perspective, Americans streamed more than 112 billion minutes of the 15 most-viewed movies of 2022, up from almost 84 billion minutes of the 15 most-watched movies of 2021.
But with audiences returning to theaters throughout 2022, many of this year’s Best Picture nominations have yet to land on a streaming service. The extended period between theatrical and streaming releases of this year’s nominations reflects evolving distribution approaches in light of reduced concerns about COVID-19 last year. Compared with 2021’s Don’t Look Up, which only had a 14-day exclusive in theaters, 2022’s Triangle of Sadness made its theatrical debut Oct. 7, 2022, but remains unavailable to streaming audiences nearly six months later.
When the 94th Academy Awards were held March 27 of last year, all but one of the Best Picture nominations had been made available to streaming audiences, which attracted significant viewership across five different platforms. The tight window of theater exclusivity for all but one of the movies gave audiences an opportunity to see the movies in the comfort of their own homes ahead of the Oscars. In 2021, for example, audiences streamed 211 million hours of CODA, which went on to win three Academy Awards in 2022, including Best Picture.
这些影片的流媒体播放时间与奥斯卡颁奖典礼相距如此之近，这也在颁奖典礼的炒作之后助长了收视率的光环效应，整个 2022 年，观众观看九部最佳影片提名影片的流媒体播放时间将近 85 亿分钟。
Fast forward a year, and we see that only one of the 2023 Best Picture nominations was released to U.S. theaters and a streaming service simultaneously: All Quiet on the Western Front, the third adaptation of the 1929 novel of the same name. And as a result, U.S. audiences had streamed 1.7 billion minutes of the film through Feb. 12, 2023. Comparatively, four of this year’s Best Picture nominations have yet to be made available on a streaming service.
That means that these films will likely experience a viewing resurgence when they do migrate to streaming, just as Elvis did when it landed on HBO Max in August 2022 after a 45-day period of theater exclusivity. Viewership got an additional boost after it was nominated for an Oscar, as audiences had streamed 568 million minutes of the film in 2023 through Feb. 12, 2023 (2.122 billion minutes streamed in 2022).
随着观众继续向流媒体倾斜，电影仍然是电视参与的重要驱动力。在电影疫情最严重的时候，流媒体甚至为电影业提供了无法去影院观看的观众。三年后，随着大部分日常生活基本恢复正常，电影的发行也更加平衡，流媒体提供了一个延伸渠道，让更多观众可以选择在影院观看电影。
