Blog 7 - The Inbetweener

The Amazon Studios offshoot of amazon.com was created in November of 2010 and laid dormant until their first real release in 2015 with Chi-Raq. Since then they have helped distribute many small films and most notably last year’s The Big Sick, which became an awards contender. However this marks something of an end for the company in terms of their co-distribution days as they aim to be moving into sole production of films in the year to come. They’re hoping to produce 12-14 films this year with budgets ranging up to $35 Million. Clearly they are aiming to catch up with Netflix in the department of self-production, but what Amazon does is different. Although their films end up on their streaming service and remain a draw for the service itself, they are also given a theatrical release. 

A still from The Big Sick

The head of distribution and Marketing for Amazon studios realises the cinematic experience is important for getting a film seen and has said that their customers want “quality films” that have been reviewed and buzzed about at festivals and the cinema experience is important to that. This is important but he gets to the real root of why they do it when he says “It enhances and incentivizes artists globally, and that encourages filmmakers to come work with us.”. By giving the films a theatrical release more creators will want to work with them as opposed to Netflix who are just releasing straight online. This method by Amazon gets them creators such as Woody Allen, Luca Guadagnino and Lynne Ramsay. Amazon is effectively about to have their cake and eat it too, they’re going to get their films released in cinemas, getting them box office, and they get to work with interesting award winning creators. Amidst this they will still hold the exclusive streaming rights for those films, and will be able to capture the audience that don’t want to pay on top of their monthly fee to see it at the cinema. The Worldwide Head of Amazon’s Motion Picture Group even says they work like a regular studio, they have a theatrical run but instead of releasing on DVD and Blu-Ray like a normal studio would they have their own home release system. The only downfall is that perhaps in terms of box office the films won't achieve their full potential as people will assume they can wait for it to be streamed or vice versa. 

NFL Football

Whilst being a streaming service Amazon has no intention of being a disruption to the cinematic industry in the same way that Netflix does, however this cannot be said about their TV department. Amazon is less focused on rivalling Netflix’s drama’s and more concerned with cable TV. Through their Amazon Fire TV stick Amazon has a created a feature in the US called ‘On Now’ that allows viewers to effectively stream live TV. Although the channel selection is small it consists of HBO, Showtime, Starz and Cinemax, quality channels. This presents the opportunity for Amazon to capture those ‘Water-cooler’ moments only Live television can have. The most impressive channel package the UK can offer at the moment is Eurosport. Lots of licensing contracts go into flux over the next couple of years meaning that if Amazon were to aggressively pursue them, with Eurosport, they might be able to gain some more impressive tournaments. For the last year Amazon earned the rights to Thursday Night Football in the US and it would be smart to assume they’ll go for something similar in the UK. Tennis is where the majority of their rights are now and they would be smart to go for this due to it’s popularity in the UK. As seen by the ladies semi finals viewing figures which hit a staggering 7.4 Million views.

Amazon's film strategy is bold and different to others in the industry and may pay off in terms of working with creators and achieving the widest audience possible but in television it’s reliant on them seizing more high profile channels or focusing their efforts into sport which may be a real possibility with amazon themselves recently having snapped up the Tennis US Open, ATP World tour and Finals from 2019 onwards.