Netflix deems Danny Boyle's Rupert Murdoch movie worthy of theatrical release

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos might believe—but not entirely—that movie theaters are an outmoded form of content delivery. Obviously, he’d rather subscribers do the old two-screen experience on his app, forever finding new shows they’ll never watch a second season of. But despite the near-constant refrain that Netflix doesn’t want to enter the theatrical business, something it had to backpedal on when it was attempting to acquire Warner Bros., the streamer keeps running up against the reality that the filmmakers they want to work with like making movies for movie theaters and, also, the streamer still wants to win some Oscars, which annoyingly require some semblance of theatrical release. Netflix has been softening on this for some time. Last year, Netflix gave Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein a real theatrical release. More recently, it announced David Fincher’s The Adventures Of Cliff Booth will receive a two-week IMAX release before it lands on the streamer. The IMAX spot only opened because Greta Gerwig required a robust theatrical release from Netflix if she was going to make some Narnia movies for the company. When she needed more time, Narnia got bumped to 2027, and Cliff Booth got an AMC recliner. Finally, to qualify for awards, Danny Boyle’s upcoming Rupert Murdoch movie, Ink, is getting a month in theaters before hitting Netflix on January 8.