There has been much talk, in recent months, of how Netflix interacts, or doesn’t, with movie theaters. Mostly, this is because the streamer itself keeps baiting the conversation, dropping a hit like KPop Demon Hunters into the multiplex for a weekend here, appeasing a big name like Guillermo Del Toro by giving his Frankenstein a quick run on the big screen there. But the fact that the streamer/studio will put a movie into theaters, at least for minute, now feels like it could be a sticking point in some conversations all on its own, leading certain directors—like Weapons and Barbarians guy Zach Cregger—to ask, “Well, why doesn’t my movie get the star treatment, too?”
This is per The Wrap, which quotes sources suggesting that development on Cregger’s new Netflix film The Flood has stalled out over disagreements over whether the sci-fi film will get a theatrical release. Which, we have to assume, is especially galling in so far as Netflix came to Cregger to make the film, which he originally penned for Amblin a few years back; Cregger was reportedly wooed by Netflix Films chairman Daniel Lin while he was busy working up his new Resident Evil film for Sony, offers that apparently included Lin “dangling” a theatrical release for the movie to lure Cregger in. But the company’s co-CEO, Ted “Who Even Goes To Movie Theaters, Anyway?” Sarandos, shot the idea down, and now the whole thing is, depending on who you ask, stuck at a massive impasse.
(We’ll note here that The Wrap does quote a few other sources who say this is all being overblown, and that The Flood is, at the very least, still in talks, and possibly even in “active development.”)
The “Who gets a movie screen?” question has become one of those Hollywood culture queries that continues to have massive box office repercussions, for the pretty simple reason that movie executives are generally a little pragmatic, if not outright ambivalent, about it, while the directors in their employ really give a shit. Warner Bros. is still smarting over losing the allegiance of Christopher Nolan over its handling of the rollout for Tenet, Apple apparently killed the possibility of a Wolfs sequel by shunting the movie onto its servers at the last minute, and Netflix itself has made big headlines by wooing Greta Gerwig, fresh off Barbie, with an uncharacteristic IMAX run for her upcoming Narnia film. We would have assumed that Cregger, who’s got a ton of critical heat on him right now, and managed to turn a $40 million budget on Weapons into an extremely unlikely box office hit, would be getting similar “Hey, just make him happy” treatment—but, apparently, not so much.
