Once the movie theater chains refused to screen the movie, Sony had no choice but to cancel the December 25th theatrical release of The Interview. So what happens next?
Sony Pictures Entertainment has officially cancelled the theatrical release of The Interview. After a deluge of major theater chains, including AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc., Regal Entertainment Group, and Carmike Cinemas Inc., made public their decision not to screen the Seth Rogen/James Franco comedy as intended starting on Christmas Day, the die was cast and the game was over. Yes, the American film industry as a whole, including rival studios who weren't thrilled about their big Christmas releases like Into the Woods, The Gambler, and Unbroken being jeopardized over a $44 million R-rated comedy, seemingly caved to the theoretical and highly improbable demands of a group of cyber-terrorists who are seemingly in-fact connected to the North Korea. Yes, the bad guys won. Those of us who were lucky enough to see The Interview at the first press screenings may well be the only outside-the-industry people to see the film for a very long time, which is frankly a bizarre situation. So now what happens now?
First of all, as much as we'd like to say that Sony should have be "brave" or "stood up to terrorists," they can't very well execute a theatrical release of a major motion picture if there are no theater chains willing to show the film. Once the threats were broadcast, Sony had little choice but to basically let the theaters off the hook for legal reasons. If the film played next week as planned and something did occur, either an actual attack by whomever the hell "Guardians of Peace" are or by some copycat with an eye towards instant fame, Sony had to be in a position of saying that they did not force or pressure theater chains to carry the film. Conversely, the theater chains had to weigh the likelihood of an actual incident occurring with the potential massive losses over a crucial year-end box office frame for the sake of a small-scale comedy feature. If I may be blunt, the nightmare scenario for the industry was the idea of children being harmed or killed at a movie theater while seeing Disney's fairy tale adventure Into the Woods on Christmas Day because a theater two-doors down was showing The Interview.
Once Carmike opted out, the theoretical liability for the remaining chains actually increased both by virtue of increasing the likelihood of being targeted as well as the notion that other parties had "taken action" to deal with said threat while the other chains had not. Once the first domino fell, the rest were inevitable. And once the theaters bowed out, there was no reason or option for Sony to be "brave." Sadly, the choice to cancel The Interview actually caused Sony's stock to rise 4.8% at the end of trading yesterday, but that's another discussion. All of this brings us back to "So what happens now?" Well, there are a number of possibilities, none of which I can vouch for beyond educated speculation. And for the record, as of Wednesday night Sony has stated that they have no plans to do anything at all with The Interview. But assuming they don't want to just lock up a completely finished film in a vault, what are their options?
It is possible that Sony will merely slot The Interview for a later release date next year, which will the situation time to cool down while theoretically giving authorities further time to catch the hackers and/or those who made the threats in question. They can just release the film as a straight-to-DVD title, which of course might be more appealing if the studios hadn't basically destroyed the DVD market via a rush to Video on Demand streaming services. Selling to another distributor is an option, as Lions Gate Entertainment made a name for itself via controversial films (Dogma, Fahrenheit 9/11) that Harvey Weinstein wasn't able to distribute while he worked under Walt Disney. The producers and the distributors can eat the $44 million production budget and marketing expenses and chalk it up to an unfortunate circumstance that is unlikely to be duplicated again in the future. Truth be told, considering the damage done by the hack itself and the overall terror in the industry right now, the fate of The Interview doesn't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. But the so-called best case scenario, both for Sony and for the rest of the studios, is for Sony to release The Interview as a Video on Demand title in the very near future.
Sony has claimed that they won't be doing this as of now, but while I take them at their word it would provide a weirdly ironic opportunity amid the chaos. The irony of a future VOD release is that it gives Sony and Hollywood as a whole an excuse to try something that they've wanted to do for around ten years, which is to release a smaller-scale major-studio release on Video on Demand. The theaters have long balked at such a thing as a day-and-date theater/VOD release for obvious reasons. Universal (Comcast Corp.) scuttled plans to offer a $60 VOD rental of Tower Heist which would have begun just three weeks after its theatrical release. If the theaters are not willing to carry The Interview, Sony now has the perfect chance to test out the notion of releasing big budget motion pictures outside of the conventional distribution model. If the film ends up making substantial profits, and who is to say that the controversy won't turn the film into a kind of "must see it for myself" forbidden fruit, then Sony will have sidestepped their way into theatrical day-and-date theatrical/VOD distribution models.
One thing I would argue they should not do is give the film away for free or for charitable donations. It's been suggested that Sony give away the movie as a form of social protest. Even former Governor Mitt Romney suggested as much on Twitter last night, stating that Sony should offer the film for free with the option to donate towards Ebola research and containment. It's a potent idea and a positive suggestion. But the problem is that giving the film away still means that Sony loses money on the picture, which in turn still means that Sony has been financially punished by virtue of making the film in the first place. As odd as this may sound, for the sake of preventing situations like this from occurring again and/or preventing studios from thinking twice about green-lighting potentially controversial material in the future, it is frankly in everyone's best interest that Sony eventually at least break even with The Interview.
This whole situation is tragic, from the initial hack and the glee in which the media treating stolen gossip as breaking news to the current situation in which a major motion picture has been removed from theaters due to fears of violent retribution. The precedent this could set is mind-boggling. We can talk about studios being afraid to green-light any remotely challenging or controversial projects for fear of anonymous threats and actual cyber-attacks. We can talk about any film involving a volatile social issue being at the mercy of a fringe member of the opposing side calling in a bomb scare. We can talk about the fact that the studios and theaters probably decided that a smaller film like The Interview wasn't worth sacrificing the Christmas/New Year’s box office booty and then wonder what happens when the next threatened film is something on the scale of Star Wars: The Force Awakens or Batman V Superman. Actually, I would imagine such a threat against such a major film would likely be the end of this tactic, as such a major film would have to move forward and thus the bluff would likely be called.
But in truth this situation is so unprecedented that we have no idea what the long-term fall-out will be, which is arguably the scariest part of all. An American motion picture has been pulled from theatrical release due to outside terroristic threats that may-well have emanated from a foreign government. So yes this is a sad day for American movies. It is sad because the movie theaters pulled the plug on the film even though the threats were likely a bluff and it is sad because I don't entirely fault them for doing so. I don't know what the future holds for The Interview or the industry at large in the wake of this disaster. There are no heroes in this story, only villains and victims. It is tempting to howl at the sky and claim that the powers that be should have stood up to theoretical threats even as doing so would have put not themselves but others in danger. We got beat today. It doesn't mean we have to like it, but it does mean we have to live with it.
