
Cannes Artistic Director Explains Netflix Competition Ban - cctt23
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/cannes-artistic-director-banning-netflix-competition-why-he-allowed-streaming-movies-last-year-1096800
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ggg9990
The entire purpose of Cannes is to showcase films which need distribution.
It’s pointless to show films there which have already secured distribution.
It’s worth noting that the films shown there can be and are purchased for
distribution by Netflix, Amazon, etc.

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mseebach
> The entire purpose of Cannes is to showcase films which need distribution

This seems like one of these things that were probably nominally true all
along, but that everybody were very happy to forget as Cannes became a super-
prestigious celebration of the art of cinema, but then gets dug up when it's
convenient to keep the arriviste on the outside.

I mean, if Cannes is just an industry trade show, it certainly isn't justified
that media from across the world (including public service media) sends their
top arts reviewers out at great expense?

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majewsky
Why would I not want to have media representatives (including public service
media) at an industry trade show? Things like "the newest trends from CES" are
generally considered newsworthy.

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majewsky
So as far as I understand, films submitted to the Cannes film festival must
have a theatrical release in France, and then French law forbids streaming for
36 months after the theatrical release.

I don't see why Netflix doesn't just submit a few of its own movies to Cannes,
then does a token theatrical release in one cinema in France somewhere (to
abide by the letter of the law), then prominently displays the movie in the
streaming catalog. But when a French person selects the movie, it just says:
"This movie is not available before $long_away_date because of
$stupid_french_law. By the way, this is the phone number of your
representative. Just saying."

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jogjayr
Is there a reason Netflix can't do a limited release in a few French theaters,
as many as necessary to satisfy the eligibility requirements? Or are they not
particularly concerned about being ineligible for the Palme d'Or? Which is
also a valid stance.

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azemetre
Cannes is mostly about having a venue for film makers to find distributors,
Netflix films already have a distributor (it's Netflix).

It's equivalent to asking why The Last Jedi or Black Panther aren't allowed to
enter the competition.

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dogma1138
Episode 3 was the opening film of the 2006 Cannes.

[https://www.theguardian.com/film/2005/feb/18/cannes2005.cann...](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2005/feb/18/cannes2005.cannesfilmfestival)

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kthejoker2
Netflix can show movies at Cannes, they just can't compete for the prizes.

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hereiskkb
Good cinema is good cinema no matter the release medium. This is making a
statement that people who release their art with a certain distribution outlet
and medium are somehow inferior. Deplorable.

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usrusr
Film art, good or bad, has no place at a sales event if it's already sold. It
simply isn't a quality statement. It would be like a wholly owned alphabet
subsidiary that doesn't need or take any investors trying to get into
ycombinator, or like an NFL team crying foul for not being allowed to compete
in the NCAA.

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moomin
The truth is, Netflix loves any publicity that associates them with high-
quality movies. Since the depressing truth is, most of their movie output is
just plain dull stuff, in contrast to their pretty great TV commissioning.

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crocal
I don’t think Netflix customers nor Netflix cares. The competition is a side
show to the real purpose of the festival, that is the professional event where
deals and contacts get made.

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kelukelugames
We should start a pool on how many years it will take for Cannes to accept
Netflix and other streaming sites.

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techsupporter
Side note: Could we, as submitters, please try a little harder to submit the
original source link instead of the reblogging link?

The linked article from The Verge is little more than pull quotes from the
full article by The Hollywood Reporter and the source link is provided in the
opening lede: [https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/cannes-artistic-
direc...](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/cannes-artistic-director-
banning-netflix-competition-why-he-allowed-streaming-movies-last-year-1096800)

The outlets that write the original report deserve our clicks and interaction
as much as (or, I'd argue, more than) the summarizers.

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rurban
Well, the original statement is here: [http://www.festival-
cannes.com/fr/infos-communiques/communiq...](http://www.festival-
cannes.com/fr/infos-communiques/communique/articles/communique-de-presse-du-
festival-de-cannes) in french, not in english.

And the original interview with Le Film Francais in which he explained it - in
french - is not even online. He hates online media and the internet. Hollywood
Reporter is just the most major copycat.

