Directed by True Detective’s Cary Fukunaga, the film stars Idris Elba as an African warlord who trains a young orphan to become a guerilla soldier and join his militia.
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If you thought releasing a film in theaters after it was already made available to 40-plus million people on streaming devices was a curious strategy, the numbers certainly seem to back it up.
Netflix content boss Ted Sarandos has said today that the original drama “Beasts of No Nation” has been streamed over 3 million times in 10 days since it was released, a huge number for an independent film.
Sarandos told Deadline Beasts of No Nation was, in the first week of release, the most watched movie on Netflix in all countries in which the service operates. While Netflix likely knew that Beasts had little chance to perform at the box office, the company had reason to believe that a theatrical release-even a limited one-would be part of a larger push to nab Netflix its first Oscar win. Netflix dropped Beasts of No Nation, its first feature film to date, over the weekend and unsurprisingly, people chose to click play rather than buy tickets.
More importantly for the company, Sarandos says the film has been popular in places like Japan and Brazil, where USA developed indie films are normally not popular in the slightest.
“It’s been incredibly gratifying to see these audiences respond to this film”. Studios have trouble opening those movies in Japan.
However, he said Netflix was planning to release the film theatrically in Africa, in Ghana and Nigeria. We can make it available and try to book it, but if theater owners don’t want to book it, they won’t book it. Whether it’s in a theater or at home, our focus is on the total audience of the film. We just want people to see and love this movie.
Netflix has 69 million monthly subscribers, 43 million of which are in the United States, in more than 50 countries around the world. But it is a very good experience, to watch a movie at home in 4k, in the comfort of your living room.
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Ultimately, the so-called feud between Netflix and theaters is overblown, said Sarandos, and consumers could care less. Tell us what you think in the comments.
