After the COVID-19 pandemic forced Warner Bros to shift the release date of Wonder Woman 1984 last year, it became the studio's first big release to premiere simultaneously in theaters and on the new HBO Max. However, director Patty Jenkins has now made her dislike of such release models known and had some harsh words for direct-to-streaming releases.
Los Angeles Times reported Jenkins' comments during her appearance at CinemaCon, where she admitted that she isn't a fan of the day-and-date release plan despite feeling it was necessary in the case of Wonder Woman 1984. However, she also went on the criticize other streaming movies, saying, "All of the films that streaming services are putting out, I’m sorry, they look like fake movies to me. I don’t hear about them, I don’t read about them. It’s not working as a model for establishing legendary greatness."
RELATED: Patty Jenkins Had To Fight To Keep Wonder Woman's Greatest Scene
Jenkins went on to discuss the need for studios to give a diverse range of movies the chance of a theatrical release and lamented the fact that only the big titles seem to play on the big screens these days. The Wonder Woman director also pointed out the need for theaters to take more responsibility in delivering a proper cinematic experience, and she pointed to the dismal audio presentation as a common problem in modern theaters.
Jenkins' comments add to the ongoing conversation about the future of the theater industry and how streaming will affect it. Though it was already a point of discussion before the pandemic, the dire situation the theaters were put in during various lockdowns intensified these conversations. This summer box office has been particularly significant, with underperforming day-and-date releases like The Suicide Squad and studios viewing releases like Shang-Chi as "experiments."
Obviously, Jenkins is a very talented filmmaker, not only with the ground-breaking first Wonder Woman movie but also the Oscar-winning Monster. And though her opinions are valid, dubbing streaming releases as fake movies goes beyond her own feelings about streaming and is an unnecessary attack on filmmakers themselves. It is also hard to imagine how movies like Da Five Bloods and Marriage Story fit into her criticism.
However, her comments may also have been taken out of context, as there is an argument to be made that the streaming services need to do more to highlight their prestige releases. Jenkins' comments about maintaining and improving the theater-going experience should be agreeable to everyone, but the truth is that the future of the industry will likely look like a balance between movie theaters and streaming platforms.
Wonder Woman 1984 is now available on HBO Max.
MORE: The Next Wonder Woman Movie Should Move To The Future
Source: Los Angeles Times
