The entertainment industry has been going through massive shifts in the last few years as audiences choose to stay home to watch movies, and stream TV shows through services instead of through cable. Services like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime have ballooned into massive media giants, and now the latter is taking a big step forward in their goals of achieving world dominati – er – I mean, a larger marketability range.
According to sources who spoke with Reuters, Amazon Studios is has made the decision to migrate away from making and distributing smaller indie movies – like MANCHESTER BY THE SEA and THE BIG SICK – and focusing those resources towards movies with much larger budgets. This is all to expand their reach to a wider market base while getting those people to start subscribing to their Prime service.
In the past, acquiring movies like SICK and SEA may cost the studio anywhere around $5-10 million, and such movies would then get big award season pushes (SEA won two Oscars in 2017). But now Amazon is looking to focus on movies with budgets in the neighborhood of $50 million, although sources said they are still figuring out the exact price range Amazon is willing to aim for. Netflix has been doing something similar, and last month released their original movie – BRIGHT – which made for around $90 million in their foray into big-budget filmmaking.
But this does not mean Amazon will divert away from its massively successful TV projects. The TV division recently shelled a quarter of a billion dollars for the rights to make a LORD OF THE RINGS TV series, while just yesterday it was announced they were renewing THE TICK for season two. However, this news comes on the heels of Amazon canceling three of its series – JEAN-CLAUDE VAN JOHNSON, I LOVE DICK and ONE MISSISSIPPI.
Amazon has made a name for themselves by acquiring fantastic smaller films that earn tons of acclaim and have a major presence on the awards circuit. But given Amazon's quest to take over the world one could only expect they would eventually go down the route of blockbuster filmmaking. Hopefully, they don't ignore the little films that put them on the map. Movies like SICK. SEA, THE LOST CITY OF Z, PATERSON and more need studios with enough reach and industry clout in order to be seen by the largest possible audience. Some of these movies can be hits for Amazon Studios, so it seems unwise to ignore other small films in favor of big-budget flicks that could flounder. The world would be a better place with more movies like THE BIG SICK around.