Platforms, the virtual cinemas of the future beyond the pandemic - Lifestyle

It makes you smile to think back to a controversy of a couple of years ago: the Cannes ban on platforms, or the news on how many Netflix or Apple films awarded at the Oscars that now would no longer be news.

The pandemic has wiped out everything and today without virtual cinemas, the public would be orphaned of cinemas and the market would be in an even deeper crisis.

In one year the platforms have exploded and have thus established themselves in our lifestyle that they emerge like mushrooms, who can invent one from the super niche one perhaps linked to a festival, to the mini ones of downstairs cinemas, to the global super giants that have brought the challenges of the box office to the web.

Will they also be the future?

And how will they talk?

We asked some protagonists of the sector, with the distinctions of the case but with a single common denominator: there is no going back.

"Nothing will be the same again for cinema -

tells ANSA

- this acceleration of platforms translates into industrial growth with a consequent evolution of the market, less monotonous, more mature. When the platform will be complementary, it will become a visibility tool, physical room and virtual room will dialogue. It is then necessary to distinguish within the market between the platforms of those who also own the rights, such as Disney, from those of the operators who pay the rights but in any case the films find an audience that in theaters it is not certain that they would find and this also for the production and the directors is a new fact. Let's imagine a future of fewer films in theaters but with longer tenures because the crowds of releases at the cinema they will probably be a memory ".

The giants are

which just surpassed 100 million global subscribers in 16 months, Amazon Prime Video, Apple +.

Then there are Now by Sky, Timvision, RaiPlay (free), Chili, Rakuten, Infinity but in Italy, among others,

are still missing

.

To these video streaming platforms (not just cinema) have been added many other experiences loved by fans of the seventh art: first of all

which offers a billboard with a film a day, retrospectives, great classics and selections from festivals around the world. world, but also

with the history of cinema and the restored works, the newborn

(from the 'differently' independent distribution I Wonder focused on biopic but not only) and the two network expressions from the physical theaters born in these months of pandemic that is #Miocinema (an auteur cinema platform that focuses on the cinema and its audience) and #Iorestoinsala (a circuit of virtual quality theaters, whose cinematic offer is available online).

Today the latest addition:

from Nexodigital which wants to stand out for the diversity of the offer, not only cinematic but cultural in a broad sense and a 'hybrid' schedule that resembles the generalist programming of a TV channel.

"We have made an important investment -

tells ANSA

- for accessibility and because we want that when the situation is back to normal, the platform remains as a digital extension of auteur cinema. , without replacing the room but where you can find everything you expect at home from those who frequent our circuit, a platform with a precise identity. Meanwhile, we continue to enhance it: we have just taken the Romanian film that won the Golden Bear in Berlin ".

is convinced that "there will be no going back: the platforms - he comments to ANSA - will be the protagonists even when everything is reopened, the two are complementary. virtual will dialogue with the physical room, it will be one more opportunity for the public. Let's say it is the good fruit of the pandemic ".

Finally

"In the now vast sea of ​​platforms we have thought of an unprecedented project for Italy and which we hope to expand in Europe, a sort of cultural collector, based on a pact of trust with the public on Valuable content. The offer is now vast, extricating yourself is a business, being different, distinguishing yourself is fundamental. The hateful pandemic has improved digital literacy, has been an accelerator and we think that in the virtual and real future they will play a part. Nexo + we aim to be stimulating of cultural need ".