Gerwig triumphs: Netflix agrees to cinema release for Narnia
Greta Gerwig, the director of "Barbie", a film that earned record-breaking sums at the cinema, threatened Netflix with abandoning her next project for the streaming giant if they did not show her film in theatres. And what happened? She succeeded.
This concerns the new adaptation of "The Chronicles of Narnia" based on C.S. Lewis's prose. The first film adaptation of this series began in 2005 with "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" and was intended exclusively for theatrical distribution.
Meanwhile, Netflix planned to release Gerwig's film solely on its platform. However, Gerwig insisted that the movie be shown at least in a limited scope on the big screen. Apparently, she threatened to abandon the project if she didn’t get her way.
This conflict is quite telling for today’s cinematography. Since the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns, cinema owners have been counting losses. Audiences receive new films right after the theatrical release or skip them altogether. The pattern of audience behaviour has changed; they now prefer watching movies at home from the comfort of their sofa. However, there are still creators who want to reverse this trend.
Let's also remember the important Oscar rule: for a film to be nominated, it must have a theatrical distribution.
Gerwig vs. Netflix: 1-0
It seems Greta managed to achieve something that seemed impossible: she persuaded the VOD giant to bend its business model for her film. She certainly had a strong position for such negotiations. After all, she is an artist nominated for an Oscar four times and the director of a box office hit in 2023.
The film's cast is being assembled, and among the potential stars is Saoirse Ronan, a regular collaborator of Gerwig. However, this information has not been officially confirmed by Netflix or Gerwig's team.
If Gerwig's "The Chronicles of Narnia" first appears in cinemas (it’s rumoured to be on the IMAX network), it will fit into a new trend among streaming platforms. Films like Martin Scorsese's "Killers of the Flower Moon" or Rian Johnson's "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery" had limited theatrical releases before debuting on Apple TV+ and Netflix.
