Movies
Netflix and Sony Make Deal for Exclusive Streaming Window Beginning Next Year With ‘Morbius’
A big time deal has just been inked by Netflix and Sony Pictures Entertainment, Deadline reports, which will give Netflix exclusive streaming rights to Sony titles *after* theatrical and home entertainment releases. This pact begins next year, which kicks off with Sony’s release of the Jared Leto-starring Marvel vampire movie Morbius, currently dated for January 21, 2022.
The partnership will “provide Netflix with an 18-month exclusive window for Sony films.”
Deadline further explains, “The slate will kick off with tentpoles like Morbius, Uncharted, Where the Crawdads Sing and Bullet Train. Two subsequent windows will keep films circulating on Netflix as they reach other platforms across TV and streaming.”
No word yet on precisely how soon after theaters Sony’s movies will come to Netflix.
As part of the deal, Netflix will also be given the first crack at any Sony projects made for the streaming market, with Sony allowed to shop those projects elsewhere if Netflix passes. According to reports, several projects will indeed be made by Sony, exclusively for Netflix.
“Sony Pictures is a great partner and we are thrilled to expand our relationship through this forward-thinking agreement,” Netflix film chief Scott Stuber said today. “This not only allows us to bring their impressive slate of beloved film franchises and new IP to Netflix in the U.S., but it also establishes a new source of first run films for Netflix movie lovers worldwide.”
Theo James Krekis‘ short film Jealous People are Ugly People premiered earlier this year at SXSW and has since inspired a massive bidding war for its feature film expansion.
New Line Cinema has emerged victorious in the latest feeding frenzy over next-generation digital horror IP and its creators, Deadline reports.
Krekis will adapt Jealous People are Ugly People, directing from his own script.
In the short film, “Vasilly has become painfully jealous of his best friend, Luke. But things aren’t going so well for Luke. Every time he shares some good news, he starts to suffer from strange and violent repercussions. Disturbed by the uncanny timing, Vasilly recalls his Yiayia’s warnings about the Greek superstition of the evil eye – and starts to believe his own envy might be to blame for Luke’s bad luck.”
SXSW described the short film as ” a darkly comic psychological thriller about male jealousy, inherited superstition, and the corrosive power of repressed ambition.”
Jennifer Monks and Michelle Stein will produce the feature take alongside Isaac Klausner, John Fischer, Ben Levine and Ethan Cappello. Josh Mack and Lauren Botchan are overseeing for New Line.
Jealous People are Ugly People joins New Line’s upcoming horror slate that also includes Santiago Menghini’s The Revenge of La Llorona on February 26, 2027, and The Conjuring: First Communion on September 10, 2027.