Rich Fiscus
12 Dec 2007 23:41
Paramount is going to be experimenting with Internet-based film distribution when they debut the new hour long movie 'Jackass 2.5' free with advertising on Blockbuster's recently purchased Movielink service.
Thomas Lesinski, prexy of Paramount Digital Media, said the third "Jackass" movie was never considered as anything but a straight-to-Web project. "We've developed a distribution model that's never been done before," he explained. "Our goal is to prove that there is an audience to watch content online."
Besides being a landmark for Paramount (or any major Hollywood studio), it's a chance for Blockbuster to show off what they can do with Movielink. Immediately after it was announced that Blockbuster was buying the service there was a lot of speculation that they wanted to use it to keep their Total Access subscription service competitive with rival Netflix's Watch Instantly Streaming service. Since that time Blockbuster has very publicly changed their strategy to focus more on the brick and mortar market they already dominate. This has lead to some question about their plans for Movielink.
Source: Variety