Avengers was released overseas prior to the US release. A film like The Descendants was released 4 weeks early in NY/LA, and then foreign releases were only 6 weeks after the US release. That is insanely fast for a movie that could potentially have never made it out of NY/LA.

Besides, 6 weeks is still a long time in the age of instant global communication. Basically, all the hype and buzz surrounding a film starts well before the release and dramatically drops a week after. After a month, people have pretty much forgotten about it.

This hurts sales even without piracy, because the artificially created urgency (why do you thing so many people go see a movie in the opening week?) has gone.

There is no alternative for simultaneous release that doesn't hurt sales, piracy or not.

I also don't agree with your 6 month figure, but I'd be happy to be proven wrong. Release dates are widely published. Comedies tend to have the slowest rollout because it takes time to prove that the humor translates well. Even with comedies, I can't find anything where the wide US release is 6 months before foreign releases.

Who cares about theaters?

I haven't been in a movie theater in 5 years - it just doesn't appeal to me at all. And I know for a fact that many of my friends who used to be cinema-buffs don't care much anymore either.

We prefer to watch films in our home-cinemas now, on a big flatscreen or beamer.

Consequently we use the first release in watchable quality that we can get. And often that's from PirateBay. Not because we'd be unwilling to pay $9.99 for a HD movie on iTunes, but simply because most movies appear 6 months earlier on the torrents.

If iTunes launched in parallel with the theaters we would buy all movies.

I wish movie distribution was up to the standards we expect when buying music these days. Ditch DRM, just offer me the files and let me re-download them at any time via my account. Streaming is an option but for me bandwith is limited (speed, not volume) while harddisk space is cheap. Plus XBMC + Apple TV + NAS lets me build up my own film archive.

unfortunately and in contrast to the process of buying music we aren't there yet with movies.

I have a decent home-cinema system too (projector and all) but I still go and watch movies. The screen is so much bigger and brighter in theaters, it's not really the same experience. However, sound-wise, I agree a good home cinema system is unbeatable. You can sit right in the center, at the sweet spot to get all the effects right, something you cannot achieve often in theaters.

Luxury theatres are appearing. My small hometown (population something like 90,000) has one - big comfy seats, nice screens, good sound, lack of idiot customers, to-the-seat food and drink service.

(http://www.thescreeningrooms.co.uk/gallery)

If iTunes launched in parallel with the theaters, the PirateBay would have a pristine copy of all movies in the theaters. If you were a movie maker or a distributor, is something that you would do given the current marketplace? That strikes me as bat-shit crazy.

That being said, I think it would be best if the top 100 films had a global release, and were all available on iTunes globally 10-14 weeks later. Hollywood is forced to compete with the PirateBay. At some point, they are going to have to start selling on iTunes as soon as the pirates get a quality copy.

I personally love going to the movies, and frankly I think it is a bargain. I spend about $200/year on movie tickets and enjoy it most of the time, and I spend about $1000/year on broadway shows and fucking hate it the majority of the time. There is nothing that gives me the creeps more than when someone breaks into song for no apparent reason. I do love comedy clubs, and $5 admission plus two overpriced drinks is the best deal around.

When I have kids and move to the suburbs, my perspective will likely be identical to yours. I fully understand your perspective, and a I think hollywood would be well served to cater to the future myself.

Why go if you hate it so much?

It's really hit and miss, but most of the more major films lag by two to three months.

1 - http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A2%E3%83%99%E3%83%B3%E3%...

Oh no, they DO need the money, believe me. Most of their productions take years to just break even, and some never do. The reason why they are not actively pursuing international releases is linked to the way Japanese do business. Most of these media companies are very traditional and do not understand the opportunities outside of Japan. And even if they did, they'd need to get the approval of an old 社長 to proceed with such plans. This happens very rarely. They are missing a huge market.

Not true. Avengers is not even out in Japan yet. It wont be out until later summer (August). I can't believe they are delaying it for so long. And Japan is a BIG market for movies.

GOD you are damn right on this one. Dubbing studios in Japan are just horrible. Honestly i dont understand how Japan can both have excellent voice over studios for animation and extremely bad ones for western movies. There s something deeply wrong going on there.

http://singularityhub.com/2012/04/27/movie-theaters-ramp-up-...

Another part is translation. Though language barriers have been decreasing during the last two decades, they still exist, and most people prefer to watch movies in their native language, or at least have subtitles in a language they know well.

Various "fan groups" release subtitled versions of their favorite anime, and at least to some degree, this addresses the time delay of translation. More importantly, the entertainment industry has been slowly learning from the fan subbing groups. A good example would be the partnership between entertainment companies (read: investors) and groups like CrunchyRoll which does and distributes officially sanctioned, subtitled (re)releases a short time after the programs have originally aired.

http://www.crunchyroll.com/

Though the former could easily be considered just cost cutting, the latter is undoubtedly due to pressure from alternate distribution channels.

"I like both, but it doesn't matter what I think, as the last 35mm film camera rolled off the assembly line months back and most studios are ceasing print distribution altogether: first overseas, then domestically."

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/tcxgh/i_am_thekevin_sm...

But through more official channels, there's not much which can be done until rights-holders wise up. They have been and remain the core bottleneck.

The main reasons these movies take so long to distribute outside of North America has been because of local content & distribution rules for movies, risk assessment for success from distributors and, importantly, studios not wanting to spend extra money on new or extra reels when they can just use those from North America after a few months in overseas markets.

I disagree. They're intensely biased, they select only information that suits their agenda and they spin reports and statistics shamelessly.

That's not to say that they're entirely worthless as a news source but they do have to be treated as a mouthpiece.

Sometimes triangulation between propaganda artists points you at the truth. Or at least illuminates what each side prefers you not see.