Hollywood’s attempt to get “Iron Man 2” out in foreign markets obsessed with the World Cup may have generated a huge box-office weekend for the superhero sequel but it’s also opened up another door–fans in the United States getting an early look at the film via file sharing sites.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, camcorder copies of the upcoming blockbuster have begun to crop on file sharing sites across the Internet.
However, distributor Paramount says that the leak probably won’t have a huge impact on this weekend’s domestic opening. Paramount says that the film is tracking to have a $150 million opening weekend based on Hollywood estimates.
And while the availability of the film on file sharing sites may not be a concern in the short term, it could be a concern in the long run. Hollywood has found that torrents of films do have an impact on the home theater market.
I disagree with that assessment. If you really want to own the film in pristine blu-ray format (with all the glorious extra features), a shaky camcorder copy has no appeal. If that sub-standard pirated movie ‘will’ suffice, then you were never going to buy the DVD film to begin with.
I would also suggest, that it may do the opposite. If you did not see it in the theater, and got the pirate, you may love it enough to want to own the better quality version.
You can spin this both ways and it makes equal sense either way.
I agree with Michael. According to the report by the GOA (General Accounting Office, a federal agency) piracy has had no quantifiable impact on Hollywood (http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-423).
Mike is dead on. Trust me: if you were willing to pirate the film, you were never gonna pay money to see it anyway, but if you pirate it and like it , you might *then* go and see it in cinemas or on DVD.