Here’s Netflix CCO Bela Bajaria, speaking with Puck’s Matt Belloni in a wide-ranging and, quite frankly, tough as nails interview. Belloni really throws some heaters at Bajaria.
The topic of theatrical vs streaming is central to the Bajaria/Belloni conversation, and the Netflix CCO tries to defend the streamer’s defiance towards releasing their titles theatrically, to the point where she actually claims that Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” would have had just as big a cultural impact if it were a Netflix original.
We would have done an amazing qualifying run. So many people obviously would have watched it. It was a great movie. And I think it would have had that.
Bajaria, not to mention her boss Ted Sarandos, are willing to die on this hill. Yes, a Netflix “hit” movie gets watched by millions of people, but the cultural impact has always been fairly stagnant. Barely anyone talks about their “hit” movies.
If anything, Netflix has has had more of a cultural impact with their shows. Stuff like “Wednesday,” “Squid Game,” “Stranger Things,” and “Bridgerton” is proof that the streamer should be seen more as a TV network.
Bajaria goes on to deny that “everything theatrical is bigger and lasting,” and that if you’re a filmmaker who wants to make a movie, that “you want a lot of people to watch,” then Netflix is the place to be. David Fincher has been a vehement defender of the Netflix mantra, going as far as to claim that the streamer was “the future of cinema.”
Let’s pause for a moment and go straight to the Netflix charts. The #1 most watched film in Netflix history is “Red Notice,” starring Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot. You’d think that with the numbers it’s gotten (230M views) it would have become a cultural staple, but it hasn’t, instead it’s been relegated to dust, and barely anyone talks about it.
Quentin Tarantino recently offered an opinion on this very topic. He called out Netflix for making expensive blockbusters that made no real cultural impact after being unceremoniously released:
I mean, and I’m not picking on anybody, but apparently for Netflix, Ryan Reynolds has made $50 million on this movie and $50 million on that movie and $50 million on the next movie for them […] I don’t know what any of those movies are. I’ve never seen them. Have you? I haven’t ever talked to Ryan Reynolds’ agent, but his agent is like, ‘Well, it cost $50 million.’ Well, good for him that he’s making so much money. But those movies don’t exist in the zeitgeist. It’s almost like they don’t even exist.
You can counter Tarantino’s opinion by saying that nowadays very few movies, theatrical or streaming, hit the zeitgeist, Yet, has Netflix ever produced culturally significant films like “Barbie”? “Oppenheimer”? “Wicked”? “Top Gun: Maverick”? I can’t find any Netflix titles that match the impact these have had.
