[anal_reactor]

Most people are completely fine watching a 720p x264 1GB version half a year after release. Sure, there are some purists who want as good image quality as possible as soon as possible, but that's a tiny minority. I think the actual motivation is that cinemas are becoming less and less relevant in the age of streaming, so they're doing anything they can to protect the little revenue they have, because the only way cinema can make money is to hype a movie to the moon, and then have it shown exclusively in cinemas for some period of time. But with streaming services investing in their own movies, the days of this distribution model are numbered. Having a cinema in 2025 is like having an internet cafe in 2010.

[yladiz]

This really downplays the cinema experience. Yes, many people are fine watching a movie at home while doing something else (the current Netflix model of filmmaking is precipitated on this), and others are fine to watch at home in general, but few people would truly say that their setup is close to what you get in a cinema. The screen is much bigger, the image quality is higher, and the sound system is much better as well, compared to anything short of an actual home cinema setup. It’s not the only reason of course, but it’s one of a few reasons cinemas still sell out for big films like Dune 2, and why people will go out of their way to go watch it in the cinema.

Streaming will never fully replace cinemas, even if it dramatically impacts their operating mode, and to argue otherwise is naive.

[anal_reactor]

> but few people would truly say that their setup is close to what you get in a cinema.

The opposite is also true. Few cinemas have a setup that imitates the comfort of watching something at home.