Do they have those rights?

Film Because we all have our own addiction, because I can never have enough film, I'm still receiving shiny discs by post and maintain subscriptions to both Amazon Prime and Netflix. Something which is becoming an increasingly nefarious problem is navigating who has the rights to films from which companies, the reason being that all too often I've received a film by disc only to have it turn up on Netflix a week later (Frances Ha) which, now that I'm only receiving two discs at a time through the mail is a bit of a waste.

In an ideal world I'd simply cancel the dvds (finally!) but thanks to the segmentation of services and the Murdoch exclusivity problem, some films don't appear on other services at all or for at least a couple of years. Plus back catalogue is all over the place. After the Century of Chinese Cinema season, I'm planning to work my way through all of Bergman finally and not all of his work is available to stream. Studio Gibli doesn't appear on either services. Disney is patchy.  Oh and some of the Amazon Prime streams slightly ropey old dvd masters.

With that in mind I'm going to start compiling an ad-hoc list of companies I think have been carved up between Amazon Prime UK and Netflix on the assumption that if a film is from any of these companies I needn't add them to my by-post list. I'm posting the list here for easy access / editing. Just to add: these are the studio names as utilised by the database on "Lovefilm".  Plus, this is for pre-release.  If it's been released and isn't on the relevant streaming service, it's probably been and gone.

I've also noticed the odd StudioCanal thing turning up on Netflix after its first run on Amazon Prime, but I'm sticking with first run here.  Some back catalogue for Lionsgate and Disney turns up on both services simultaneously too.  Plus quite often, once its dropped from one of these services I'm back to shiny disc again.  Also just to confuse things, the same company's films can be split between the two depending on who which theatrical label they used.  E1 Momentum's stuff is at Netflix, just E1 is at Amazon Prime UK.  Blaawhhehh.

Netflix

Arrow Films (six months)
Artificial Eye (six months)
Brit Doc Films (near simultaneous)
Buena Vista International (not on Lovefilm)
Curzon Film World
Dogwoof Digital
Elevation Sales (not Anchor Bay) (including Chelsea Films)
Fusion Media Sales (four months?)
Independent Films
Kaleidoscope Entertainment (six months?)
Kotch Media (six months)
Lace Group
Lionsgate
New Wave (about eighteen months)
Masters of Cinema (new releases)
Metrodome (four months)
Momentum Pictures (six months?)
Paramount Home Entertainment (unclear - three to six months? A year?)
Universal (Vertigo)

Amazon Prime UK

Entertainment One
Lionsgate (Television only?)
Momentum Pictures
Showbox Media Entertainment / CineAsia
StudioCanal
Twentieth Century Fox (big delay possibly as long as eighteen months available for about six months)
Universal Pictures (big delay?) (also actually Universal Home Entertainment)
Warner Home Video (big delay?)

Elsewhere (only available by post)

Axiom Films
BFI
Entertainment on Film/Video
Network
Optimum
Peccadillo
Revolver Entertainment
Third Window Films
Universal Pictures (The Works)

I'll keep updating this with more information as and when.  You can hardly wait.  It is hard to keep an eye on because the studio name on Lovefilm's database doesn't always reflect the actual studio or has variety of synonyms (Entertainment One, E1 Entertainment, E One Ltd etc).

Plus some of these are under advisement thanks to release windows and the like (checkable by comparing adding dates on the streaming service to the availability date on the rental service).  Warner and Disney take an age to get to the Prime, so it's up to the viewer as to how quickly they need to see Dream House and such.  I'll try to add some accurate data on how quickly after the shiny disc release these as I can.

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