Steven Spielberg Slams Warner Bros, HBO Max For Throwing Filmmakers "Under The Bus" By "Relegating" Their Movies To Streaming

Steven Spielberg thinks that filmmakers were "thrown under the bus" by the pandemic.

The legendary director, 75, explained that while the Covid-19 crisis allowed streaming platforms to thrive when cinemas were closed during lockdown, moviemakers had some of their work "relegated" to services such as HBO Max.

He told The New York Times: "The pandemic created an opportunity for streaming platforms to raise their subscriptions to record-breaking levels and also throw some of my best filmmaker friends under the bus as their movies were unceremoniously not given theatrical releases. They were paid off and the films were suddenly relegated to, in this case, HBO Max. The case I’m talking about.”

In 2020, Warner Bros made the controverisal decision to release its 2021 line-up — including Dune, The Matrix Resurrections, and The Suicide Squad — on streaming platform HBO Max and in cinemas. 

The West Side Story director went on to explain that the pandemic was a catalyst for change and while the older generation of moviegoers may have initially been "relieved" that they did not have to make the trip to the cinema, they may now "miss" being in a social situation.

"I think older audiences were relieved that they didn’t have to step on sticky popcorn," he said. "But I really believe those same older audiences, once they got into the theatre, the magic of being in a social situation with a bunch of strangers is a tonic."

But Spielberg is not totally opposed to streaming. 

“I made The Post as a political statement about our times by reflecting the Nixon administration, and we thought that was an important reflection for a lot of people to understand what was happening to our country,” he said.

“I don’t know if I had been given that script post-pandemic whether I would have preferred to have made that film for Apple or Netflix and gone out to millions of people. Because the film had something to say to millions of people, and we were never going to get those millions of people into enough theatres to make that kind of difference. Things have changed enough to get me to say that to you.”

Spielberg's latest movie, The Fabelmans, opens in Singapore cinemas on Jan 19.

 — BANG SHOWBIZ

Photo: TPG News/Click Photos