Anything to pad your wallet on 'Redacted,' eh, De Palma?
Brian De Palma's one-man anti-war mission and big-screen gang-rape epic "Redacted" opens in theaters today, and will be met with protesters tonight, 6 p.m. at Laemmle's Sunset 5 Theater at Sunset and Crescent Heights in Hollywood.
But did you know that it's already on the small screen -- for a price? They’re simultaneously offering this movie on Charter On Demand cable in the L.A. area right now. I stumbled across it while looking for “Knocked Up” earlier. “Redacted” has its own special little category called “Pre-Theatrical Run,” and costs a whopping $9.99 to rent for 24 hours (new releases run $3.99).
Being as in love with On Demand stations as I am, this is the first time I've seen a simultaneous release there. Not to mention for more than a matinee ticket. Does this mean Charter's going to offer other advance screenings besides De Palma propaganda? I missed the After Dark Horror Fest this past week -- will they offer those films right now on On Demand? Or do the ghouls and vampires need to protest the Iraq war first?
Actually, this is a variation on something that Mark Cuban (one of the film's producers) has tried a couple of times in the past, once with the Steven Soderbergh low-budget movie "Bubble:" Releasing a movie on multiple platforms simultaneously. If memory serves, "Bubble" debuted on HDNet, in theaters and on DVD all on the same day.
(And I believe "Redacted" also premiered on HDNet's movie channel a couple of days ago.) So it's not really a political gambit, just a marketing one.