Miramax reaches deal to put its films on Hulu
Miramax Films has signed a digital distribution agreement with online video distributor Hulu as part of an ongoing effort to generate more revenue from its library of more than 700 films.
Subscribers to Hulu’s premium service Hulu Plus, which costs $7.99 a month, will get access to hundreds of Miramax titles that will be added over the next few months. “Pulp Fiction” and 26 others were the first to be made available for streaming Wednesday. Miramax announced a similar deal last month to put its films on Netflix’s Internet streaming service.
Hulu will also make about 15 Miramax films available each month for free on the advertising-supported section of its website beginning later this month. That will be the first time that Miramax movies are available for viewing free online — legally that is.
Hulu has been looking to boost the number of movies on Hulu Plus in a bid to better compete with Netflix, Amazon.com and other digital distributors. Currently, Hulu Plus only has several hundred independently produced films, including classics from the Criterion Collection. It does not offer any recently made movies from big Hollywood studios as Netflix does, although its collection of television shows is more extensive.
Miramax, meanwhile, is pursuing a range of non-exclusive digital distribution deals in order to exploit the library of movies that a consortium of investors led by Colony Capital and construction magnate Ron Tutor acquired from Walt Disney Co. in December for $663 million. The catalog includes such Oscar-winning pictures as “Shakespeare in Love,” “The English Patient” and “Chicago.”
