The highly anticipated Kangana Ranaut starring biographical drama, ‘Thalaivii’, released on Netflix earlier today. Since the movie was released on Netflix, this South-Indian movie gets a much needed International release, especially after its atrocious box office numbers. However, one country seems to not fall in the “International market” for Thalaivii and surprisingly it is the US. Even though Netflix is an American company, the streaming service conglomerate have not released this on-demand Jayalalithaa biopic within its home country. And now, a lot of Netflix users in the US are in an uproar.
ZEE5 Entertainment and The Walt Disney Company have understood the value of their Indian and Indian-American audience in the US (and Indian content-viewers) and usually release their latest films and TV shows alongside its Indian release. Netflix, however, did not release the movie in the US – and what’s more, this “non-release” has enabled the piracy of Thalaivii – the one thing streaming platforms struggle to fight against. Because Thalaivii haven’t released on Netflix in the USA but the movie is still available in other countries, people are downloading the pirated HD versions of the film within the US. An unfortunate blunder.
Of course, usually there could be many reasons why Thalaivii didn’t release on Netflix in the US – different countries could have different release timings (or release dates) or maybe Netflix didn’t get the streaming rights to release the biopic in the US. Still, this could cause many Indian and Indian American subscribers to be less excited about having a Netflix subscription. The OTT platform has been facing stiff competition as of late and setbacks like these are enough for Netflix to lose subscribers.
Thalaivii is currently available for streaming on Netflix in India. For you guys in the US, follow us on Twitter if you want to know when and where Thalaivii will stream in your country.
We’re hiring!
We are hiring two full-time junior to mid-level writers with the option to work remotely. You need to work a 5-hour shift and be available to write. Interested candidates should email their sample articles to [email protected]. Applications without a sample article will not be considered.
