Paul Thomas Anderson, Christopher Nolan, more sign open letter to save FilmStruck

Prominent filmmakers like Christopher Nolan, Paul Thomas Anderson, Guillermo Del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron, among others, have petitioned Warner Bros. Pictures Group chairman Toby Emmerich to rethink on the company's decision to pull the plug on FilmStruck.

FilmStruck, started in 2016, is a film streaming service from Turner Classic Movies which caters to cinephiles and focuses on rare, classic, foreign, arthouse, and independent cinema.

The filmmakers, joining the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and other top filmmakers such as Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Rian Johnson, Karyn Kusama, and Damien Chazelle, among others, have sent a letter to Emmerich to reconsider the decision, which WarnerMedia announced last month, reported Variety.

 

"The FilmStruck service was (IS) the best streaming service for fans of cinema of all kinds: classic studio movies, independent cinema, international treasures," the letter reads.

"Without it, the landscape for film fans and students of cinema is especially bleak. There's a reason there was a huge outpouring from artists and fans over it being shuttered, they were doing the Movie God's work," it added.

They said streaming service caters to "both satisfy older fans of cinema and a younger generation of cineastes that will be making amazing movies long after we're dead".

"In an era of huge corporate acquisitions of cinema by communication companies- in a business that may render billions of dollars off a medium like cinema, we believe this is a gesture that is needed- a minuscule show of goodwill towards the preservation and accessibility of a tradition and a rich history that would benefit the public," the letter read.

The open letter follows the viral online petition "Keep FilmStruck Alive", which has garnered over 50,000 signatures since launching in October.

The streaming service is set to discontinue from November 29.

The official signees also include: Ana Lily Amirpour, James Brolin, James Gray, Bill Hader, Barry Jenkins, Christopher McQuarrie, Reed Morano, Emma Thomas, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Barbara Streisand and Edgar Wright.