For those of us trying to pinch a penny, or home bound due to “inclement weather,” after we have finished darning our socks, mending the broken farm tools and have watched the children play “will you stop touching me” for the 40 hundreth time, we want to watch a “good movie” but for many of us, our DVD libraries are usually woefully small.
Even in the advanced neighborhoods where the neighbors actually LIKE one another (you know, have bar-b-ques together, take one anothers’ kids to the pool, or wave when we see someone out at the mail box) swapping DVDs isn’t all that common.
There are those of us who watched as our college kids came home for the holidays with nifty ideas on how to save a buck on entertainment. We watched as they hooked up to OUR internet and spent the next 12 hours downloading one movie only to get half way through and, amid much groaning and swearing, to find out that our download speed was too slow and some glitch had prevented the process from completing.
Later, much to our horror, we watched as a television shows expose told us that we had been part of an act of piracy by allowing an “illegal” download to occur using our internet connection! Horror of horrors! Never again, we would vow. Actually, most of us would hardly be conscious of the fact if a download was taking place in the wee hours of the morning.
Zoom ahead a decade later and the scenario has changed, drastically. Websites now offer the viewer the opportunity to stream a movie, never having to download it to their device. Instantly watch a movie that is playing, right now, down at the movie theater. All one needs is DivX codec & player, or comparable, and you are ready to go. The download for one is free, if you don’t already have one and once you get it you can also use it if you buy a DVD from ZML and store it on your PC for viewing later.
Watch-Movies.net is a free site which, basically, is a giant catalog of all the sites that are streaming the movies that are currently in the theaters, around the world in all the major languages. Also streamed are hundreds of oldies but goodies. You can chose to register or not. Benefits of registering are no more advertising at the bottom of the page and when you first play the movie a pop up spam window wants you to take an IQ test or find a mate or some such spam. You cannot hit ignore button or get rid of this popup by any other means than just accepting it and then deleting it. After that you go right back to the opening window for the movie you selected. Open it wide screen and enjoy.
Movies range from Bedtime Stories and Gran Torino to Goonies or 1952’s High Noon. Independent movies and Foreign films to chose from galore. You can look through the selections based on genre or release date or search for a specific title. That can take a while because every five minutes the site updates, adding and deleting links to the sites that are hosting the movie. So far I have not had a bad experience with losing a movie partially through however I have read of viewers who have been asked to subscribe to MegaVideo with only 20 minutes left to go in their movie (MegaVideo being the host of the video).
If your trying to convince someone to go the online movie route and it is a hard sell your best bet is to allow the movie to buffer all the way through before hitting the play button. It will take a few extra minutes to do this but you will know a head of time whether or not the whole movie is going to be there for viewing.
Another option for those of us who just don’t have the extra bucks to spend $14.99-$22.99 on a DVD is to purchase it for $1.99 – $4.99 online and download it. At Z Movie Library http://www.zml.com/ a couple thousand plus movies are available for download in three different formats. Ipod, DivX and DVD burnable formats are all available for everything from 2009’s Ghost Town to 1925’s Ben Hur: A tale of the Christ and 1948’s Anna Karinina.
Z Movie Library (ZML.com) offers an easy-to-use website featuring thousands of movies — including the latest — that download superfast with high quality to personal computers, iPods or other handheld devices, or can be burned to DVD. Prices range from $2-$5 and there’s no DRM (digital rights management) so you’re free to do whatever you like with the movies. The debate is hot and heavy as to whether or not it is offering a legal product. SongBoom gives a decent review of ZML and walks you through the step by step process of registration and downloading the movie of your choice in the format of your choice.
Watch-Movies.net’s disclaimer states: Watch-Movies.net is absolutely legal and contain only links to other sites on the Internet : ( rapidshare.com, megaupload.com, megashare(s), mega, dailymotion.com, myspace.com, ouou.com, stage6.com, tudou.com, veoh.com, youku.com, youtube.com and others.. ) We do not host or upload any video, films, media files ( avi, mov, flv, mpg, mpeg, divx, dvd rip, mp3, mp4, torrent, ipod, psp ), watch-movies.net is not responsible for the accuracy, compliance, copyright, legality, decency, or any other aspect of the content of other linked sites. If you have any legal issues please contact appropriate media file owners / hosters.
The likelihood of lawsuit to closing down either of these sites is moderately low. According to CNET the big media companies aren’t sitting on their hands when it comes to Web. Several of the largest studios now offer catalog titles on Hulu, and Metro-Goldwyn Mayer recently posted a few films to YouTube.
Even though it was easier 10 years ago to download music than to download the huge digital movie files now, Atlantic Records just became the first label to see Internet sales equal that of CD sales and that benchmark took almost a decade to reach.
Watching from home will have to put a serious gouge in box office sales in order for Hollywood to put the time and money into closing these sites down. Complicating the situation is that these companies are often located in countries that don’t have enforceable copyright laws. If and when watching movies from home starts to put a serious dent in the pocketbook of the big media companies you can bet they will be offering incentives to websites such as Watch-Movies.net and ZML to work for them or set up competitive websites that will be financially beneficial to them.
Box office sales
Movie Title Distributor Weekend Gross Cumulative Gross
Marley & Me 20th Century Fox Distribution $24,050,000 $106,510,000
Bedtime Stories Buena Vista Pictures Distribution $20,317,000 $85,351,000
Case of Benjamin Button Paramount Pictures $18,400,000 $79,011,000
Valkyrie MGM Distribution Company $14,042,000 $60,692,000
Yes Man Warner Bros. Pictures Distribution $13,850,000 $79,413,000
Seven Pounds Sony Pictures Releasing $10,000,000 $60,038,000
The Tale of Despereaux Universal Pictures $7,020,000 $43,742,000
Doubt Miramax Films $5,031,000 $18,730,000
The Day…Earth Stood Still Fox Distribution $4,850,000 $74,299,000
Slumdog Millionaire Fox Searchlight Pictures $4,770,000 $28,779,000
Twilight Summit Entertainment, LLC $4,530,000 $176,815,000
Bolt Buena Vista Pictures Distribution $3,271,000 $109,897,000
Now, hurry up and get that movie streaming or downloaded before the next “weather event” takes the power away!
(NCO disclaimer: NorthCoastOregon.com does not endorse any illegal downloading nor copyright infringement. If in doubt of whether or not any activity is legal, check with appropriate authorities. This article is for entertainment purposes only and is not suggesting, recommending nor endorsing a course of action. Readers act at their own discretion and are responsible for their own actions.)
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