Christopher Nolan chooses Blu-Ray over Netflix for his movie watching

In an interview hosted by the Film Society of Lincoln Center, Dunkirk director Christopher Nolan has said that he “rarely” uses Netflix when watching films at home, as he prefers Blu-Ray over the streaming giant. While he didn’t elaborate on why, it’s interesting to hear about the viewing habits of one of our generation’s finest filmmakers.

Nolan is no stranger to criticizing Netflix, having previously taken issue with the distribution model that it follows. In an interview with IndieWire he said, “Netflix has a bizarre aversion to supporting theatrical films, they have this mindless policy of everything having to be simultaneously streamed and released, which is obviously an untenable model for theatrical presentation.”

As a filmmaker who creates theatrical films, he is understandably invested in the theatrical release model. He drew direct comparison to Netflix rival Amazon, highlighting that a streaming service doesn’t necessarily have to be at odds with theatrical distribution: “You can see that Amazon is very clearly happy to not make that same mistake,” he said. “The theaters have a 90-day window. It’s a perfectly usable model. It’s terrific”

You should feel small and humble

The director isn’t the first to side with theatrical presentation over Netflix. At the Cannes film festival in May, Spanish director Pedro Almodovar got into a heated debate with Will Smith over Netflix having films nominated for the Palme D’or prize saying, “The size of the screen should not be smaller than the chair you’re sitting on, you must be feel small and humble in front of the image.”

So for theatrical films, digital distribution is obviously threatening, but hearing that Nolan chooses not to watch Netflix at home has us asking further questions. Is it a case of the higher audio visual quality that you get from watching an Ultra HD Blu-Ray? Or is it perhaps just a continuation of his personal stance on Netflix that's driven him towards this decision?

While the number of 4K titles available on Netflix is still fairly limited, and access to the service is dependant on the bandwidth of the user, these limitations don't seem to be slowing down its progress. It recently announced that it has over 100 million subscribers.

It will be interesting to see whether Blu-Ray becomes a vinyl-like market, with a small pool of devoted purists still using the format, with a larger pool choosing the easier, while arguably worse quality, streaming option.