“THEY WANT YOU TO MISS IT” — Matt Damon Exposes How Netflix Is Changing Movies 🚨K2

Netflix has played a large role in changing the movie industry in the past decade or so, and, according to Matt Damon, it wants to make even more changes.

The actor recently addressed how the streamer has tweaked the way films are made — specifically how plots are reiterated in their dialogue — now that so many viewers are watching them at home versus in a theater.

“I went to see One Battle After Another on IMAX — there’s nothing like that feeling,” Damon said, recalling a trip he took to the theater with his family while promoting The Rip, his new Netflix crime-thriller with longtime collaborator Ben Affleck, during an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience this week. “You’re in with, you know, a bunch of strangers, but people in your community, and you’re having this experience together. I always say it’s more like going to church — you show up at an appointed time. It doesn’t wait for you.”

Seeing a movie at home, however, is another story.

“You’re watching in a room, the lights are on, other shit’s going on, the kids are running around, the dogs are running around, whatever it is,” he continued. “It’s just a very different level of attention that you’re willing, or that you’re able, to give to it.”

That difference in viewing habits is why Netflix wants moviemakers to tell their stories another way, the actor-director said.

He added that the streamer pushes for a framing that reiterates “the plot three or four times in the dialogue because people are on their phones while they’re watching.”

“It’s going to really start to infringe on how we’re telling these stories,” Damon predicted.

However, Affleck, who co-founded the production company Artists Equity with Damon in 2022, pointed out that this method isn’t the only way for streaming-only releases to keep audiences tuned in.

“But then you look at Adolescence, and it didn’t do any of that s—,” Affleck said. “And it’s f—ing great. And it’s dark too. It’s tragic and intense. [It’s about] this guy who finds out his kid is accused of murder. There are long shots of the back of their heads. They get in the car, nobody says anything.”

While Damon said he thinks shows are the exception, Affleck asserted that the limited series’ success proves that streamers don’t have to spoon-feed viewers the plot to hold their attention.

“It demonstrates that you don’t need to do any of that s— to get people [to watch],” Affleck said, adding that he doesn’t think streaming poses an “existential threat” and that storytelling was bound to shift as circumstances resulted in fewer people going to theaters.

But Affleck maintained that theaters will never be obsolete: “People are still going to go to the movies because of what you said. It feels like a cool thing to do. I’m going to go see The Odyssey, I guarantee you, in a theater, no matter what.”