5 OTT Releases You Can’t Miss This Week

It’s a miracle that we just started April and there are already a few amazing releases to binge. This week, from 1st to 7th April, has a diverse range of movies and TV series to choose from. Add these to your next watchlist!

Parasyte: The Grey (5 April 2024) 

Based on the sci-fi horror manga, Parasyte by Hitoshi Iwaaki, Parasyte: The Grey is a South Korean live-action adaptation that strays away from the main plot of the manga. Long-time fans of the original manga might hesitate to watch the series. However, South Korean entertainment has a stronghold in the horror genre, especially when it comes to depicting supernatural monsters. Parasyte: The Grey is directed by Yeon Sang-ho, who previously created the famous zombie horror Train to Busan (2016). His style and writing have the creative potential to do Parasyte justice. 

Coming soon on Netflix

 

Ripley (4 April 2024) 

Ripley is a crime psychological thriller designed to keep you on the edge of your seat. Starring Andrew Scott as the titular character, this series is based on Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955). This will be a short and sweet 8-episode series about Tom Ripley (Scott) stepping into a life of deception, fraud and murder. 

Coming soon on Netflix

 

Farrey (5 April 2024) 

Initially released for theatre on 24 November 2023, Farrey is a thriller-heist film by Soumendra Padhi. This film is the official Indian remake of the Thai movie, Bad Genius (2017). Alizeh Agnihotri is stunning in her role, starring as the main character – Niyati. Some viewers have described the vibe as straight-up horror rather than a thriller so buckle in!

Finally releasing soon on Zee5!

 

How to Date Billy Walsh (5 April 2024) 

How To Date Billy Walsh is a fluffy British romantic-comedy, directed by Alex Pillai. It revolved around the childhood best friends, Amelia (Charithra Chandran) and Archie (Sebastian Croft), the latter of whom has a crush on her. When he plans to confess, Amelia falls for Billy Walsh (Tanner Buchanan). Archie plans to sabotage this new love but ends up comedically bringing them closer. If you want something light to watch, How to Date Billy Walsh is perfect. 

Coming soon on Amazon Prime Video! 

 

Star Trek: Discovery – Season 5 (4 April 2024) 

Originally piloted in 2017, Star Trek: Discovery is still going strong. This series follows the crew of USS Discovery, their journey beginning a decade before the events of the original Star Trek. You witness the fall and eventually rise of Michael Burnham, played by Sonequa Martin-Green, and her crew. Season 5 sets a more adventurous tone with their goal of finding an ancient power but they aren’t the only ones. Star Trek: Discovery is a great start to your Star Trek journey!

Back soon on Amazon Prime Video

Don’t Miss These Oscar-Nominated Films Already Streaming in India

The Oscars is an event for movie enthusiasts worldwide. On 11 March 2024, the 96th Academy Awards was held, and the selected films were among the strongest. Let’s explore which films were nominated (and won!) and where you can stream them. 

Barbie 

Now let’s get the obvious ones out of the way first. Greta Gerwig’s Barbie was the pinnacle of the 2024 movie culture and theatre-going experience. With pretty much everyone dressed in pastels to match the movie’s vibes, Barbie meant a lot to people with its message of feminism and freedom of expression. It resonated with a diverse demographic. 

Barbie (2023)

Where can you stream it? You can stream it on JioCinema or rent it on Amazon Prime for 149. 

Nominations received: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor – Ryan Gosling as Ken, Best Supporting Actress – America Ferrera as Gloria, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Production Design, Best Costume Design, Best Original Song – “I’m Just Ken” and “What Was I Made For?”

Oppenheimer 

Here’s the other half of Barbie. We all are familiar with Barbenheimer and Oppenheimer’s success was a blast. This is one of Christopher Nolan’s best films to date and another brilliant performance by Cillian Murphy that makes sitting through 3 hours of political and scientific jargon worth it. 

Oppenheimer (2023)

Where can you stream it? You can stream it on JioCinema or rent it on Amazon Prime for 119. 

Nominations received: Best Picture, Best Director – Christopher Nolan, Best Actor – Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer, Best Supporting Actor – Robert Downey Jr. as Lewis Strauss, Best Supporting Actress – Emily Blunt as Kitty Oppenheimer, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Production Design, Best Costume Design, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Sound, Best Original Score

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse 

The ambitious and thrilling animated movie revolving around what it means to be the Marvel superhero Spider-Man was the most visually attractive film in 2024. With the vibrant artistic styles and emotional storytelling, you could never go wrong with watching Across the Spider-Verse again. Weaving you right into their (spider) web sets the tone for the next instalment. 

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)

Where can you stream it? You can stream it on Netflix, or rent it on Amazon Prime or Zee5 for 99. 

Nominations received: Best Animated Feature. 

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar 

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar’s ensemble cast was a guaranteed winner by Wes Anderson. His ability to adapt Roahl Dahl’s stories is unmatched in the industry. Bringing out the weird and the wonderful of Dahl’s narratives is impressive and a well-deserved nomination. 

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (2023)

Where can you stream it? You can stream it on Netflix

Nominations received: Best Live-Action Short.

American Fiction 

In his directorial debut, Cord Jefferson based American Fiction on the 2001 novel Erasure by Percival Everett. It does justice to the satirical genre where the performances sold the story and the characters behind the mess of it all. 

American Fiction (2023)

Where can you stream it? You can stream it on Amazon Prime.

Nominations received: Best Picture, Best Actor – Jeffrey Wright as Dr. Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, Best Supporting Actor – Sterling K. Brown as Dr. Clifford “Cliff” Ellison, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score.

Past Lives 

A strong directorial debut, Celine Song’s beautiful and symbolic romantic film Past Lives made it big. The profound performances by every cast member and the incredible chemistry made it on par with Barbenheimer. Greta Lee, who plays Nora Moon, gained critical acclaim for her performance. 

Past Lives (2023)

Where can you watch it? You can watch it on Amazon Prime (Lionsgate subscription required). 

Nominations received: Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. 

Netflix’s Damsel: Subverting Expectations with Nothing

Damsel is Netflix’s latest fantasy film that didn’t quite hit their maximum potential. Directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, the movie starts by informing the viewers it isn’t the typical “damsel in distress” trope. For the most part, they kept their promise but at the cost of an inspiring ending. Their main selling point is that their leading lady, Elodie, is played by Millie Bobby Brown. Brown nails the role given to her in every way possible but it only makes the audience want more out of the movie. 

Elodie and Henry

Marriages and Rituals

Damsel follows the engagement of Elodie and Henry, played by Nick Robinson, after receiving a proposal from the Queen of Aurea and Henry’s mother, Queen Isabelle (Robin Wright). She and her family set course to Aurea to scope out the kingdom and also help their poverty-struck community. Henry and Elodie don’t hit it off right away until they discover their shared love for travel. However, not all seems rosy as Lady Bayford (Angela Bassett) instinctively feels something is off. 

Angela Bassett as Lady Bayford

Elodie, despite her stepmother’s advice, does not break off the engagement but everything takes a turn when she is deceived into a deadly ancient “ritual” deep in the mountains. It strikes a series of thrilling events where she has to successfully evade and survive against a dragon looking for her next sacrifice. The dragon is voiced by Shohreh Aghdashloo, whose deep, gravelly voice brings a hint of terror to the story. Brown’s performance is the saving grace of the movie’s overall lack of nuance. 

People praise the VFX of the dragon

So What Went Wrong?

The biggest criticism of the movie is that every aspect had wasted potential. The harsh environment could have been utilised more effectively or at least emphasised and explored. The characters deserved fleshed-out arcs with better chemistry. More than that, the ending of the film was predictable and boring. Brown’s performance was inspiring to young girls who need a strong leading female protagonist of their age. However, the overall message the ending conveys is nothing short of lazy. The poor writing choices and inability to fully employ the creative freedom the fantasy genre allows you are disappointing. 

How IOT AND OTT applications amount to Future Technologies?

Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and Amazon Prime Instant Video are just some of the clear examples of successful OTT content delivery services. DirectTV’s lucrative sports package and HBO’s popular Game of Thrones series are just some of the top OTT streaming content that can be streamed across multiple screens and portable devices. As Ott content is delivered over a broadband connection to the Internet, consumers also have more options.

The dramatic rise of nimble (OTT) content providers like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video challenges this dominance, reduces revenue, and threatens growth. Consider how OTT services have changed the way we consume television and the media in a very short space of time. If the network-wide and communications-wide transformation is to deliver anything, we could see a similar revolution with the arrival of over-the-top service providers (OTTs), a cocktail of innovative services, the widespread popularity of smart devices, and a hint of widespread and widely available broadband.

As network operators develop home technologies to unlock the low latency and high capacity of 5G, OTT providers and broadcasters will have the opportunity to offer their viewers services ranging from live sports, 4K and 360 videos, headcam recording, virtual reality, and other immersive experiences. Shortly, 5G is expected to disrupt the way we consume content and global OTT operators are aware of this well. It will pave the way for the fourth industrial revolution with high-speed wireless connectivity, AR and VR apps, autonomous vehicles, personalization based on consumer preferences, access to continuous health monitoring through IoT and Smart City devices, and the development of exciting and innovative services.

The Internet of Things ( IoT ) is an emerging network of smart devices and sensors including many everyday items that begin to send and receive data. New York, 2020 – Analysts predict that the Internet of Things will eventually connect 20 billion devices, and these devices will generate data that can be managed and analyzed. The Internet is part of a broader challenge to America’s network infrastructure, which is likely to see a surge in traffic, owing to the increasing use of virtual reality, machine learning, and other emerging data-intensive technologies.

The latest trend in the OTT video streaming arena is the introduction of the Internet of Things (IoT). In this scenario, OTT and video platform players compete with each other to increase their subscriber base through monetization to the IoT and since OTT enables data sharing between IoT devices and OTT services there is attractive potential. In a highly competitive OTT/video platform landscape, the skilled use of data is critical to success and requires the full deployment of technologies such as AI, machine learning, automation, and IoT.

The phenomenal growth of OTT applications is largely due to improved accessibility of content via high-speed Internet, the high-quality streaming capacity of devices, and advances in technology analysis and artificial intelligence. This outbreak has led to an increase in content consumption across devices, with consumers switching from using Amazon Fire Stick and Google Chromecast to the new era of smart TVs for OTT consumption. There are new monetization opportunities for existing networks and OTT service providers to take advantage of performance improvements and cost reductions.

While we use IoT (Internet of Things) technologies, consumers will use voice shopping in the future to maintain an effortless lifestyle. The first hurdle for OTT streaming is that other technology providers will continue to meet consumer expectations. The relationship between OTT service providers and network operators will be more akin to a merger and acquisition.

In recent years, major internet companies such as Google, Facebook, and Microsoft, as well as leading OTT content providers such as Netflix have heavily invested in infrastructure such as data center space and network capacity. Digital natives and OTT competitors can piggyback on this expansive infrastructure, including the last mile services that connect consumers to the content they want to see, and they can benefit from it in a variety of ways. In the Internet of Things (IoT), there are huge untapped opportunities to bring content to portable devices like this, Miller says.

The answer is to use the Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, and other self-service technologies to interact with customers on a personal level. The IoT is a hybrid network with optical fiber in new locations and many, many wireless connections, according to network infrastructure experts, which increases data capacity and coverage density with small cells and distributed antenna systems. OTT and IT mobile networks are not the only areas to be affected by the IoT.

Digital Home Services (DHS) combines emerging technologies such as Oracle, IoT, AI, mobile chatbots, and remote video to support advanced digital customer management and deliver the next-generation digital home services. Replay consists of pre-integrated OTT back-end components (CMS, SMS, OTT Middleware, engagement, usage analysis, content discovery, and ad tech solutions) together with world-class UI / UX design and application development to enable our customers to experience satisfaction and grow their business.

It changes the way we consume media, underpins the business case for new services, and offers attractive prices that reach end consumers. Market forces such as exponential growth in content and a realignment of distribution models are forcing a realignment and investigating how industry technologies such as AI, immersive reality, IoT, and 5G can be leveraged.

The FCC, major pay-TV providers, and technology startups are engaged in a multi-party dispute over the future of broadcasting television content via set-top boxes and TV app ecosystems. OTT is a media service or streaming media service offered to viewers via the Internet. The term over the top (OTT) refers to the provision of audio and video content to users over the Internet without subscribing to traditional satellite providers.

The integration of Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant into OTT platforms and streaming services will provide more user-friendly and easier search options for content, voice commands, and an enhanced customer experience through artificial intelligence. Part of the OTT model is generally an IoT experience that breaks the shackles that bind us to our old approach, with each iteration enriching the user experience and expanding the possibilities of the service.
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