With the backing of five Hollywood studios, Movies Anywhere lets you watch titles from Amazon, Google Play, iTunes and Vudu. Netflix, you’ve been warned.
Watch out Netflix and Hulu: There’s a new streaming service in town. And it could have everything movie and TV fans want.
Launching Oct. 12, Movies Anywhere (previously Disney Movies Anywhere launched in 2014) is a new all-in-one service that will bring some of the world’s biggest movie studios and digital streaming platforms together into the one platform, meaning US viewers can watch content bought from multiple services through the one app.
Using the free app or website, viewers will be able to connect their Amazon Video, Google Play, iTunes and Vudu accounts to Movies Anywhere and then flick between every title bought or redeemed on those services, all within the Movies Anywhere Platform.
The app will work on iOS and Android devices, Amazon Fire devices, Apple TV, Android TV, Chromecast and Roku devices, as well as in browser, and Movies Anywhere says more platforms and retailers are still to come.
We’re yet to go hands-on with Movies Anywhere — stay tuned to CNET to get our first impressions Thursday — but already there’s an impressive list of Hollywood studios on board with the new service.
That means Movies Anywhere will have films from Sony Pictures Entertainment, The Walt Disney Studios (including titles from Disney, Pixar, Marvel Studios and Lucasfilm), Twentieth Century Fox Film, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros. Entertainment.
But you’re out of luck if you want to watch » House of Cards » or » The Handmaid’s Tale » from launch. Netflix and Hulu are the most notable names left off the list of digital services compatible with Movies Anywhere.
Consider the battle lines drawn.
The major Hollywood powerhouses have come out to support the new service, but there’s one company at the front of the pack.
Walt Disney Studios senior vice president and former general manager of Disney Movies Anywhere, Karin Gilford, has been charged with leading the project as Movies Anywhere’s general manager. According to a statement, Gilford will lead an independent «cross-functional team of product, technology, marketing and other professionals» as part of the project.
Gilford described Movies Anywhere as «a virtual one-stop movie-watching shop» and a massive step forward for consumers wanting to access digital movies and TV.
«Consumers never have to remember where they purchased a film or which device they can watch it on, because all of their eligible movies will be centralized within their Movies Anywhere library and available across platforms through the Movies Anywhere app and website and also available at their connected digital retailers.»
The likes of Netflix and Hulu have long held pride of place in the digital media landscape, but there are signs that the world order is changing. In August, the Walt Disney Company announced it would be pulling its titles from Netflix by 2018 (including flagship Marvel and Star Wars titles) to start its own streaming service the following year.
And there’s the rub. While Netflix and Hulu have reduced their reliance on outside studios by creating their own Originals in-house — like » Stranger Things » or «The Handmaid’s Tale» — there’s no doubt big names like Disney, Sony and Universal still produce a great deal of the titles viewers want to watch.
That’s where services like Movies Anywhere could rise to the top. Your average movie buff doesn’t want to know about the machinations of studios and streaming services — they just want the latest blockbusters in one place. By securing the buy-in of major studios as well as digital retailers, Movies Anywhere could soon be the one-stop-shop for viewers, giving them what they want, where and when they want it.
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There’s a game changer when it comes to buying movies online, and it involves most of the top players.
Buying movies through different services just got a lot less complicated thanks to a new ‘Movies Anywhere’ initiative that combines your splintered film library.
This means you’ll now have access to a single library of movies if you bought them through Google Play, Amazon, iTunes and Vudu across all of your devices. All it takes it downloading the Movies Anywhere app or logging into the website.
This solves a painful issue in which you’d download a movie to a platform like Amazon, for example, and then realize that you can’t easily watch it on a TV or set-top that doesn’t have the app (like Amazon TV 4K at the moment).
Having one place for almost all of your movies sounds much more consumer friendly, and it currently involves major studios like Disney, Fox, Sony Pictures, Universal and Warner Bros.
Previously Disney had its Ultraviolet program that worked much the same way. Now, with a total of five key studios backing the same idea, it’s going to become the norm, not the exception.
To start things out. Google and other services are offering five free movies so you can test out the expanded Movies Anywhere service.
All you need to do is connect two or more accounts through the Movies Anywhere app in order to download these movies for free.
This single-library strategy is a nice incentive for consumers who may be wary of buying movies because they’re siloed to one platform and one account.
Starting today, with Movies Anywhere and thanks to the benefits of Family Sharing, online movie purchases don’t seem so limiting.

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The heir to South Korea’s Samsung Group appeared in a packed court on Thursday for the first day of arguments in the appeal of his five-year jail term for corruption.
SEOUL (Reuters) — The heir to South Korea’s Samsung Group appeared in a packed court on Thursday for the first day of arguments in the appeal of his five-year jail term for corruption.
The 49-year-old Jay Y. Lee was convicted by a lower court in August of bribing former president Park Geun-hye to help strengthen his control of the crown jewel in the conglomerate, Samsung Electronics, one of the world’s biggest technology companies.
The appellate court hearing the appeal is likely to try to rule on the case by next February, legal experts said. Whichever side loses could take the case to the Supreme Court, the final court of appeal in South Korea.
Lee’s presence marked his first public appearance since the August ruling. He did not speak during the early proceedings other than giving his birth date and address.
The lower court in August had ruled that while Lee never asked for Park’s help directly, the fact that a 2015 merger of two Samsung affiliates did help cement Lee’s control over Samsung Electronics “implied” he was asking for the president’s help to strengthen his control of the firm.
The defense strongly challenged the lower court’s logic that Lee’s actions “implied” solicitation for help from Park by providing financial support for the former president’s close friend and confidante Choi Soon-sil.
The prosecution, which has lodged a cross-appeal against the lower court ruling that found Lee innocent on some charges, said the court’s decision to not acknowledge explicit solicitation for Park’s help from Samsung despite the evidence found “did not make sense”. DEFENSE FIGHTS BACK
The defense, which spent much of its time during the initial trial refuting the prosecution’s individual charges, is expected to focus on a few key arguments in the appeal — including whether there was in fact an “ordinary type of bribery” as defined under South Korean law, which says only civil servants come under the statute.
Park’s friend Choi was not a civil servant.
The lower court found that Samsung’s financial support of 7.2 billion won ($6.27 million) to sponsor the equestrian career of Choi’s daughter constituted an ordinary type of bribery, as “it can be considered the same as she (Park) herself receiving it.”
The defense is expected to strongly challenge this by saying that the prosecution, on whom the burden of proof lies, has not proved collusion between Park and Choi.

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