Beasts of No Nation - Cary Fukunaga, Idris Elba, Netflix, child soldiers

3 million views in North America alone.

It is worth sharing that this movie, in North America alone, has over 3 million views already. Which I think is a bigger audience than any specialty film could ever hope for in its first two weeks of release, and maybe for its entire run. And we’re just starting. We are just thrilled with the total audience reach of this film, not just in North America but the world. In the first week of release, Beasts Of No Nation was the most watched movie on Netflix, in every country we operate in. Even Japan, and I’m only calling out Japan because most specialty films don’t do very much of their box office outside the U.S. at all, let alone in Japan. Studios have trouble opening those movies in Japan. This was No. 1 in really diverse places in the world — Japan, Brazil, Mexico, places where these films typically never even open. It’s been incredibly gratifying to see these audiences respond to this film.

Anything that keeps Idris Elba acting is okay in my book.

I am enjoying the film, though I still have about 30 minutes to go. Real life has prevented a one time sitting.

I would definitely question that 3M statistic. Netflix definitely has a stake in the film’s success…Obviously Netflix is a great platform to get viewers, but was there any supporting stats? (did not see any in the article) Did the viewers really watch the film? Or did they just make the connection to load it? How many checked out in the first 10 minutes?

On my viewer it is both in the above the fold splash and they have put it high up in the “trending” and “new release” selections.

I suppose Netflix could be lying, but absent any other information, I’m going to assume they’re telling the truth.