11/05/2011

As the Marche du Film gets underway, Denmark’s Zentropa has announced the launch of an in-house Video On Demand arm, making it the first production company in the world to have its own VOD service.

Zentropa on Demand will launch on May 18, granting access to the entire Zentropa catalogue, which ranges from Lars von Trier's debut film, Element of Crime, from 1984 to last year's Academy Award-winning movie In a Better World [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2010) by Susanne Bier.

Users will also be able to access films by some of the most successful Danish directors, including Per Fly, Niels Arden Oplev, Annette K. Olesen, Kristian Levring, Lone Scherfig and Thomas Vinterberg.

Prices will be €3 for catalogue titles, €4 for new releases and €1 for TV series and short films. Users of Zentropa on Demand will also get exclusive access to films that have never been released on DVD; rare short films and non-published extra-material from the archives; as well as the TV series The Kingdom (1994-1997) and Performances (2007) by Per Fly.

Zentropa has since its establishment in 1992 been big on innovation. The company initiated the Dogme95 concept and has been awarded at the Cannes and Berlin film festivals and the Academy Awards.

“Zentropa has experienced enormous interest from fans all over the world but the costs of distributing films via traditional media have made it difficult to meet the demand until now,” the company said in a statement.