ME's Tim Green reviews the latest releases at the wireless box office.
Eighteen months ago I took possession of a Nokia N95.
God, how futuristic that fat slider seemed back then. It came pre-loaded with the third Spider-Man movie, which was a nice extra, and a good opportunity to find out whether it's possible to sit through an entire film on mobile – even one with three clumsy plotlines and an unnecessarily long running time. Well, guess what? It certainly is possible to enjoy a film on a handset. Just not this one.
Since then the idea of movie viewing on mobile has ceased to be so outlandish. Needless to say the iPhone has lead the way: it's pretty common now to see iPhone owners shutting out the world to concentrate on the hilarious antics of Adam Sandler for 90 minutes.
So it was little surprise to see a dedicated mobile-led movie service announced this week. The fact that it came courtesy of Samsung may have raised eyebrows though. Unlike Nokia, Apple and Sony Ericsson, Samsung has not been remotely aggressive in the entertainment space. Sure it has its 'Fun Club' but the underlying message from Samsung has always been 'let's sell handsets and not compete with our partners'.
So why the Samsung Movies Store? Well, the firm believes the service can be employed by operators to drive customer acquisition and fight churn; three free movies and a sleek new Samsung Tocco Ultra Edition would tempt anyone, goes the logic.
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I say Samsung Tocco Ultra Edition because this will be the only device supported by the service at launch. The phone's 2.8-inch AMOLED touchscreen certainly does justice to the action. I've seen it, so I know. The Tocco is also an eagerly-awaited device and will undoubtedly be one of the year's best sellers.
But one handset? To get to the 500 or so movies on offer, you have to sideload them from the PC. And it's this online factor, I think, that explains the launch. Samsung has a good share of the laptop market, and a massive share of the TV market. Surely this is where the real potential is. Still, how strange that the launch is being positioned around mobile.
We'll watch this space carefully. Insiders tell me it's a matter of time before Nokia, Sony Ericsson and others stick their flags in the sand. It's risky for them all, as the basic concept of a content store tethered to one vendor remains unproven (unless it's Apple).
The Motorola movie store didn't last long, although I suppose the collapse of its handset sales may have played a part in the closure. I wonder if Apocalypse Now was in the library.
