Digital technology and cinema

The rapid spread of the use of digital technologies for film-making and the very swift transition to digital projection in cinemas suggest that cinema is lagging behind. Yet this fails to reflect more profound upheavals in the industry concerning the chronology of media ecosystem. The various modes of film exploitation are all affected equally by the digital turn because they are all at the very core of the financing of cinema, and are therefore interdependent. Their articulation in time – the chronology of media – determines their respective weight. This transition is taking place in a context where each mode of exploitation is subject to profound trends: the need to renew the cinema experience, the extinction of physical video, the audiovisual crisis in the face of new media, the change of scale caused by digital technology, and the inflation of cinema or sports rights. The article seeks to unravel these underlying trends and identify the breaking points that occur in the French context. It hints at the beginnings of more significant changes beyond a peaceful digital turn.