Monday Links: MovieBeam Sold, Blu-ray Interactivity, 'Journey' Dazzles in 3-D

- Can anyone explain this? An Indian company is buying Moviebeam, the movie-delivery-over-the-airwaves-set-top-box, for an undisclosed sum. They're promising to invest $100 million to re-start it, delivering both Hollywood and "ethnic" content to consumers. Moviebeam was started in 2005 by Disney, then re-started in 2006 with an assist from Cisco Systems and some other investors. Then it was sold to the Movie Gallery, a rental chain. Last December, it was shut down. Through it all, there has never been any word on how many customers Moviebeam has managed to acquire.

- Disney is experimenting with Blu-ray's interactive features in a new release of 'Sleeping Beauty,' according to the NY Times. Friends can chat with one another while viewing it separately, and the text will appear on the screen...or play trivia contests... or record video messages that will pop up during the movie. But these Internet-dependent features only work in a sub-set of Blu-ray players which support 'BD Live.'

- 'Journey to the Center of the Earth' wasn't the top new movie for this past weekend, but it performed quite well in theaters where it unspooled in 3-D, according to the NY Times. Brooks Barnes writes:

...[T]here were hints buried deeper in the box-office returns suggesting that 3-D is well on its way to becoming a force at multiplexes. Auditoriums screening the movie in 3-D sold more than three times as many tickets as those showing the standard version. About 57 percent of the total gross for “Journey to the Center of the Earth,” based on the classic Jules Verne tale, came from 3-D screenings.

In comparison, 3-D screenings of “Beowulf,” the computer-generated picture that opened last November, generated just 28 percent of its opening-weekend gross. (“Beowulf” was available in 3-D on slightly fewer screens.)

3-D in Asia ... Movie Gallery Heads for Bankruptcy Protection

- The Hollywood Reporter has a piece that focuses on the emerging market for 3-D screens in Asia. The two players doing the conversions (or hoping to) are Real D and IMAX. From the piece:

"Asia is somewhat in the same position as Europe is in," [Real D CEO Michael] Lewis said. "The digital business arrangements have not been worked out, and you are dealing with more indigenous content, which means that more of the digital projector has to be paid for by the exhibitors."

Lewis estimates that 3-D digital cinema installations include roughly 14 installations in Korea, 16 in Australia and three in Japan. Other sources put the number of 3-D screens in Korea, where chains like CGV and Lotte have led the transition, as high as 20.

There's also a passing mention of In-Three, a company that wants to "dimensionalize" conventional movies. They still haven't announced their first project, despite having launched in 2005. About time, guys?

- It's not a great time to be in the video store business. The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Movie Gallery (which owns Hollywood Video) is about to file for bankruptcy protection, hoping to emerge in early 2008. You'll recall that Movie Gallery bought the MovieBeam set-top box service back in March.

MovieBeam's Web site, interestingly, has been down for maintenance for almost two weeks. That must mean the service is doing really well. From the site: "Normal operation will return no later than the end of the day on Wednesday October 3rd."

Thursday links: Comcast and Fandango ... Drive-Ins at Home ... Movie Gallery and Moviebeam

- Comcast just bought Fandango, the movie ticketing site, and announced that they're going to try again to create some sort of cool new digital destination called Fancast.com, described in the NY Times piece as a site that will "allow users to watch on-demand shows via television, the Internet and wireless devices." It'll be up this summer. The Journal describes Fancast a bit differently, as "a national online destination that will allow consumers to search, discover and manage entertainment choices across multiple platforms including television, computers, DVDs and wireless services."

Either way, I'm sure it'll be stupendous. Remember Comcast's Ziddio, launched way back in November?

- Sweet NY Times piece on wealthy movie buffs who install drive-in size screens in their back yards. Joyce Wadler writes:

Feeling a little bored in the backyard with your pool, spa, outdoor kitchen, tennis court, fireplace and fire pit? Fear not. Outdoor video has landed. It’s been seen here and there in the last few years — a pop-up TV in the side of the hot tub, a video projection on an inflatable screen — but it’s been an outdoor novelty, the equivalent, perhaps, of Angelenos and their cellphones 15 years ago. But with such advances as weather-resistant television sets impervious to rain; good-quality low-cost video projectors and screens; and widescreen high-definition TV, as well as the general trend to move the indoors out, outdoor theater is gaining ground.

“It’s becoming more and more popular because the products are better and cheaper,” said Jeff Hoover, the president of Audio Advisors in West Palm Beach, Fla. “Instead of having to spend $10,000 or $15,000 for a projector, you can get a nice little $1,500 projector now that will make great 100-inch pictures. And now that there are large-panel TVs that are getting brighter and cheaper, people are starting to put outdoor theaters in patios that are mostly covered.

- I somehow missed the news last month that Movie Gallery, the video rental chain that also owns Hollywood Video, had purchased MovieBeam, a system that delivers movies over the air to a set-top box. MovieBeam had received about $48.5 million in funding last year from Disney, Cisco, Intel, and several venture capital firms. Seems like Movie Gallery is paying in the neighborhood of $10 million for MovieBeam (earlier CinemaTech coverage here), which makes it a phenomenally cheap bet for a bricks-and-mortar rental company to make on the digital future. Blockbuster has been talking for eons now about buying Movielink, an Internet-based service that doesn't require a set-top box or antenna, as MovieBeam did...