The war in Ukraine has dragged on for more than two months with millions of Ukrainians now refugees and several major cities destroyed after being shelled. Western countries immediately imposed economic sanctions on Russia with streaming platforms like Netflix suspending operations. In addition, the supply of films from the West was also stopped, causing cinema operators in Russia to suffer losses.
According to a report by The New York times, some stage operators in Russia are now starting to offer pirated Western films. Movies like The Batman, Turning Red and Don’t Look Up are among those screened.
In addition to offering pirated films, classic Russian, Indian and South Korean films are expected in bringing audiences back to the stage. However, the Russian Theater Owners Association said this would only account for about 10% of the collection compared to before the economic sanctions were imposed.
The Russian government has not yet taken any action on the stage of committing intellectual property infringement offenses in public. As long as economic sanctions are imposed, there is no reason the government will honor the agreement to respect intellectual property from the EU and the United States as a condition of joining the WTO in 2011.