Apple’s Best Picture win in 2022 for CODA, a family drama acquired at the 2021 Sundance Festival for $25 million, once resonated as a validating moment for streaming services’ flashy spending at film festivals.
Years later, the big picture regarding festival spend couldn’t be more different.
As reflected in Luminate Intelligence’s new State of Film Industry 2026 report, the flashiest sale throughout the 2025 fests came not from Apple or Netflix but instead boutique streamer Mubi.
A dual theatrical and SVOD player, Mubi shelled out $24 million for marriage drama Die My Love, starring Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson. That’s well over the reported $10 million Netflix spent on Train Dreams, a somber period piece about a lumberjack raising his family.
While Train Dreams is up for four Oscars next month, including Best Picture, its streaming performance hasn’t impressed so far. Luminate Streaming Viewership (M) data shows U.S. consumption of Train Dreams didn’t crack the top 50 original Netflix films streamed in 2025, as ranked by minutes watched.
That wasn’t the case for documentary The Perfect Neighbor, which was a viral sensation and the 18th most-viewed Netflix original film in 2025. Like Train Dreams, Netflix acquired The Perfect Neighbor at last year’s Sundance shortly after its premiere, albeit at half the price, and the documentary is also up for an Oscar.
It’s telling that Netflix has yet to nab any of the films or docs that were on the ticket at Sundance 2026 in January. While the streamer maintained its typical presence, theatrical distributors including A24 and Neon reportedly went home with films Netflix was circling, a sign it is reluctant to make use of its deep pockets.
Likewise, Apple has so far made only one small purchase this year, for a winter climbing documentary that played at Sundance. Its last significant festival deal, Flora and Son, failed to resonate with the awards circuit after Apple paid around $20 million for the family drama upon its Sundance premiere in 2023.
Meanwhile, Netflix’s homegrown Frankenstein remake from Guillermo del Toro, whose 2017 creature feature The Shape of Water won Best Picture, is up for nine Oscars and was equally popular with U.S. subscribers, taking the No. 8 spot for most-viewed original films on the streamer in 2025.
Like Mubi’s The Substance, Frankenstein was initially set up at Universal before migrating to Netflix. As for Die My Love, Mubi’s flashy purchase didn’t yield much. The film made just $5.5 million domestically and is snubbed entirely for this year’s Oscars, a far cry from The Substance’s box office haul and awards run, where it was nominated for five Oscars, with one win.
Other reported fest deals from last year, including Neon’s Together and A24’s Sorry, Baby, are notably without Oscar noms as well. That’s in stark contrast to Marty Supreme, which A24 self-produced as its most expensive film to date, at $70 million, before it brought the distributor its best performance at the box office. The film is up for as many Oscars as Frankenstein.
A Best Picture prize for Frankenstein would ultimately bring Netflix full circle from its many years of scouring the awards circuit for Oscar-worthy efforts — as well as remind boutique buyers their strategic festival deals may still face heavy competition from films outside of the festival circuit.
