Recently Film Wallet Premium Video-On-Demand (Film Wallet PVOD) was launched in Malaysia with the appearance and officiated by the newly appointed FINAS CEO, Prof. Dr. Md Nasir Ibrahim. During the launch, Film Wallet has confirmed to be working with local and international producers and distributors on film production and exclusive international content.
The company has stated they will launch their platform to two Southeast Asia countries in February 2022, which allowed local content to reach overseas audience. But one thing that was announced during the launch was quite concerning – hundreds of on-demand content from all across the globe, including – United States of America, Hong Kong, China, Korea, Europe, and more. A short visit to the site also just show there are only 22 film to watch and there should be thousands of contents to be more convincing for larger audiences in Southeast Asia region.
They also mentioned the content will be in high definition but there is no confirmation on which resolution. Also, don’t expect any audio features like Dolby Atmos as that was not mentioned. The company say users would only need to purchase the movie once for as low as RM1.90 and be able to re-watch it multiple times within the given time period. The content can be watch anywhere on your smartphones, tablets or TVs.
At the launch, Film Wallet PVOD announced their involvement in the co-production of three local movies titled – Syaitan Nirrajim (directed by Ayez Shaukat), Where You Are (directed by Woo Ming Jin), and Isolasi (directed by Ryon Lee) which is expected to be released next year. Additional international content will be available thanks to a collaboration with Celestial Tiger Entertainment from Hong Kong, allowing users to access exclusive action/thriller movies from around the world under its ‘KIX’ brand.
I would have to say the launch is done too hastily and it is hard to sway Malaysians from using their service as current streaming service also providing their own movies on their own platform. Also, the contents is quite dated and not too many recent content available. During the presentation, it was mentioned that there will be ads playing on the app. All this just made it really hard to convince anyone with their “Premium” segment. There are other ambitious mentions during their presentation but let’s leave it until they can bring more (latest) contents for their service for now.
Apologies for lack of photos of the event as it was too dark and I was seated too far. The official photos were taken straight from smartphone (and weirdly edited) as well so let’s move on. You may disagree with my comments but you can have a visit and look at their at https://filmwallet.com/.