Sky Cinema

Sky Movies was originally a single film channel offered as part of Sky's original four-channel package (along with Sky Channel, Sky News and Eurosport) on the Astra 1A satellite on 5 February 1989, the first film shown on the channel was 1987's Dirty Dancing, starring Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze. Prior to its launch, Sky Movies signed first-run deals with 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros. Domestic Pay TV, Cable and Network Features, Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Orion Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution Co.

After one year of broadcasting free-to-air, on 5 February 1990,[1] it became the first Sky channel to scramble its signal, using a card-encryption system called VideoCrypt which rendered the picture totally obscured to anyone attempting to view it without a decoder and smart card.

When Sky Television merged with rival British Satellite Broadcasting on 2 November 1990, it acquired BSB's The Movie Channel. With the launch of the second Astra satellite (1B) on 15 April 1991, becoming part of the Sky package, and the first film shown was 1989's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, starring Harrison Ford and Sean Connery. Similarly, Sky Movies was made available to viewers on BSB's old satellite on 8 April 1991, replacing the music channel The Power Station. From the re-launch of the channel under BSkyB, The Movie Channel's ident was made by Pacific Data Images and heavily based on NBC's film opening used from 1987 to 1993.

During 1991, Sky Movies and The Movie Channel started broadcasting for 24 hours per day,[2] in addition of these times for 6.00pm, 8.00pm and 10.00pm, Sky Movies had several different film genre slots were used each evening such as:

• Monday Night Comedy
• Tuesday Night Action
• Thursday Night Horror
• After Dark – used for Wednesdays and Saturdays at around 11.30pm, will feature erotic films with sexually explicit material and various adult-oriented content.

At around the same time, The Movie Channel started to begin its evening films at the later times of 6.15pm, 8.15pm and 10.15pm in the evenings, and also began showing classic films and children's films at 4.00pm.

For two years in the early 1990s, Sky Movies carried various non-film premium content such as live boxing, music concerts and World Wrestling Federation's special events such as UK Rampage and WrestleMania (the first event was WrestleMania VI on 1 April 1990). This was because at this time all of Sky's other channels, including Sky Sports, were shown free-to-air and during this period, the channel was often referred to as Sky Movies Plus. When Sky Sports became a pay channel on 1 September 1992, Sky Movies stopped showing non-movie related programming.

On 1 October 1992, The Comedy Channel was replaced by Sky Movies Gold, a "classic movies" service from 4.00pm to midnight every day and it was added as a three-channel Sky Movies package, Rocky (starring Sylvester Stallone) was the first film is shown on the network.

From 1 February 1993, British Sky Broadcasting introduced a new system of film ratings often used for various times (with the exceptions of U and PG) in different colours, replacing the British Board of Film Classification certificates, and remained on air until 31 October 1997:

The two main channels were rebranded under a common brand on 1 November 1997, Sky Movies became Sky Movies Screen 1 and The Movie Channel became Sky Movies Screen 2.[3]

After a rebrand on 10 September 1998, Sky Movies Screen 1 became Sky MovieMax, Sky Movies Screen 2 became Sky Premier, and Sky Movies Gold was renamed Sky Cinema.[4]

The launch of Sky Digital from the new Astra 28.2°E satellite position on 1 October 1998 was accompanied by a major expansion of channels.[5] Sky Premier and Sky MovieMax both added three multiplex channels each (Sky Premier 2 to 4 and Sky MovieMax 2 to 4), Sky Cinema launched Sky Cinema 2, and additionally, Sky Premier Widescreen – at the time was the only channel devoted to showing widescreen films were all launched exclusively on digital satellite. On 15 November 1998, Sky MovieMax and Sky Premier launched on the ONdigital terrestrial platform.[6] On 1 October 1999, Sky MovieMax 5 was launched.[7]

1 July 2002 saw yet another re-branding exercise, while the Sky Premier channels were renamed Sky Movies Premier, the Sky MovieMax channels became Sky Movies Max and the Sky Cinema channels became Sky Movies Cinema.[8] Eventually in June 2003, Sky listened to demands for more widescreen films, the channel was closed and the majority of films on the remaining channels were actually shown in widescreen.[9]

On 1 November 2003, the Sky Movies Premier and Sky Movies Max channels were all brought under one banner as simply Sky Movies 1 to 9. At the same time, Sky Movies Cinema 1 and 2 became Sky Cinema 1 and 2.[10]

Sky Movies along with numerous other channels became available to watch via Sky Mobile TV in 2005, in partnership with Vodafone.[11]

From 30 January 2006, Sky Movies 9 and the new Sky Movies 10 started broadcasting from 5.00pm to 3.00am. They were PIN-protected, meaning that for the first time when films with a 15 certificate were able to be shown as early as 5.00pm. With the launch of Sky HD, the two channels were also available in a high definition format.[12]

From 4 April 2007, Sky Movies channels were revamped with each channel covering a different genre,[13] but three of the HD channels have launched already before the other:

Sky later made Sky Movies HD1 and HD2 available to subscribers without HDTV equipment through two channels simulcasting the same content in SDTV format, the channels were known as Sky Movies SD1 and SD2. These channels were renamed Sky Movies Screen 1 and Screen 2 in February 2008, and the HDTV channels were renamed Sky Movies Screen 1 HD and Screen 2 HD accordingly.[14] On 20 March 2008, an additional high definition film channel called Sky Movies Premiere HD, which is a high definition simulcast version of the current Sky Movies Premiere channel, was added after many requests for the channel from Sky HD subscribers.

Sky also announced that in October 2008, they would launch six new high-definition simulcast channels called Sky Movies Action/Thriller HD, Sky Movies Sci-Fi/Horror HD, Sky Movies Drama HD, Sky Movies Modern Greats HD, Sky Movies Family HD and Sky Movies Comedy HD.[15] This means that almost all Sky Movies channels are broadcast in both standard- and high-definition, except for Sky Movies Premiere +1, Sky Movies Classics and Sky Movies Indie which remained standard-definition only until Sky Movies Indie HD launched on 26 October 2009.[16][17]

Sky Movies were rebranded as the part of the Sky channels rebranding on 1 January 2010.

On 26 March 2010, some Sky Movies channels were renamed, the new Sky Movies Showcase channel replaced Sky Movies Screen 1, carrying box sets, collections and seasons. Sky Movies also reshuffled its bouquet of ten channels to achieve greater "clarity" for subscribers. The changes included Sky Movies Action & Thriller becoming Sky Movies Action & Adventure, Sky Movies Drama becoming Sky Movies Drama & Romance and Sky Movies Screen 2 becoming Sky Movies Crime & Thriller.[18] The Sky Movies HD channels launched on the Virgin Media platform on 2 August 2010.[19]

Sky Movies Classics HD launched on 9 August 2010, exclusively on Sky.[20] The channel was added to Virgin Media on 4 October 2011. Smallworld Cable added the Sky Movies HD channels to their line-up in the first quarter of 2012,[21] followed by UPC Ireland on 16 August 2012.[22]

On 28 March 2013, Sky Movies Disney was launched, effectively replacing Disney Cinemagic, as part of a multi-year film output deal between Sky and The Walt Disney Company.[23] Sky Movies Disney marked the first time that Disney has been involved in a co-branded linear film channel anywhere in the world,[24] included new Disney films are available on Sky Movies Disney around six months after they have ended their cinema run. To facilitate the channel, Sky Movies Classics ceased broadcasting, while Sky Movies Modern Greats was rebranded as Sky Movies Greats and Sky Movies Indie became Sky Movies Select.[25][26] The content of the three former brands was merged into Select and Greats.[27]

On 15 June 2016, Sky announced that Sky Movies would rebrand as Sky Cinema on 8 July. This change aligns the service's naming with those of Sky's film services in other regions, in consort with Sky plc's takeover of Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia. To compete with subscription video-on-demand services, Sky announced that the re-branded service would premiere a new film each day, and that it would expand the service's on-demand library. Sky also announced plans to launch a 4K ultra-high-definition feed later in the year.[28][29] 4K films became available on 13 August 2016 for Sky Q customers with a 2TB box and Sky Cinema and multi-screen packs. 70 were available by the end of 2016.[30]

In January 2018, Sky announced a partnership with film distributor Altitude Film Distribution, with the launch of Sky Cinema Original Films, this new brand would distribute films for Sky Cinema's on-demand service, as well as release them into cinemas. The first film under the new banner was the United Kingdom release of the animated film Monster Family. Other films like The Hurricane Heist, Anon, Final Score and Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile have also been released.

In June 2020, Sky added a content warning to several older films stating that they "have outdated attitudes, language, and cultural depictions which may cause offence today".[31]

On 23 July 2020, Sky Cinema launched a twelfth channel, Sky Cinema Animation, replacing Sky Cinema Premiere +1 on Sky and Virgin Media UK. Sky Cinema Premiere +1 continued to air on Virgin Media Ireland until its removal on 13 August 2020.[32] The timeshift resumed broadcasting on 6 January 2021, replacing Sky Cinema Disney, which officially closed on 30 December 2020 and was temporarily replaced by Sky Cinema Five Star Movies from 31 December until Premiere +1's return on 6 January 2021.[33]