FilmFlex, is a UK pay-per-view

Pay-per-view

Pay-per-view provides a service by which a television audience can purchase events to view via private telecast. The broadcaster shows the event at the same time to everyone ordering it...

 movie service, which is a joint venture

Joint venture

A joint venture is a business agreement in which parties agree to develop, for a finite time, a new entity and new assets by contributing equity. They exercise control over the enterprise and consequently share revenues, expenses and assets...

 between Sony

Sony

, commonly referred to as Sony, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan and the world's fifth largest media conglomerate measured by revenues....

 and The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...

.

Virgin Media

FilmFlex makes up part of Virgin Media

Virgin Media

Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom...

's "On Demand" video on demand

Video on demand

Video on Demand or Audio and Video On Demand are systems which allow users to select and watch/listen to video or audio content on demand...

 system. FilmFlex has been available on Virgin since January 2005 and saw over 11 million films watched on demand in 2009. FilmFlex replaced Front Row which was a near video on demand pay-per-view service which was initially available on analogue cable from 1997, switching to digital

Digital television

Digital television is the transmission of audio and video by digital signals, in contrast to the analog signals used by analog TV...

 when digital cable services launched from late 1999 onwards.

FilmFlex provides over 500 movies some of which are available in HD (high definition), which are available at any time for the viewer to watch when they want to. Viewers can search for a movie by title, genre, cast or director. Once a movie has been ordered it can be viewed any time within the next 24 hours before it has to be paid for again. The movie can also be viewed as many times as the viewer likes within the 24 hours for no additional cost. Once viewers are watching a movie they have full control over it by the use of pause, rewind and fast forward functions, much like a DVD.

All genres of movies are available ranging from Hollywood blockbusters to action, adventure, horror, comedy, romance and classic movies.

From the 16th May 2007, 21 of the 22 James Bond

James Bond

James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...

 movies are available to view on FilmFlex. From the 1962 Dr. No

Dr. No (film)

Dr. No is a 1962 spy film, starring Sean Connery; it is the first James Bond film. Based on the 1958 Ian Fleming novel of the same name, it was adapted by Richard Maibaum, Johanna Harwood, and Berkely Mather and was directed by Terence Young. The film was produced by Harry Saltzman and Albert R...

, all the way through to the 2006 Casino Royale

Casino Royale (2006 film)

Casino Royale is the twenty-first film in the James Bond film series and the first to star Daniel Craig as fictional MI6 agent James Bond...

.

Virgin Media Online Movies

On 26 April 2010, Virgin Media

Virgin Media

Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom...

 announced the launch of its first online movies service: Virgin Media Online Movies. All rentals will offer unlimited streamed views for 48 hours so viewers can pause, rewind and watch again, plus the film can be watched wherever the account holder logs on. Virgin Media Online Movies is powered by FilmFlex Movies Ltd., the service is delivered over the web using Microsoft Silverlight

Microsoft Silverlight

Microsoft Silverlight is an application framework for writing and running rich Internet applications, with features and purposes similar to those of Adobe Flash. The run-time environment for Silverlight is available as a plug-in for web browsers running under Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X...

 and will initially present movies in standard definition. A HD version of the service is in testing, though there is no word on when it might become available.

Penny Movies Festival

From 30 March 2007 Virgin Media ran a movies promotion called the ‘Penny Movies Festival’. The promotion was run over five weeks and each week focused on a different genre. Week one: blockbusters, week two: family favourites, week three: cult classics, week four: comedy, week five: action adventure.

Each week viewers could vote on the Virgin Media website for their favourite movie out of a selection of 15 movies and the winning movie would be available to view on the On Demand service, during the next week for the price of 1p.

The festival returned in 2008.

Film4oD

Channel 4

Channel 4

Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...

 partnered with FilmFlex to launch an online video on-demand service for Film4

Film4

Film4 is a free digital television channel available in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, owned and operated by Channel 4, that screens films.-Programming:...

. Film4oD, which officially launched on 1 November 2010, has more than 500 films available for 48-hour rental online.

External links

including Film Listings and Contact Info

• Virgin Media Online Movies
• Film4oD
• Unofficial Virgin Media info Film listings and schedules in PDF and XPS formats
• Filmflex Ratings Currently available movies listed by ratings according to Rotten Tomatoes
  Rotten Tomatoes
  Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
  
  , Metacritic
  Metacritic
  Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
  
  etc