What is EE Film Store?
EE Film Store is a forthcoming service from EE that will effectively replace Orange Wednesdays and the T-Mobile Night In services. Don’t worry, your 2-for-1 cinema vouchers aren’t going anywhere, they’re just getting a new name.
As well as this, EE Film will also be home to a new EE Film Store; an video on-demand service that’ll give subscribers a free movie every week, until February 2013.
Crucially, the free movie stream or download won’t eat into your monthly allowance, which is good news if you’re thinking of going for the starter £15/month plan.
Thanks to a service EE is calling ‘Pause & Play,’ you’ll be able to start watching a movie on your phone on a 4G connection and carrying on streaming it on your TV, laptop or desktop in the home via the fibre connection, or vice versa.
Either way, there’s no dent in your 4G or fibre data allowance for watching the free movie from EE Film Store.
For now, keep an eye on this EE Film Store page, where you can sign up for updates.
How much does EE Film Store cost?
The EE Film Store brings over 700 new films available to watch on-demand, with prices starting at 79p/film. Films can be streamed or downloaded and titles will include ‘five times the number of new releases than other similar providers.’
EE Film Store is powered by FilmFlex, the same company which runs the Virgin Media, HMV On Demand and FIlm4oD on-demand platforms.
Based on the prices seen on these sites, we’d expect most prices to be around the £3.99 mark.
FilmFlex’s site promises ‘significantly more’ new releases than what’s available on Netflix, Lovefilm, Blinkbox and iTunes according to the FilmFlex press blurb – we’ll have to see how this compares to Sky’s Now TV which is currently leading in terms of most new releases.
What’s on EE Film Store?
Specific titles and studios have not been announced directly by EE, but FilmFlex’s site gives us an idea of what’s in store. Films highlighted on the FilmFlex site include Dark Shadows, Prometheus and Wrath of the Titans.
FilmFlex has agreements with over 30 big content owners including 20th Century Fox, Disney UK & Ireland, MGM, Sony Pictures and Universal. Other household names FilmFlex has agreements with include Icon, Lionsgate and Momentum.
Can I watch EE Film Store in high definition?
It’s not been confirmed but given that EE Film Store is being launched in tandem with EE’s superfast 4G and fibre services, we’d very much expect HD streams and downloads to be part of the deal.
How fast does my broadband connection need to be for EE Film Store?
Again there’s nothing concrete on required speeds but we’d expect that speeds of at least 3Mbps will suffice for streaming films in standard definition.
How much of my broadband will EE Film Store use?
Each of your weekly films will not count towards your monthly usage quota so there’s no need to worry about that.
Until we hear more from EE, there’s no telling how much of a dent film downloads and streams will make on your bandwidth.
As an example, here’s how much of an impact Netflix’s SD and HD streams have on a typical broadband connection:
- Good (up to 0.3 GB/hour)
- Better (up to 0.7 GB/hour)
- Best (about 1.0 GB/hour but up to 2.3 GB/hour when streaming HD content).
Can I watch EE Film Store on my PC or Mac?
It’s expected that PCs and laptops running Windows and Mac OS will be able to stream films from EE Film Store. This hasn’t been confirmed by EE, we’ll update as soon as we hear more.
Can I watch EE Film Store on my iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch?
EE has big plans for it’s ‘Pause & Play’ service, which means you’ll be able to start watching a movie via 4G on your phone and then carry on watching it from where you left off on a computer at home when you get in.
Given that EE has confirmed that the Apple iPhone 5 will support 4G we can assume that this will be able to stream films from the EE Film Store.
We can’t yet make the same assumptions about the iPhone 4 and 4S or the new iPad which doesn’t work with EE’s 4G, but we don’t see why these devices wouldn’t be included.
Can I watch EE Film Store on my Android tablet or phone?
If we assume that EE Film Store is coming to the iPhone 5, then we can assume that the Huawei Ascend P1 LTE, HTC One XL, Samsung Galaxy S3 LTE and the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 LTE – all of which have been confirmed to work with EE’s 4G – will play ball with Pause & Play as well.
This is all still to be confirmed, so we’ll update with official information once we get it.
Can I watch EE Film Store on my Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or Nintendo Wii?
None of the current generation of consoles have been confirmed for EE Film Store support so far and we’ve heard nothing to suggest that this will change.
Can I watch EE Film Store on my smart TV or set-top box?
Again, there’s been no confirmation of smart TV or connected set-top box support for EE Film Store as of yet.
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