Regular patching to be applied to films from now on

Films will now be subject to new features and bug fixes delivered as patches on a regular basis, as the film industry follows the software giants’ model of constantly fixing poorly made products.

Every initial cinema release will now by advertised as ‘beta’ and movie industry personnel will scour web forums and review websites in detail to identify issues and retroactively fix glaring continuity issues, plot holes and disastrous miscastings.

Production companies have long since gambled on movies, putting in vast amounts of initial capital, only to lose billions as the films flop at the box office due to abject critical response, with no remedial action previously possible.

Producer Jeremy Simpson said, “This new model is very appealing.  Companies such as Microsoft, Apple and Oracle can always fix their terribly-flawed software retrospectively; something the film industry has thus far been unable to deal with.

“Now that films are entirely digital, unless you’re dealing with some art house nutcase who demands you still use 8mm, and, because summer blockbusters are pretty much script- and directorless, it’s actually very simple process to fix problems within them.

“So, take the famous chariot race in Ben Hur where a car can be seen in the background. The car just looks out of place in ancient Rome.

“Now, with this new tech, we’d be able to release a patch that would change it to the sort of car that they would have in ancient Rome – a Fiat or something.

“We could give added value to your favourite picture.

“For example, in The Usual Suspects, we could film some new sections and patch any streams or digital downloads to reveal a different person is Kaiser Soze every week.

“Although, never the Kevin Spacey character, that simply wouldn’t make sense.

“We can even achieve the previously impossible, such as replacing any actor with Melissa McCarthy in a whole movie thus rendering even the most tedious indie nonsense watchable!

“The possibilities are endless!”

Film patching will be available very soon and film fans will notice it appearing more and more as, when you try and watch a film, it will show a message saying ‘Critical updates are being applied to your movie’, stopping you doing anything else on your television for the next 45 minutes, before rebooting unexpectedly.