Wide release is a term in the American motion picture industry for a motion picture that is playing nationally (as opposed to a few cinemas in cities such as New York and Los Angeles). Specifically, a movie is considered to be in wide release when it is on 600 screens or more in the United States and Canada.
In the US, films holding an NC-17 rating almost never have a wide release. Showgirls (1995) is one of the rare films with an NC-17 to get one.
The term is sometimes used informally in relative terms. For example, a documentary or art film promoter might speak of a film expanding from a few New York and Los Angeles screens to cinemas in major cities across the U.S. as moving into "wide release" even though it might be playing on single screens in as few as 15 or 20 major cities.
Famous quotes containing the words wide and/or release:
“Bind us in time, O seasons clear, and awe.
O minstrel galleons of Carib fire,
Bequeath us to no earthly shore until
Is answered in the vortex of our grave
The seal’s wide spindrift gaze toward paradise.”
—Hart Crane (1899–1932)
“As nature requires whirlwinds and cyclones to release its excessive force in a violent revolt against its own existence, so the spirit requires a demonic human being from time to time whose excessive strength rebels against the community of thought and the monotony of morality ... only by looking at those beyond its limits does humanity come to know its own utmost limits.”
—Stefan Zweig (18811942)