TorrentFreak

• Ernesto
• December 8, 2008
• 38
• bittorrent,
  DVDrip,
  dvdscr,
  piracy,
  r5
• Print

‘Resident Evil: Degeneration’ is the first CG animation film inspired by the popular video game. Although it skips most US theaters and is scheduled to be released on DVD no sooner than late December, it has been downloaded on BitTorrent close to a million times already – in just four days.

‘Resident Evil: Degeneration‘, or ‘Biohazard: Degeneration’ as it’s known in Japan, will never become a blockbuster film, simply because it is only set for release in a few movie theaters. On the Internet, however, its popularity exceeds all expectations.

The film, produced by Hiroyuki Kobayashi, is set for a Sony Pictures DVD release in the USA on December 30. A few days ago it leaked onto the Internet and since then it has already been downloaded a million times via BitTorrent.

This is not the first time that a movie quickly became popular online due to the release of a pirated copy. “The Man from Earth” is another example of a film that became immensely popular due to its distribution on BitTorrent. Contrary to the opinion of the big studios, many independent filmmakers see piracy as free promotion instead of a threat.

We doubt that Sony Pictures will respond similarly to the leak of ‘Resident Evil: Degeneration’, which tops our weekly download chart. Below is the full list of this week’s most downloaded movies on BitTorrent. The Dark Knight, which led the chart three weeks in a row, has dropped to third place. Later this week and following on from our top 10 most downloaded games chart, we will publish the top 10 most downloaded movies in 2008.

The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. Currently both DVDrips, DVD Screeners and R5 rips are counted.

RSS feed for the weekly DVDrip chart.