Seeing the list of films most pirated for a year is very interesting. These are the films people are actively seeking out online and knowingly downloading them illegally because they want to see them, and most of the films on this year’s list do not surprise me. They are mainly blockbuster and comic book fare, which filled up theater seats as well. I am also not surprised to see something like 12 Years a Slave, which won best picture, and people sought it out for curiosity’s sake if it did not come to their town.
What surprises me, however, is the number one film: The Wolf of Wall Street. Look, I love the film, but I am quite confused as to why a debauchery filled, three-hour film would be the most sought after. Then again… it is the Internet. With the mass exposure to pornography and the like, I should not be surprised the film filled with copious amounts of sex and nudity was most downloaded. Whether or not that is the reason for the mass downloads, we will never know. But I have my suspicions.
You can look over the top twenty pirated films below, according to Excipio. If you will notice, the numbers for RoboCop include both this year’s remake and the original, as parsing out the downloads between the two is quite difficult.
- The Wolf of Wall Street – 30.035 million
- Frozen – 29.919 million
- RoboCop – 29.879 million (incl. both 2014 and 1987 versions)
- Gravity – 29.357 million
- The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug – 27.627 million
- Thor: The Dark World – 25.749 million
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier – 25.628 million
- The Legend of Hercules – 25.137 million
- X-Men: Days of Future Past – 24.380 million
- 12 Years a Slave – 23.653 million
- The Hunger Games: Catching Fire – 23.543 million
- American Hustle – 23.143 million
- 300: Rise of an Empire – 23.096 million
- Transformers: Age of Extinction – 21.65 million
- Godzilla – 20.956 million
- Noah – 20.334 million
- Divergent – 20.312 million
- Edge of Tomorrow – 20.299 million
- Captain Phillips – 19.817 million
- Lone Survivor – 19.130 million
Original report from Variety.
