OKJA directed by Bong Joon-ho, screenplay by Bong and Jon Ronson from a story by Bong, with Tilda Swinton, Jake Gyllenhaal, Lily Collins and Ahn Seo-hyun. A Netflix release. 120 minutes. Some subtitles. Opens Wednesday (June 28). See listings.

Okja, the new movie by Korean writer/director Bong Joon-ho, starts a limited run at the TIFF Bell Lightbox on Wednesday (June 28). An unclassifiable adventure-cum-satire about a little girl who’ll do anything to protect her giant hippo-pig, the film will screen nightly at 7 pm through Tuesday, July 4, paired in a series of Bong double-bills. This will be Okja’s only theatrical showing in all of Canada.

That’s because the film also drops on Netflix worldwide on Wednesday (June 28). Theatrical play would seem antithetical to the concept of a Netflix original, but Okja is an exception: it premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival just last month, marking it as a proper contribution to world cinema. There was a red carpet with Tilda Swinton and Jake Gyllenhaal! Sure, the audience booed the Netflix logo, but they applauded at the end! A movie like that can’t go straight to streaming, can it? That would be wrong.

And so, partly to soothe the rage of film Twitter and partly to nudge the movie into this year’s awards conversation, Netflix is screening Okja in theatres in New York, Los Angeles and Toronto. At the Lightbox you can see it on the big screen with a proper Dolby Atmos soundtrack, or you can watch it at home on whatever set-up you have – projector, smart TV, laptop, tablet, even your phone.

Once upon a time, a theatrical run conferred legitimacy on a movie. Ever since the direct-to-video market emerged in the late 80s, there’s been a clear distinction between films that play on the big screen and those that aren’t deemed worthy of the expense of a 35mm print run. About a decade ago, digital technology made it much cheaper to screen a film in a theatre, but right around that time, audiences started saving their money for blockbusters and event movies, watching everything else at home.

Netflix lives in that niche, as do rival streaming services like Amazon Prime Video and Crave TV. But if a given title doesn’t make it onto the first tier of the menu, its intended audience might never find it.

Okja isn’t likely to have that problem, because as a Netflix property the company will promote the crap out of it, pushing it to the top of every “If you liked that, you’ll like this” algorithm. (Surely you noticed how all roads led to Iron Fist earlier this year.) And the theatrical release, however small, has industry watchers talking about the company’s radical new marketing, while movie buffs get to see the film the way it was meant to be seen.

Either way, though, Netflix wins. It’s seen as a positive force in world cinema, and Bong’s weird little movie gets a boost it might never have gotten from a Hollywood studio. But honestly, there’s no way Okja could’ve ever been made by a Hollywood studio.

The thing no one’s talking about (yet) is that Okja is really, really weird. Bong doesn’t do conventional cinema his films freely mix genres and change tones in order to build their own distinctive vibe. His post-apocalyptic thriller Snowpiercer and his kaiju movie The Host are as beloved for their cockeyed satire as for their fantastical storylines, while his detective movies Memories Of Murder and Mother are more than willing to meander away from the noir concepts at their core to meditate on their protagonists’ lives and personal failings.

While Okja could be described as a girl-and-her-creature story not unlike E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, its Korean hero and freewheeling tone mean it would never be a blockbuster on the scale of Steven Spielberg’s beloved classic – except possibly in South Korea, where Bong’s movies regularly set box-office records.

Of course, Okja isn’t going to do that because South Korean theatre chains are refusing to show it. They’d rather lose money than serve as a marketing tool for Netflix, a service that’s seen as destroying the theatrical release model. I can sort of see their point, even though it’s ultimately suicidal.

See, Netflix is going to keep buying up more and more movies for the same reason it keeps launching more and more TV shows: it’s a lot more profitable to own content than to licence it. There will always be competition from movie theatres, but Netflix exists as competition for the theatrical model it doesn’t have to offer the same movies. But when one of its movies does make it to the big screen – especially one as weird and precious as Okja – we should take advantage of that opportunity. It won’t happen too often.

normw@nowtoronto.com | @normwilner