Star Movies is an Asian

pay television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...

network originally owned by The Walt Disney Company (Southeast Asia) Pte. Ltd.,

Fox Networks Group Middle East Fox Networks Group Middle East (formerly Fox International Channels FZ LLC) is a commercial television broadcasting company operating in the Middle East and North Africa, a subsidiary of Disney International Operations's Fox Networks Group. FN ...

and

Disney Star Disney Star Private Limited is an Indian media conglomerate and a wholly owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company India. It is headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. Disney Star network runs more than 70 TV channels in eight languages, rea ...

. In March 2019,

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on Octobe ...

acquired

Star TV Star TV may refer to: * E! (Canadian TV channel) (formerly Star!), a Canadian entertainment news channel * Las Estrellas (Spanish for The Stars), the Mexican television network * Estrella TV (Spanish for Star TV), the American Spanish-language net ...

for $71 billion with

21st Century Fox Twenty-First Century Fox, Inc., doing business as 21st Century Fox (21CF), was an American multinational mass media corporation that was based in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It was one of the two companies formed on June 28, 2013, fo ...

. Star Movies was originally launched as a single channel broadcast across Asia, but it was regionalised into different localised channels since then. Fox Networks Group Asia Pacific have since rebranded some of the network's international feeds in Hong Kong, Taiwan (SD feed only) and Southeast Asia as

Fox Movies Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

, but retains the Star Movies brand in

Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the China, People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming Island, Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territorie ...

(Hong Kong), Taiwan (HD feed), Middle East & South Asia (except Maldives).

Star India Disney Star Private Limited is an Indian media conglomerate and a wholly owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company India. It is headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. Disney Star network runs more than 70 TV channels in eight languages, rea ...

continues to operate the Indian feed of the network as a channel specialized in Western films, while the Middle Eastern feed, operated by

, co-exists with

. Star Movies HD in Taiwan is operated by Disney Networks Group Taiwan which was the advertisement-free offering of Fox Movies Taiwan. However, from March 2021 Star Movies Taiwan started doing short advertisement breaks in between movies. Star Movies in Middle East is operated by Fox Network Group Middle East.

History

STAR Movies was split up from

STAR Plus StarPlus is an Indian Hindi language general entertainment pay television channel owned by Disney Star (formerly ''Star India''), a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company India. The network's programming consists of family dramas, comedi ...

on 1 May 1994, which usually aired movies in the early years of STAR TV from 1991 to 1994. At launch, its programming lineup was consisted of both

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywoo ...

and Chinese films and catered to pan-Asian audiences. As Star TV planned to remove

BBC World Service Television BBC World Service Television, often abbreviated to WSTV (World Service Television), was the name of two BBC international satellite television channels between 1991 and 1995. It was the BBC's first foray into worldwide television broadcasting. I ...

from its channel lineup for

Northeast Asia Northeast Asia or Northeastern Asia is a geographical subregion of Asia; its northeastern landmass and islands are bounded by the Pacific Ocean. The term Northeast Asia was popularized during the 1930s by American historian and political scient ...

by mid-April 1994, the company planned to replace it with a Chinese-language film channel.Murdoch's STAR TV to drop BBC
UPI March 22, 1994 Star Movies would focus on Western world films from then on. Star TV has since regionalized the channel's operation. A localised feed intended for the Philippines was launched on 1 January 2010. Four months later, a high-definition channel, Star Movies HD, was launched. A

video on demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos without a traditional video playback device and the constraints of a typical static broadcasting schedule. In the 20th century, broadcasting in the form of ...

channel was also launched on 16 September of that same year. On 1 January 2012, Star Movies was rebranded as

Fox Movies Premium Fox Movies (formerly Star Movies; and Fox Movies Premium) was a Southeast Asian movie network owned by Fox Networks Group Asia Pacific, subsidiaries of Disney International Operations that was originally from the Walt Disney Company. It has firs ...

and available in Hong Kong, the Maldives and most of Southeast Asia. On 10 June 2017, the Philippine feed of the channel was rebranded as Fox Movies Philippines. On 1 November 2017, the Vietnamese feed of Star Movies was rebranded as Fox Movies Vietnam. On 1 October 2021, Star Movies China officially shut down its transmission. On 1 January 2022, Fox Movies Taiwan was rebranded to Star Movies Gold. Star Movies HD will remain active and it kept its own programming and its own logo.

Star Movies changes

Now Available In English, Hindi and Tamil. On 24 November 2021, Star Movies HD was replaced with Star Movies Select HD in Bangladesh.

Programming

Star Movies has first-run contracts for movies distributed by

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

(

20th Century Studios 20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...

Pixar Pixar Animation Studios (commonly known as Pixar () and stylized as P I X A R) is an American computer animation studio known for its critically and commercially successful computer animated feature films. It is based in Emeryville, Californ ...

Marvel Studios Marvel Studios, LLC (originally known as Marvel Films from 1993 to 1996) is an American film and television production company that is a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, a division of the Walt Disney Company. Marvel Studios produces the Ma ...

) and sub-run contracts for movies from countries where Star Movies is available. It also features movies from other movie distributors including

Lionsgate Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation, doing business as Lionsgate, is a Canadian-American entertainment company. It was formed by Frank Giustra on July 10, 1997, domiciled in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and is currently headquartered ...

Summit Entertainment Summit Entertainment is an American film production and distribution company. It is a label of Lionsgate Films, owned by Lionsgate Entertainment and is headquartered in Santa Monica, California. History Independent era (1991–2012) Summit ...

and

The Weinstein Company The Weinstein Company (usually credited or abbreviated as TWC) was an American independent film studio, founded in New York City by Bob and Harvey Weinstein in March 2005. TWC was one of the largest mini-major film studios in North America pri ...

. Star Movies mainly airs Disney movies during the daytime hours. Star Movies India does fewer premieres compared to sometimes showing programs like ''

Masterchef Australia ''MasterChef Australia'' is an Australian competitive cooking reality show based on the original British '' MasterChef''. It is produced by Endemol Shine Australia and screens on Network 10. Restaurateur and chef Gary Mehigan, chef George Ca ...

'' and pushing more premium movies into their OTT platform

Disney+ Hotstar Disney+ Hotstar (also known as Hotstar) is an Indian brand of subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned by Novi Digital Entertainment of Disney Star and operated by Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution, both d ...

Operating channels

Star Movies Asia

Star Movies Asia was formerly broadcast in Southeast Asia, parts of South Asia and China as a single, ad-free channel. As of 2017, Star Movies Asia is limited to subscribers in China due to the gradual rebrand of the channel's localised feeds to

. Star Movies Vietnam used to air a program called "Thảm đỏ (Red Carpet)" to introduce the movies which are scheduled to broadcast on the channel, all in Vietnamese language and hosted by Vietnamese presenters. After the rebranding of Star Movies to

, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka were switched over to the ad supported Indian version of Star Movies. It ceases operations on 1 October 2021, after which the channel space created by

in 1991, folded and ceased to exist.

Star Movies India

Star Movies India is distributed by Walt Disney Studios,

and

in India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and is ad supported. Movie premieres are less frequent compared to other feeds Available language audio feed In Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The channel ceased broadcasting in Sri Lanka from 1 February 2015 due to content rights issues, leaving the country with no Star Movies or Fox Movies channel. The channel was relaunched in Sri Lanka in 2019 after 4 years.

Star Movies Select HD Star Movies India is an Indian English-language movie channel pay television channel owned by Disney Star (formerly ''Star India''), a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company India. This is the Indian version of Star Movies which mainly broadcast ...

was launched in 2015 showcasing niche films.

Star Movies MENA

Star Movies Middle East and Africa features a hardcoded

Arabic-language Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

subtitle track (except for Israel). The channel is available on both OSN and beIN.

Star Movies Gold and HD Taiwan

An ad-supported feed of Star Movies was launched for

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...

specifically. It was the most localised feed of the television network, since most voice-overs in promotions for up-coming movies were done in

Mandarin Chinese Mandarin (; ) is a group of Chinese (Sinitic) dialects that are natively spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. The group includes the Beijing dialect, the basis of the phonology of Standard Chinese, the official language ...

. The SD feed of the channel was rebranded as Fox Movies Taiwan on 18 January 2018, while the HD feed still retains is independent programming and branding. On January 1, 2022, Fox Movies Taiwan was rebranded to Star Movies Gold.

Star Movies Philippines

Star Movies was launched on 30 November 2009 in the Philippines as an ad-supported channel. It used to simulcast with the Southeast Asian and Chinese feeds until 31 December 2009, when a localised feed was launched specifically for the Philippines. After the rebranding of Star Movies Asia as Fox Movies Premium on 1 January 2012 in most of Southeast Asia, the Philippine feed remained broadcasting until 10 June 2017 when it followed suit.

Star Movies Action

It was launched on 2 June 2013 only in India, replacing Fox Action Movies (not to be confused with its Southeast Asian counterpart) after its temporal closedown on 11 May 2013. The channel airs action- and horror-themed movies. In 2017, the channel was shut down.Star India gears-up for more action; All set to launch Star Movies Action retrieved via http://www.adgully.com 10-22-2013
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See Studio

Walt Disney Pictures Walt Disney Pictures is an American film production company and subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is owned by The Walt Disney Company. The studio is the flagship producer of live-action feature films within the Walt Disney Studios unit ...

Lucasfilm Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company and a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is a business segment of The Walt Disney Company. The studio is best known for creating and producing the '' Star Wars'' and ...

Sony Pictures Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Sony Pictures or SPE, and formerly known as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.) is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acq ...

References

External links

* {{Fox Networks Group Disney television networks Movie channels in Taiwan Movie channels in Vietnam Movie channels in China Television channels and stations established in 1994 English-language television stations in India Disney Star