Star Movies
Star Movies is an Asian-based pay television channel owned by Disney Entertainment. Star Movies was originally launched in 1994 as a single channel broadcast across Asia, but it has regionalized into different localized channels since then. Fox Networks Group Asia Pacific have since rebranded some of the network's international feeds in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia as Fox Movies, but retains the Star Movies brand in the Middle East & South Asia.
Disney Star continues to operate the Indian feed of the network as a channel specialized in Western films, with the logo remaining completely unchanged since 2009. Meanwhile the Middle Eastern feed is operated by Disney Entertainment, keeping the 2009 logo until adopting the non-Indian Star channels' logo scheme in 2024, while Fox Movies was replaced by a new channel, Star Films. In the Balkans and Portugal, the local versions of Fox Movies were replaced by Star Movies. Star Movies in the Middle East, Balkans and Portugal is managed by The Walt Disney Company.
History
Star Movies began broadcasting on 20 April 1994 for viewers in Taiwan, replacing BBC World Service Television in the Northern Beam region which was dropped on 17 April 1994. The channel became scrambled on 1 May 1994. The need to launch the channel was based on research on viewers' preferences and feedback from cable operators. At launch, Star Movies was a Mandarin and English movie channel, with 60% of the films in Chinese or produced in Asia and 40% being Western titles. The channel was only available through authorized cable operators.Star Movies was split up from Star Plus on 1 May 1994, which usually aired movies in the early years of Star TV from 1991 to 1994. At launch, its programming lineup consisted of both Hollywood and Chinese films and catered to pan-Asian audiences.
As Star TV planned to remove BBC World Service Television from its channel lineup for Northeast Asia by mid-April 1994, the company planned to replace it with a Chinese-language film channel. Star Movies would focus on Western world films from then on. Star TV has since regionalized the channel's operation.
The channel was noticeably absent from Singapore Cable Vision upon the launch of its cable service in 1995 due to censorship problems in the country.
On 1 February 1996, the channel changed its logo from a STAR wordmark similar to Zee Cinema in 1995 to a box-type STAR symbol featuring a frame, a pentagram star, and a blue square.
It was launched in Malaysia on 1 June 1996.
A localized feed intended for Taiwan was launched on 1 January 1997, Southeast Asia and China on 1 May 1997, and the Philippines on 1 January 2010. Four months later, a high-definition channel, Star Movies HD, was launched. A video on demand channel was also launched on 16 September of that same year.
On 1 April 1999, the channel had a first major logo change from vertical to horizontal, along with other STAR TV channels.
On 1 January 2012, Star Movies was rebranded as Fox Movies Premium and available in Hong Kong, the Maldives, and most Southeast Asia.
On 10 June 2017, the channel's Philippine feed was rebranded as Fox Movies Philippines. In other Southeast Asian countries and Hong Kong, Fox Movies Premium rebranded to Fox Movies on the same day. The channel shut down on 1 October 2021 in these regions along with other local versions of several Disney- and Fox-branded channels.
On New Year's Day 2022, Fox Movies Taiwan was renamed under the new name Star Movies Gold so that Star Movies HD remains active with the programming separate from each other. As Disney decided to further enroll Disney+ across the Asian markets, they had decided to cease further pay TV broadcasting, including both Star Movies Gold and Star Movies HD. Both of the channels were ceased in operation on January 1, 2024.
On 7 June 2023, Disney announced that it would launch Star Movies in the Balkans as a replacement for Fox Movies in the region on 1 October 2023. Disney would later announce that it would also replace Fox Movies in Portugal with Star Movies on 7 February 2024.
Programming
Star Movies has first-run contracts for movies distributed by Disney and sub-run contracts for movies from countries where Star Movies is available. It also features movies from other movie distributors including Paramount Pictures, Lionsgate, Summit Entertainment and The Weinstein Company. Star Movies mainly airs Disney movies during the daytime hours. Star Movies India does fewer premieres compared to sometimes showing programs like Masterchef Australia and pushing more premium movies into their OTT platform Disney+ Hotstar.Current feeds
Star Movies (India)
Star Movies India is distributed by Walt Disney Studios, Pixar, Marvel Studios and 20th Century Studios in India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and is ad supported. Movie premieres are less frequent compared to other feeds. Other studios include Lionsgate, NBCUniversal and Warner Bros. Discovery. Available audio feed languages are English, Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The channel ceased broadcasting in Nepal and 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 Nepal and Sri Lanka in 2019 after 4 years.Star Movies Select HD was launched on 9 July 2015 showcasing niche films. An SD feed was launched on 15 March 2023 along with the launches and shutdowns of several other Star channels.
Star Movies (MENA)
Star Movies Middle East and Africa features a hardcoded Arabic-language subtitle track. The channel is currently available on beIN and was formerly available on OSN.On 1 March 2024, Star Movies MENA rebranded for the first time in 16 years and stopped using its 2009 logo.