This brings a catalogue of classic and modern movies to diaspora and fans of French culture and cinema currently underserved in North America by the major streaming services.

The French platform offers a curated catalogue of classic and modern movies with subtitles in French and English for $6.99 per month, as well as pay-per-view options.

Cinessance is available on the web and apps for both iOS, and Android with support for casting via Chromecast and AirPlay, and plans to expand to Smart TVs. The service is built on a cloud-based infrastructure from 24i, making use of the video backend, white label front end applications and backstage content, through an application management interface that is part of the modular streaming platform. It also includes CDN services and an off-the-shelf integration with subscriber management capabilities from 24i partner company Cleeng.

France is the second largest exporter of movies in the world, yet only 3% of Netflix’s catalogue features French films, according to a recent study from Unifrance. French expats, Francophiles and cinema-lovers in North America have until now had no effective option for watching French cinema.

Cinessance is launching with movies acquired from many established French studios, such as TF1 Studio, StudioCanal and EuropaCorp, with plans to expand the catalogue to 500 movies by mid-2022.

“I've lost count of the number of times I’ve tried to watch a French movie and couldn't find it online,” said Clément Monnet, Cinessance Founder and CEO, himself a French expat who has lived in Europe, Asia, as well as both South and North America. “Like many French expats, I try to stay connected with my roots and to share my culture with others, so I couldn't be more excited to share the gift of French film via Cinessance.”