Martin Scorsese’s “The Wolf of Wall Street” has been named the most pirated film of 2014, closely followed by the Disney animated musical fantasy “Frozen” and the Oscar-winning space drama “Gravity.”
Scorsese’s black comedy, starring Leonardo DiCaprio as an unscrupulous trader who makes a fortune via morally dubious “penny stock” boiler rooms, was downloaded 30.04m times, according to piracy tracking firm Excipio. “Frozen” and “Gravity” were just behind with 29.92m and 29.36m downloads respectively. Rounding out the top five were “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” with 27.63m downloads, and superhero sequel “Thor: The Dark World,” with 25.75m downloads.
Intriguingly, neither the year’s highest-grossing film worldwide, “Transformers: Age of Extinction,” nor the US box office’s biggest movie, “Guardians of the Galaxy,” made the top 10 for illegal downloads. But the potential damage to critically acclaimed, awards-season-friendly fare from piracy was clear. Steve McQueen’s Oscar-winning race drama “12 Years a Slave” was downloaded 23.65m times in seventh place, despite taking just $187m at the global box office, the second lowest figure for films placing in the top 10.