With 33 million hours watched, 'Darlings' is still not the most popular Netflix original film

'Darlings' stars Alia Bhatt, Shefali Shah and Vijay Varma in the lead.

Netflix has said it is pleased with the progress of its original film initiative in the third quarter of 2022, which also saw a growth in subscribers. Darlings became one of the most popular non-English language Netflix original films. The Alia Bhatt-starrer has been watched for more than 33 million hours after opening to “rave reviews and huge fandom in India,” Netflix said in its Q3 report.

Darlings is still ways behind Loving Adults and Carter, which proved to be the most successful non-English films of the quarter for Netflix.

Loving Adults, a psychological thriller from Denmark, was viewed for 67 million hours, while Korean film Carter followed close behind at 65 million hours.

The Gray Man, with its star-studded cast of Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Dhanush and more, clocked 254 million hours viewed, making it one of the most successful English language Netflix original of this quarter.

“The romantic drama Purple Hearts was a hit among our members with 229 million hours viewed,” the report noted.

The numbers for English scripted TV were also promising for the streaming giant. Stranger Things season 4, one of the most anticipated Netflix shows, generated 1.35 billion hours viewed – making it the biggest season of an English language series ever.

This was followed by The Sandman (351 million hours viewed), season five of Cobra Kai (270 million hours viewed) and limited series Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story (824 million hours viewed).

Netflix said it ended the quarter with slightly more than 223 million subscribers worldwide, up some 2.4 million, after seeing subscriber ranks ebb during the first half of this year. Netflix shares shot up more than 13 percent on the earnings news.

"After a challenging first half, we believe we're on a path to reaccelerate growth," Netflix said. The company reported a profit of $1.4 billion on revenue of $7.9 billion in the recent quarter.

(With inputs from AFP)