Q: Why won't my iTunes movie rental play or download?

I've had the same problem and have tried ever fixed listed on this board. Apple is very diasappointing and I will NEVER download a movie/ rental again. I've downloaded dozens of movies from Amazon and have never had a problem. Amazon is the way to go.

You gotta be more specific about the "WINDOWS" thing. Is it on itunes windows or internet explorer?O.o

yeah, it didn't work. didn't work at all.:P

I've downloaded a handful of movies in the past and never had a problem, but two nights ago I rented a movie and now it's no where to be found. I'm so ticked! I'm not having the same problem as y'all where you see your downloaded movie but it won't play... my problem is that it's literally no where. Gone. As if I didn't even rent it. But I did, and my account confirms that. Am I completely missing something here or is it an error on iTunes's part?

I rented the movie, began the download, it finished downloading after a minute or so and then asks me if I'd like to play it or wait until later...I chose to wait because I still had some things I needed to do before sitting down and relaxing with a movie. I come back later and no movie! This has never happened to me before.

So I just now plug in my iPod and low-and-behold there's the rented movie, but it's like it's in limbo or something because I still have no option to play it. It only gives me the option to transfer it over on to my iPod, which I'm assuming I could play it on there. Call me crazy but, I don't want to watch a rented movie on my tiny iPod. What is going on?? I really don't want to eat $2.99. I want my rented movie.

I came here with the same issue. I have successfully purchased movies and tv series from iTunes previously without a hitch. A internet search show this issue goes back to 2010, so like another poster mentioned, why waste my time trying to troubleshoot, when a rental from Amazon works just fine. I did try the min player workaround, but it don't work for me. I sent in a problem report via the iTunes Store, asking for a refund.

Slightly off topic, but I have had nothing but problems with iTunes since upgrading to ver 11, before that I loved iTunes, it worked flawlessly.

Having the same issue... very shocked that after years and countless issues that Apple has not fixed this. Clearly makes people want to stick to Amazon Prime, Netflix, etc. though that's not what I wish for Apple.

I also had the issue with being able to scroll through the movie but not being able to play it.  To my surprise, the trick with switching to the MiniPlayer and then back to normal fixed it.  Thanks for the tip, VFSchreiber.

I tried all of the suggestions in this thread with no success (minelayer, deauthorize). The culprit was actually the fact that I had an external TV plugged into my iMac through the Thunderbolt port with an HDMI adapter. When this was unplugged, the movie played like normal. I believe this is a sort of copyright  enforcement, but it doesn't seem like there is any warning or indication as to what the problem is.

I hope this helps someone.

Obviously, quite a few people are having this problem.  The fact that Apple doesn't even bother to moderate these forums or have one employee at least cruise through and comment with an apology once in a while is really inexcusable for a company that has a $40 Billion market value and produced profits in excess of $1.3 Billion last year.  Come on guys, at least spend a little bit on customer service when people have paid you money to view content.  Not communicating at all is basically saying you could care less about the customers. 

FINALLY! SOMEONE WHO AGREES WITH ME!

I'm on with Apple support right now and the issue may be which version you are downloading. Most PCs will only play SD version instead of HD. My suggestion would be to download SD version and see if that works.

What worked for me, deauthorized my macbook pro, reboot my macbook pro, relaunch itunes, reauthorize my macbook pro and restart itunes to check for downloads. Found the movie began to download and it played fine.

if restarting itunes wont check for downloads, after you authorized the computer again go to store and click check for downloads, I have caused this error 4 or 5 times and this fix has worked every time. Kinda sad that you have to do this, but meh its apple.

I was having the same problem with an HD movie rental (at first the screen was blank, then it would start but stop and never go anywhere; I could scroll forward and see still screen shots but nothing would play). I experimented with downloading an SD movie--and, actually, the SD movie played just fine.

Later, the HD movie, in contrast, played for about 15 mins when I selected the MiniPlayer, but then it stopped and the problem returned and I could not get it to play again. I wasn't able to download the SD version of this movie because all the option icons (the buy, SD rental, & HD rental) read "downloading" simultaneously.

I had been noticing that my WiFi signal had been slower than usual in the last few days (there were a few rooms in my house where I had no signal at all the day before). So I live-chatted with my internet provider (TWC)--at like 11 p.m. because I was that annoyed that I was 15 mins into Gone Girl and couldn't finish it--and they tested and reset my internet signal & speed. And, lo & behold, that actually solved the problem! Within minutes I was able to play the rest of movie and I haven't had the problem since!

Now, if I could only figure out how to get iTunes to save my CC information as opposed to having to buy gift cards!

I had the same problem, but I managed to solve it by changing the audio features from English AC3 to simply English.