Movie won't Play on iTunes

Hi (old question I know, but I'm still having this issue and this is top of the search list for this problem)

I've done some testing and:

The problem seems to be related to the extras.

When you initially double click on a movie with extras, it will try to open the menu (like its a DVD); sometimes, apparently at random, this doesn't work (I suspect it might be to do with changes made to the info, like title, artist, or 'album' - but I've changed them with several movies and they still play fine so...Apple, get on it...come on, you can afford to set it as some intern's pet project over the summer right?)

Point is, I've found two ways to get the film to play:

1. find your film's file in Finder(/explorer on PC if this is happening on PCs too), tell it to open in iTunes, the film will play.

You can then safely close it completely and come back to the same point (as long as you haven't unchecked the 'remember playback position' option) because now opening it in iTunes normally is set to skip over the extra menu portion (this will reset when you get all the way through the movie). This doesn't add a duplicate file or entry btw.

2. Change the media kind (Film Info, Options, first dropdown menu) from Film to Music Video (or whatever) and OK the change. The film itself will now play like any other video (though you'll have to remember it'll appear in a different tab in the library). Again, once it's started playing, you can get a second (or however much) into it, change it back to a Film and it will playback from that point. Can't vouch for whether this will reset to opening to a blank screen after the film has played through, but I suspect so.

Neither of these will get you access to the extras themselves back...so...seriously; Apple, get on it!...

Hope that helps someone.

If so, give the next homeless guy you see enough cash for a sandwich for me.

I have had this happen. Just log out of itunes (go to Account at the top) and then sign back in. Everything should work fine after that.

This worked for me. Purchased movie would play in Apple TV but not in iTunes on Macbook -- blank screen. Logged out of iTunes account, logged back in, and the movie played successfully.

I agree - this WAS NOT helpful. On my Mac in iTunes, movies I purchase will NOT play until they are fully downloaded. I cannot press the play now button and watch a movie before it fully downloads. if i do, all I see is the black start screen with the pause and play buttons etc. but nothing happens until the movie is fully downloaded.

Very annoying. All other applications and sites work perfectly so it must be uniquely an iTunes issue,

Pete

I had this problem on both a 2015 and 2017 Macbook Pro. No amount of authorising/deauthorising in iTunes, logging in and out of iTunes Store, macOS reinstalls, PRAM or SMC resets fixed it. And I found the issue to not just effect iTunes movie playback but also Netflix. This was a clue that it was actually an HDCP issue rather than a FairPlay one.

In the end I did solve it: the solution was to use Boot Camp to install Windows. And I mean that honestly not sarcastically, because it fixed the issue on the macOS side.

Once Windows is installed let it install the Bootcamp drivers package and all updates. Then once you restart in to macOS you will see that iTunes movies are working again. There must be something that the Windows Radeon driver does to "reset" things that the macOS driver never does?

Once you confirm that movies are playing in macOS again you can use Bootcamp assistant to delete the Windows partition and everything will keep working. There may be several different problems being conflated in to one issue here, so I don't promise this will work for you. Just saying what worked for me and offering it to the community.

i had the same problem this worked for me i closed iTunes went to task manager closed all iTunes tasks connected my Bluetooth speaker reopened iTunes and my videos played no problem

Thank you. This fixed it for me.

I had just purchased Justice League HD. It worked on IPhone, Apple TV, and PC airplay to Apple TV. It would go to black screen on my Windows 10 PC and not play. All other content still worked.

Signing out of Itunes and back in fixed my playback.

I had this problem until today. Do you still have trouble?
I purchased some movies/tv programmes on the TV using Apple TV. I could watch them on the TV and for some reason I could watch them on the Home Computer. But, couldn't watch them on my MAC. Until a friend, I was asking for help mentioned 'Home Sharing'. The Home Sharing was 'ON' on the Home Computer. As soon as I turned 'Home Sharing' in the 'ON' position on my MAC all the files transferred - it took a bit of time - in fact still downloading. The ones that have downloaded I can now watch.

Basically ... select 'Home Sharing On' on all your devices - home computer/MAC or whatever. It worked for me.

In my case on PC I solved this problem by switch off an option "Prefer AC3 passthrough" in audio/subtitles menu, close the window with a movie and play again. You can also try to change Maximum resolution to Standard and then back to HD in Playback options in Preferences as I read that it was helpful for someone.

See Get help with an item purchased from the App Store, iTunes Store, or iBooks Store - Apple Support. Get a refund for both payments since you haven't been able to use the content you wanted.

tt2

See Get help with an item purchased from the App Store, iTunes Store, or iBooks Store - Apple Support or use the https://reportaproblem.apple.com/ site.

tt2

A lot of us are having the same problem and all Apple does is keep sending articles to see if we have properly set everything up.

The thing is that the problem remains and apple "experts" don't seem [or know] how to properly solve this issue. It really is annoying that we have bought/rent a movie or tv show or whatever video and all we see are black screens.

Can you please fix this?

I have an older iMac (2008) and nothing has worked for me. Signing out and back in got rid of the black screen for me but the screen freezes at the beginning. The sound is fine. I guess I just wasted my money.

Well, I had the same problem. All Apple suggestions did not work. However, I also use VLC player on my Mac, this one needed an update, which I eventually carried out today. I also use an App from Square 5 (Italy) called Mpeg streamClip. I then replaced this with their latest beta version. After launching the App I got a error message that the developer had to update their app. However, my purchased films now play again. I presume, that with the upcoming MacOs I have to do a clean install. I have an iMac mid 2017 with a 4 GB videocard.

Yeah, mine do not play either! Itunes is just getting worse each new version.