90% of quicktimes - "Movie could not be played"

I just want to make sure that my iphone isn't messed up. I cant play 90% of quicktimes i come across on the web, on the iphone, using safari. Just want to make sure this is normal

If the video is not provided in an iPhone compatible format even though the video is a QT video, it cannot be played on the iPhone.

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I am not computer savvy. I have a second generation itouch, and have never had any problems. Just recently, certain songs will not play. It will skip the song to the next one. Certain videos will not play. The message, "This movie could not be played

I am not computer savvy. I have a second generation itouch and have never had any problems with it until now. When I try to play certain songs, it will not play the song and skip to the next song selection. When I try to play certain videos, the message "This movie could not be played" appears. I contacted a tech spec who said it was possibly a format problem. How do i fix this?

This might sound weird, but here's an idea which worked for me re music that was newly added to itunes and showed up in my ipod but wouldn't play - I simply played the tracks in itunes first, just a second of time or so will do it, not the whole track, then connect the ipod and sync again and this time they played - hope this helps.

How do I fix "This movie could not be played" erros?

On my iPod touch (1.1.3 with January Software Upgrade) whenever I try to play a movie it tells me "This movie could not be played." I don't quite understand why it is doing this. They are movies I downloaded from iTunes. I have some other movies that iTunes tells me cannot be played on my iPod and therefore does not sync those movies, so shouldn't it have kept these movies off as well if it couldn't play them? I am quite sure that my iPod should be capable of playing these movies. I have lately noticed that it also says the same message if I try to play a youtube video, another movie online, or audio online. What is happening and what can I do to fix it? (Already gone through everything in the "Five steps to fix common iPod Touch problems")
Thanks.

I got the same message. I made a slideshow in iPhoto. I used songs from itunes. I exported it into movies (.mov) and then tried to put it into my touch. I read somewhere (on another blog) that there are some licensing issues - which is stupid because I purchased the music from itunes. Anyway, the gist I got from that one was that you should burn the songs to a cd...then re-import them into itunes from the cd. Then you can use them without error. I don't know if I'm following the appropriate steps, but so far it isn't working for me.

"This movie could not be played", and apps don't launch

Brand new iPod Touch
Windows XP
Both iTunes and the Touch have the latest software
Syncs successfully
Attempting to play a movie produces the error "The movie could not be played" on the iPod Touch. The movie plays successfully in iTunes on the PC.
Affected content includes:
"Juno" digital copy which was included with a DVD, launches in iTunes, enter a unique code to redeem.
"Stargate" free preview, downloaded directly from the iTunes store on the Touch
Additional symptom: no downloaded app will run on the iPod Touch (the "built-in" apps run fine) They appear to launch and then instantly disappear.
Affected content: "Facebook" and "Yahoo Messenger" apps
These problems occur whether the content is added through iTunes on the PC and then synced over, or downloaded directly to the Touch through the built-in store.
Because "free", non-DRM content (such as videos I've created from DVDs using Handbrake) works perfectly, I suspect an authorization problem.
Already tried:
syncing and re-syncing
multiple hard resets
de-authorizing and then re-authorizing the iTunes on the PC, and then re-syncing
Backup and restore
Anything I'm missing? Otherwise it's going back to Best Buy tomorrow.

Similar story here...
iPod Touch - 32GB v3.1.2 (7D11) - Model MC008LL
iTunes - 9.0.2 (25) - Intel 32-bit
Bought a 32GB iPod Touch yesterday and have been trying for hours to get two of my "digital copy" movies to work.
I have some other videos that I converted from MPEG-4 to H.264 and they play perfectly. I also suspect it may be a digital rights (DRM) related issue.
My apps, however, do work:
Skype (free)
Google Earth (free)
Globe Convert (free)
NASA (free)
I have tried resetting the device and restoring all settings with no success.
-Ed-

Error - "Cannot play movie: Movie could not be played"

Hi all,
I'm trying to stream an MP4 video on my iPhone 4 (OS 4.2.1), which I could do with no problems before. For some reason I am now getting the error "Cannot play movie: Movie could not be played". I have tested this URL on a PC web browser and it streams fine. I have tried over the 3G network and wiki... same result.
Has anyone experienced this and / or has a resolution?
Thanks,
Dave

take a look at this thread and see if it helps:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2691633&tstart=25

IPod Touch 4th Generation: This Movie Could Not Be Played

Dear Apple Support Community,
I'll ask this question here to see if anyone can help me out. I've been having this problem for a while now but it's beginning to get to me. I have 30 films bought straight off iTunes along with 8 TV series totalling at around 40GB. The problem is that every time I sync these films over to my iPod I just get this error when I go to play them: This Movie Could Not Be Played. The video format is correct and they have played on the same iPod before. They are SD if that makes a difference and I have tried every soultion I know of. I have restored to iOS 4.3.5 with no success and have also reset all the settings after scouring the web with no success either. If there is anything I need to do or have missed out that may help me solve this problem please tell me.
Thanks,
Alex Holyoake
Edit: I forgot to mention that it can play music videos just fine, suspiciously...
Message was edited by: Stairhopper

Ok, I am replying to my own problem. I synced 1 more movie from itunes. This new movie played ok then they all played ok!!!

"This Movie could not be played" Message appears when trying to play video?

I have synced a number of vids to my iPhone 3G running 2.2 software.
This has been done thru iTunes which has a feature that advises you BEFORE you try and sync the file if it is in a compatible format and size. If not, then you cannot sync it.
I have been using a third party Vid file type converter to convert various files into iPhone compatible .mp4 files with sizes of either 320 X 240 or 640 X 480.
All worked well until today. I had just finished playing such a vid with no problems and when I went to replay it I got this message:
"THIS MOVIE COULD NOT BE PLAYED"
I then went thru my 26 vids that I had synced to my iPhone and found that 12 of them would no longer play????????
NOTHING changed...How could a vid that played fine suddenly not play anymore, along with a number of others that previously played with no problems?
I cannot think of what specific parameters are the same in those 12 files that make up the group that will no longer play?
I did a "Hard Shut Down" of my iPhone and then Reset all Settings...nothing worked?
Tonite, when I get home and have access to iTunes, I will delete and re-sync some of the now unplayable vids to see if they will be accepted for syncing and if so, if they will now play again?
In the meantime, is anyone else having similar problems? Cause? Fix? Workarounds?
Any advise would be much appreciated, as I do NOT want to lose the ability to view these vids, or any others like them, that may no longer play on my iPhone!
Thanx..
Chuck Proche

Thankyou for the two replies.
I have some good news but I still am concerned about why this happened?
Using iTunes, I deleted then re-synced the video files that wouldn't play and now all of them play again.
As I don't know why this problem occured, I am concerned about it happening again...it is NOT fun to have to delete and reload all of these vids, but, at least I know that there is some kind of "workaround"!
If anyone has an idea of WHY this happened and, perhaps how to prevent it in the future, I would appreciate that input despite the fact that all my vids now play again.
Chuck Proche

The movie could not be played

I purchased a movie on my iPad through iTunes. It worked great for a few months. Now I just get a message saying "cannot play the movie". I tried rebooting. I tried making sure that I am online and logged onto iTunes. But nothing is working.
The only thing that changed was that I did a backup on my computer.
Advice.

I purchased the movie with my iPad. But I see now that I synched it with my desktop that it is in the desktop's iTunes and playable. But it no longer shows up in the "Purchased on my iPad" list. I can't figure out how to get it to synch with my iPad.
I do click on the file and look at the "information" and it shows the same email address that I use with both my iPad and my desktop iTunes.

I Rented a movie and I try to play it but it says movie could not be played, I Rented a movie and I try to play it but it says movie could not be played

Help please…

I have A regular 8th iPod touch no phone and I rented it and it's not on the screen under videos when I plug my iPod in it only has my music videos and tv show not my movie can u please help me

How-to-fix? -- "This movie could not be played" error

all of sudden movies don't play; neither stuff on YouTube, nor the iPhone tutorials on Apple.com
i'm accessing these over wifi
i see an hour-glass-like thingie saying "loading movie" but then a pop-up pops-up giving the error message
any ideas?
thanks

thanks for the reply, and i thought of that, too
but i only have 43 pics on it, so there's still 7gb+
prior reply nailed it, so i suspect it twas an OS burp
and i thought only windoze had those
ciao'

I was using the 4oD app on my iPod touch and when I went to watch something on it it froze my internet access and I can't get rid of the message "This movie could not be played". How do I fix this???

Please help!!

Have you tried resetting the iPod. Nothing will be lost.
Reset iPod touch: Hold down the On/Off button and the Home button at the same time for at
least ten seconds, until the Apple logo appears.

This video could not be played

I have purchased 2 movies in the itunes store(Bandits and Shoter) and downloaded a free TV preview of Lost series. None will play on my Iphone. I get a message "The movie could not be played" and get returned back to the main menu.
The Bandits movie used to play a week ago. This week it simply would not play. I have tried a soft reset on the iphone. Deleting and Re-syncing the movies in the iphone. You Tube movies, however, play correctly,
Would you please tell me how to fix this?

If a Reset and removing and re-transferring the video to the iPhone has not worked, try restoring your iPhone as a the next step.

I'm running snow leopard. The try to open any .mov file in Quicktime, and I get an error message that says, "The document xyz.mov could not be opened. The movie is not in a format that Quicktime player understands. I'm a recent upgrade to Snow Leopard.

I'm running snow leopard. The try to open any .mov file in Quicktime, and I get an error message that says, "The document xyz.mov could not be opened. The movie is not in a format that Quicktime player understands. I'm a recent upgrade to Snow Leopard.
Help!
Thanks, Mark

Unfortunately, the error message gives no details about what codec might be missing or what it needs.
If the file can't be opened in QT, it only means you cannot use the QT "Inspector" window to check what compression formats were used to create the file. It does not mean you can't use the Finder "Information" window to check on the compression formats or use a third party media information window (e.g., like VLC which will open many compression formats not supported natively by QT) to determine what kind of data is included in the MOV wrapper. If the file cannot be opened in any app, it is usually a good sign that the file itself is corrupted.
It's a stupid error message. Apple should do better than that.
Error trapping is quite extensive but there are still many areas which require human oversight. The message is telling you that either the container has a problem (e.g., not properly terminated, non-standard, or corrupted) or that one or more of the compression formats used is not supported by your current codec component configuration or that the data was encoded using non-standard settings or preferences not supported by QT or that the fourCC code does not match the data contained in the file or that there are timecode inconsistencies, etc., etc., etc. In short there are a near infinite number of possible problems for which it would be very difficult/nearly impossible to program error trapping depending on your sourcing of content and how you process it before it reaches the player app. Think of it like trying to play a BD disc in an DVD player.
I'll call Apple support when I get a chance.
Chances are good that they will end up sending you back here. In any case, it is often a good idea to post a sample file for examination by other QT users. At the very least, they should be able to tell you if the sample file will play on other systems which would indicate whether or not the file itself is bad and under the best of circumstances whould allow them to examing the file in detail for various common problems.

The document "BOULET PEANUT - OFF LINE 3-QuickTime H.264.mov" could not be opened. An unknown error occurred (-101)

I turned on my mac this morning after using Qt all day yesterday with no problems
I get this message
The document “BOULET PEANUT - OFF LINE 3-QuickTime H.264.mov” could not be opened. An unknown error occurred (-101)
Also QT will not play the audio of the files
I'm on a mac pro, 10.7.4
Everything updated
Any know whats up and can help solve this, it seems to be a software related problem to QT 7 or X

Exactly the same by my iMac.
"The document ... could not be opened. An error occurred (-101)"
I can play the same video with VLC player but not with QuickTime.
QuickTime and iTune can not play anything at all.
VLC Player however can play all medias without any problem.
All my apps are uptodate.
What could be the problem?

Quicktime movies corrupting randomly. "The movie could not be opened."

Hello,
Has anyone else encountered the Quicktime error where you have a perfectly functional file stored to a disk and then randomly, the file's icon will change from a still image from the movie to just the generic Quicktime file movie clip icon and then if you try and open the file you get the following error message:
The movie could not be opened.
The file is not a movie file.
Nothing was done to the file. Nothing was done to the disk. This can happen when no one is even using the computer. Once it happens, the file will not open or play at all. It just returns this error message. I've only seen this so far happen on ProRes HQ files. Doesn't matter if they are HD or SD. It is infuriating and is costing my facility a ton of money and time and making us seriously reconsider using Quicktime.
The only resource I've been able to find online that seems to be able to deal with this is:
http://aeroquartet.com/movierepair/repair.html
However, because of the nature of the content that I work with I cannot send a clip out of house for repair and cannot pay $89 per file (starting price). I would really like to see a response from someone at Apple as to why this is happening and what fixes are in the works to prevent it.
Thanks.

To Apple Discussions!
What type of files are they - .avi, .mp4, .mov, etc.?
Make sure you have the following installed:
Flip4Mac
VLC Media Player
Perian

90% of quicktimes - "Movie could not be played"

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