Warner Catalog Titles on BD/UHD

[captveg]

Yes. I mean, I love several titles yet to be released on Blu-ray - The Sea Hawk, Captain Blood, Top Hat, Bringing Up Baby, Murder My Sweet, etc. - but none of those are "evergreen" sell in the 10,000+ - or even 100,000+ - kind of titles like Full Metal Jacket, Amadeus, or Casablanca. The titles that ALWAYS without fail make them money on LD, VHS, DVD, BD, and on and on. They've released all of those. All of them. Everything else is, sales history-wise, some kind of risk for them. Will Captain Blood sell 500 copies? 2000? It will certainly never be an automatic money maker like the lone true "evergreen" Flynn title The Adventures of Robin Hood.

Now, Fox has a couple "evergreens" left - namely The Abyss and True Lies. But I don't know if any of the other majors have anything left in that league, or that reasonably close to 'em.

[Gregory]

What's your source of information about the sales figures of all their titles, which are proprietary? Many of the films they own the rights to and still have not released on Blu-ray are among the most famous classic films ever made, and I just don't believe that Bringing Up Baby, film noirs, 1930s-40s comedies, Gary Cooper films, etc. etc. have not sold well enough to be released on Blu-ray, but The Great Race and all manner of other 1970s-90s stuff that almost no one ever talks about has. I grant that the market is not the same as it was for DVD, but that's no excuse for doing so little. LD sales were a joke in comparison, and they should still be able to release major titles from the 1920s-1950s and make money and not concentrate so heavily on color/widescreen titles. If the market were as bleak as you're making it out to be, then we wouldn't have the news (recently from Robert A. Harris) that 2015 will be Warner's biggest year for blu-ray yet. That suggests that they've been too cautious up to now.
I also don't understand the Warner Archive model for Blu-ray. They press the discs but make them available through far fewer retailers (Amazon and a couple others) and how does this help them exactly?

Said I wasn't going to do this again, so this will probably be my last word on the subject for a while. I do try not to be a broken record.

[Minkin]

Wooo. Clockwork Orange gets reissued for like the 10th time. I assume this still won't include the new restoration (which has thus far only made a cameo appearance on that documentary included on one of the reissues). What marketable anniversary is coming up for the film that they can release a few more times?

I kinda like the art for this box, but then I saw the MSRP: $199. Damn, you can pick up each individual title for like $5, what an absurd set. I really hope Murdoch ends up buying WB so that he can bring some sense to this company (like licensing things out/the banned cartoons/etc).

I don't mind a reissue if it is a satisfactory improvement (like the 4k Casablanca, or Playtime), but Warner has just fallen into parody.

[captveg]

I'm not saying other titles aren't profitable, but they are at a different, less dependable level, at least to suit types. They just aren't guaranteed huge sellers like the "evergreens" which are automatic sales no matter how many times they get re-released. Marketing people know the other titles are tougher to sell so they'd rather just bank on an easy re-release of Natural Born Killers.

Please don't read into this as me saying the market is dead and going to disappear tomorrow. I'm not saying that at all. But all the mainstream sellers that a high percentage of Joe Schmos will pick up on a whim are basically out there already. Then every five years or so they release them again because there are new Joe Schmos who have since got a Blu-ray player and only buy things at Target, and those are the titles that Target will carry. Not The Big Sleep, but Casablanca. Not The Philadelphia Story, but The Wizard of Oz. Again.

So everything else is either a solid middle tier release, or a niche release. Warner uses themselves for both (WHV vs. WA). All the other studios use themselves and a third party distributor. The middle release might gain some traction in regular retail world, but with some uncertainty. This is why Paramount kept something like Crocodile Dundee - a middle-selling title, one that can be casually bought by the regular public. But the Republic Library? Give it to a third party that collectors will seek out online and not expect to be at the WalMart end aisle. The Invasion of the Body Snatchers will sell this way. Just don't expect to find it frequently stocked at Best Buy.

Criterion, Warner Archive, Twilight Time, Scream Factory - These are third party business models that count on a dedicated minority to make the release profitable rather than the public at large. Warner is probably safe to bank on The Great Race as a title whose fans will seek it out, but not a title that Mr. Retail Shopper will grab while also picking up some household supplies. So, to Warner Archive it goes, to a more specified, dedicated, but far smaller purchase base.

As far as Warner's commitment to 2015 and beyond - well, my take on that is that the suits have recognized that they've probably bled the "evergreens" as dry as they can (especially after this latest majorly egregious wave of reissues) and it's time to make a bit more effort to promote the middle class titles they have on deck. I'm sure the film fans at the company are rejoicing right along with us if it turns out to be all that Mr. Harris indicated.

As for Murdoch trying to buy Warner - I don't see how that would be much better. After rising to the top of the heap release numbers wise in 2012-13, Fox has slowed down considerably this year. They did exhaust their "evergreens" that don't need Mr. Cameron's sign off, after all.

[AlexHansen]

Wasn't there supposed to be an anniversary edition of Lolita at some point?

[FrauBlucher]

Captveg, with everytihing you're saying suggests to me that the most important thing to Warner is the bottom line. Money, money, money. They have a small committment to the main stream movie fan and that's about it. I actually wonder how many Criterion titles sits on the shelves of the WHV/WAC executives personal collections. (My point being they are not serious cinephiles and could care less about the learned aspect of film.)

As Greogory says, "they have the biggest holdings" of any major studio by far, but their release ratio is piss poor compared to the other studios. Yes, of course the other studios have stopped releasing their titles blu ray but at least they license them out to labels that actually care about the films and what the films mean. That is why I prefer what Sony is doing than what Warner is doing, which is allow Criterion, amongst others to enter their vaults and pick out stuff that could be well represented by someone who really cares.

I would love for Fox to takeover the WB studios because then they can sweep away the execs that are currently in charge of this horrendous business plan at WB.

[felipe]

If the market were as bleak as you're making it out to be, then we wouldn't have the news (recently from Robert A. Harris) that 2015 will be Warner's biggest year for blu-ray yet. That suggests that they've been too cautious up to now.

That statement led me to believe several titles intended for this year were delayed for some reason, that's why we saw a slower-than-usual 2014 and are expected to see a bigger-than-usual 2015.

[Roger Ryan]

Stanley Kubrick: The Masterpiece Collection Blu-ray set (Amazon Exclusive)

Contains the 7 Warner owned movies plus Sony's Dr. Strangelove, plus 2 bonus discs, 1 with "new" content.

Well, at least it seems like A LIFE IN PICTURES will finally be in HD after being relegated to DVD the last time around...or will it simply be up-scaled SD?

[manicsounds]

Pretty sure it's just the same disc as disc 2 of the digibook edition of "A Clockwork Orage", which the documentary was in SD NTSC.

[Roger Ryan]

Pretty sure it's just the same disc as disc 2 of the digibook edition of "A Clockwork Orage", which the documentary was in SD NTSC.

Of course! I had completely forgotten that the LIFE IN PICTURES doc was crammed into the 40th Anniversary edition of CLOCKWORK. Sorry about raising any false hope.

[solaris72]

Captveg, with everytihing you're saying suggests to me that the most important thing to Warner is the bottom line. Money, money, money.

Wait, do you mean to suggest that Warner Brothers is a for-profit business?

[boywonder]

Captveg, with everytihing you're saying suggests to me that the most important thing to Warner is the bottom line. Money, money, money.

Wait, do you mean to suggest that Warner Brothers is a for-profit business?

Yes, Warner is a for profit business. So, it follows that they would be happy leasing out a film like "McCabe & Mrs Miller", thereby making a few bucks on something they could give a rat's ass about, and Criterion would have a big seller in its niche base. It seems like a win win situation. I can't, for the life of me, figure out why Warner doesn't see it MY way.

[felipe]

Captveg, with everytihing you're saying suggests to me that the most important thing to Warner is the bottom line. Money, money, money.

Wait, do you mean to suggest that Warner Brothers is a for-profit business?

Yes, Warner is a for profit business. So, it follows that they would be happy leasing out a film like "McCabe & Mrs Miller", thereby making a few bucks on something they could give a rat's ass about, and Criterion would have a big seller in its niche base. It seems like a win win situation. I can't, for the life of me, figure out why Warner doesn't see it MY way.

But if Warner isn't willing to license a film like "McCabe & Mrs Miller", why would they have licensed Badlands (which seems to be a bigger title)?

[FrauBlucher]

But if Warner isn't willing to license a film like "McCabe & Mrs Miller", why would they have licensed Badlands (which seems to be a bigger title)?

...Because Malick pushed for it to happen.

[Aunt Peg]

But if Warner isn't willing to license a film like "McCabe & Mrs Miller", why would they have licensed Badlands (which seems to be a bigger title)?

...Because Malick pushed for it to happen.

I suspect it may have something to do with the fact that Warner's only acquired Badlands. As they did not actually produce the film there may have been some made it easier to licence to Criterion. Edward R. Pressman (one of the producers) probably had more to do with this than Malick but who knows.

[captveg]

12/2/14

Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003)

[flyonthewall2983]

Vanilla Sky has been pushed to 12/9.

[captveg]

I wouldn't be surprised if they are waiting on Crowe to sign off on the feature or on that new bonus content, but he's preoccupied with the production of his new upcoming film.

[Ashirg]

Any Given Sunday somehow now popular enough for a double-dip

Oliver Stone explains the double dip -

Important to point out that this disc also contains, for the first time, the original theatrical version of the film. The theatrical cut was 2hrs and 43min, but the DVD version was shorter at 2hrs and 36min. At the time I was so jammed to finish for December 1999 release that I continued past the deadline into cutting the DVD Director’s Cut so as to come out quickly. Convinced this was the correct cut (still am), I asked WB not to release the rushed original theatrical version. This is unusual, but they accommodated me.

Over the years film purists have scolded me for this missing theatrical version – and here we’ve done the right thing. Looking forward to your appraisal of the differences.

[flyonthewall2983]

Amazon still has Vanilla Sky listed for an October release, btw.

[manicsounds]

bluraydefinition review of "Once Upon A Time In America: Extended Cut"

[EddieLarkin]

In response to a question on Facebook regarding the Weissmuller Tarzan films coming to BD:

WHV is exploring these films for possible Blu-ray release in the future. Much work would be required to bring them to Blu-ray quality standards.

I don't know the board's general feelings on these films, but the first two are some of my most wanted upgrades. It's nice to hear that if they do come, they'll be newly remastered/restored.

[domino harvey]

The Replacements in January, which I believe was one of the early fullscreen-only Warner titles

[PfR73]

Nah, The Replacements wasn't even released in theatres until several years after the advent of DVD. The DVD release was widescreen.

[manicsounds]

bluraydefinition of "Roger And me"