New Yorker

[onedimension]

I'm surprised no one has bought out New Yorker.. I could see Kino, who have so many sub-labels and recent acquisitions, being interested in having a little more of an art house market..

[dwk]

New Yorker lost the rights to the Kitano films a few years ago. BCI had picked up the rights but they went out of business before they released any of them.

[ShellOilJunior]

I sent an inquiry to them on Nov. 29:

Greetings,

I see your Web site has an October release date listed for this film. Do you happen to have an updated release date? Very much looking forward to this release.

All the best,
Patrick

They replied today (Dec 23):

All I am told is that it will be later in 2014. Sorry we can't provide
more info at the moment, but thanks for your interest.

[shaky]

Has anyone heard anything at all from these guys since last year? My goodness...

[FrauBlucher]

I wonder if they're on their last leg. You don't even hear of them signing deals to distribute new films.

[onedimension]

I think they're past last leg, were in wheelchair, now in hospital bed fighting valiantly. If they don't make it, hopefully another label can pick up the work they've put into 'Celine and Julie' - they did get out a theatrical release, right? so it's not all PR and red tape..

[whaleallright]

Since the New Yorker DVDs of Platform and Unknown Pleasures are technically out of print (though you can still find copies on Amazon and elsewhere), and Xiao Wu/Pickpocket doesn't seem to have any distribution in the US, do you think Criterion could pick up Jia Zhangke's so-called "Hometown Trilogy"? I'd love to see Platform, in particular, on Blu-Ray. Jia is working on a "definitive cut" of Platform (which will not be identical to the original, longer festival cut), and such a thing would certainly warrant a revisiting of his first three features.

(I would actually hope that any release of Platform include the release cut with which most are familiar, since it is such a remarkable--and remarkably proportioned--film.)

I don't recall this idea being batted about anywhere....

[FrauBlucher]

I wonder how this works if they go out of business and can't hold onto rights. Do the rights revert back to film makers or can NYer sell off rights to another company? I'm sure it's not as easy as all this.

[Max von Mayerling]

Not that I know much about this area, and not to be too much of a lawyer about it, but I would assume that their licenses are just an asset that would be dealt with like other assets. Unless the licensing agreements somehow provide otherwise. (And, sorry, but I imagine that the licensors are rarely the film makers - they are most likely studios or whoever it was that paid for the film (or whoever bought the rights from them, etc.).)

[FrauBlucher]

(And, sorry, but I imagine that the licensors are rarely the film makers - they are most likely studios or whoever it was that paid for the film (or whoever bought the rights from them, etc.).)

Yes, I should have suggested Producer and not filmmaker, unless one in the same.

[Shrew]

Yeah, if you look back in this thread, New Yorker actually already went bankrupt around 2008. Not sure of all the details, but everything went OOP and their theatrical distribution shut down. I think they tried to sell/auction off the rights to their library, but no one bought it (likely because it was being sold as a unit). Eventually they somehow got reorganized/came back, distributed a couple new films, got out a couple new discs, and then we're here.

Whatever's going on there, it certainly seems like they're an incredibly incompetent company. I can only assume some rich Manhattanite's discretionary funds are what keeps it afloat, but probably not enough to finance a print run of a new disc like Celine and Julie. This seems like it would be a perfect project for Kickstarter, but considering their website doesn't enough have an easy-to-find catalog page, I figure whoever's running it hasn't heard of such technology.

Unfortunately rights will probably stick with them until their natural expiration. Since New Yorker has so many low profile films I imagine they and/or their creditors fear they will be stuck with a lot of unsellable product if they let the relatively better-known titles like Celine and Julie, Beau Travail, or the Jias go seperately.

[feihong]

I wonder what they still have. They used to have some Bresson, some Sogo Ishii, quite a bit of Alain Tanner, some Chabrol...but I guess much of those rights have passed to other companies.

[SpiderBaby]

They have The Hour of the Furnaces. I started asking about a potential dvd release a couple years ago, in which they replied it would likely be a 2013 release (same with the Rivette). That of course didn't happen, and still waiting.

[feihong]

It sucks this that great movies can get buried in this way.

[javi82]

Do they still have Claire Denis' Beau Travail? I thought I saw there logo when TCM aired it about three months ago. I wish it would go to someone who would do something with it.

[FrauBlucher]

June 27th of 2013 is the last time New Yorker has updated their site.

Has anyone who pays close attention to the festival circuit has seen or read whether New Yorker has been attending or even bidding on films for distribution rights?

[JSC]

I thought I'd bump this thread up a bit to inquire if there's been any word
about the state of New Yorker Films these days. Their website hasn't been
updated in two years and I'm assuming the 'Celine and Julie go Boating'
blu-ray release is essentially kaput.

[domino harvey]

Rosenbaum answered a question about it in his Reddit AMA and said he didn't expect his extras to ever see the light of day, so since I can't imagine New Yorker paying for them and not using them, presumably the film's release is similarly DOA

[feihong]

On the Projection Booth podcast about Celine & Julie Rosenbaum said that the owner of New Yorker films didn't like the film, but it seemed to me that he basically implied that New Yorker probably wouldn't be releasing Celine & Julie in the future. Putting the different sources together, it seems really unlikely New Yorker has any plans for Celine & Julie.

[FrauBlucher]

New Yorker hasn't been active in any way. They no longer procure new films from the festival circuit. They are also letting rights from their catalogue lapse, as Criterion and Cohen have obtained a bunch that were previously with New Yorker. So, I don't know what to expect with Celine and Julie. Maybe it's just waiting for the rights to lapse.

[beamish13]

Liberating Alain Tanner's films from New Yorker would be tremendous.

They're infamous for their shoddy approach to film distribution, and they were known for loaning out unplayable 35mm prints to university film clubs and repertory houses during the 80's and 90's.

[whaleallright]

Does this company continue to exist—if only as a kind of holding company for the theatrical and home-video rights to a dwindling number of films, for which they may or may not have copies available—at all, or is it dead? It's grimly amusing to me that their website has read "The New Yorker Films’ website is being redesigned" for something like six years.

[JSC]

Maybe there should be a new thread for potentially moribund labels... when did anyone last hear something from New Yorker, Fantoma, Mondo Vision, etc...

[beamish14]

Maybe there should be a new thread for potentially moribund labels... when did anyone last hear something from New Yorker, Fantoma, Mondo Vision, etc...

I'm very interested in this as well. Mondo Vision is just one guy! Fantoma definitely seems dead.