NY Times article on unreleased DVDs

[Marq]

Nothing beats Sunday morning in front of the computer with fresh coffee, reading a weeks worth of great movie articles and reviews from the Times.
As always, free registration is required.
It's a nice article that details some of the process and reasoning why some films still aren't on DVD six years into the medium.

Greatest DVD's Never Made: A Most Wanted List

[larphillips]

That was a really great article Marq, thank you!

[aedavela]

Absolutely, what a great read.

[Riddick]

Marq that was a great read

And I'de like 5 minutes in a room alone with that asshole thats holding up my 3 disc version of Blade Runner . That fucker didn't even like the film, some people are just assholes

I would get arrested if I wrote here what I would do to that jerk-off

[Notoriousaurus]

I guess that was an okay article, it has its errors in it though.

For example "2 Fast 2 Furious" is already out, and I would have liked to hear more about the Harold Lloyd silent films. They are among the greatest of the silents and this was the first I heard about why they weren't released yet. I would like more background on this story.

It was a decent article, but I expect more out of the paper that always states "All the news that's fit to print"

[Riedenschneider]

Danke, Marq. What would would this forum be without you?

Originally Posted by Notoriousaurus

I guess that was an okay article, it has its errors in it though [...] but I expect more out of the paper that always states "All the news that's fit to print"

I agree.

"(Warner Brothers still sells the 1992 "director's cut," though the picture quality is mediocre.)"

Mediocre?

[Oscar Antonio M]

Thanks a lot Marq! It was a pretty interesting article to read.

[moviezzz]

Great article, thanks for the link!

I think it should clear up for some MGM's problems with certain titles. Why not all are OAR. Seems like it is a nightmare. ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK in a wrong can???

[FilmFanSea]

Originally Posted by Notoriousaurus

I would have liked to hear more about the Harold Lloyd silent films. They are among the greatest of the silents and this was the first I heard about why they weren't released yet. I would like more background on this story.

The word on the street is that Suzanne Lloyd (who is only in her early fifties) and the Harold Lloyd Trust have priced the DVD rights to the films too high for most of the independent companies which would be interested in releasing them (e.g., Criterion, Kino, Image). Since TCM* purchased broadcast rights from the Trust, Warner Bros* is considered the odds-on favorite for releasing these on DVD, but Warners may be waiting to see how their expensive Chaplin releases (and their newly branded "TCM Archives" releases) fare in the marketplace before plunking down money on the Lloyd films. (Also, with its extensive library of films--including the great MGM silents--Warner doesn't "need" the Lloyd films: they have plenty of their own films to keep them busy for the next decade.)

The Message Boards at the Official Harold Lloyd website document the frustration over the protracted wait for the Lloyd films on DVD.

Many of us feel that--due to the TCM airings of the silents--the awareness of Harold Lloyd and the demand for his films on DVD has never been higher, and if the Trust continues to hold out for a ridiculously high bidder, a great opportunity will have been lost.


*Both Turner Classic Movies (TCM) and Warner Brothers are subsidiaries of the conglomerate AOL/Time-Warner, which loves co-branding opportunities

[larphillips]

Originally Posted by moviezzz

Great article, thanks for the link!

I think it should clear up for some MGM's problems with certain titles. Why not all are OAR. Seems like it is a nightmare. ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK in a wrong can???

If you could see how many film prints are stored (especially the remnants and non-theatrical cuts), you would be appalled. Only within the past few years have there been a real effort to find, catalogue, and properly archive things. Hell, we are only thirty or so years removed from WB and MGM dumping original animation cells of their classic cartoons into landfils.

[Soggy Bagel's Revenge!]

The fact that the Marx Brothers films are STILL not in print on DVD is quite amazing. I need "The Cocoanuts", so I can see my friend Ashley's morning dance

The NY Times Sunday movie articles are always very well-written, but I feel always cover material that's pretty much obvious and doesn't necessarily need to be pointed out. The information they provide in this article about "Blade Runner" and MGM's search for "Escape from NY" is pretty interesting, however.

[roomservice]

What makes me mad is that they can't have a few movies just "barely break even." Why does every single release have to have a huge profit?
If they can release a movie that some people will love and only make a little money or just break even, they owe it to us, the real people that spend our hard earned dollars buying movies that keep them in business in the first place!

[larphillips]

Originally Posted by roomservice

What makes me mad is that they can't have a few movies just "barely break even." Why does every single release have to have a huge profit?
If they can release a movie that some people will love and only make a little money or just break even, they owe it to us, the real people that spend our hard earned dollars buying movies that keep them in business in the first place!

It's a business not a charity. For the major studios, they are roped in by the low-end price points of a DVD. Image and Criterion are considerably more expensive, so they can afford a 'risky' release. That higher price doesn't work in the models of the majors. In a perfect world, every movie would be out and in prisine condition. As it is, they are doing a fairly good job and I'm not complaining.

[tripps]

the studios will sell 100 times more copies of a bad action film made three years ago than they'll sell of a great film that they've dug out of the archive.

I hate people.

Still, I'm very excited to hear about the SE of Duck Soup... sweet!