Breaking News: Universal Announces Blu-ray plans! (1 Viewer)

[Douglas Monce]

Yes the studios own the material, however there maybe contractual obligations to the people who are participating in the extra features. The actual extra features are not always made by the studios themselves. They are often produced by a third party company. Said companies may have a contract that requires additional payments if those materials are to be included on some new medium.

Also if music from the film is to be used in the special features, the composer and all of the musicians would need to be paid again. I often wondered why Disney's own behind the scenes stuff about Disneyland never used the actual music from the attractions. Well if it did they would have to pay the composers, lyric writers, musicians and singers again, or in some cases pay their estates.

Some actors are now including in their contract that they be paid extra to participate in the bonus features. Again that contract may require an additional payment for inclusion on a new medium.

Doug

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Aye, the same things happen in other industries too like in the world of still photography. It all depends on what the contract says between all parties involved -- and if things are not explicitly detailed in a contract, the courts will likely decide in favor of whatever contributing parties in terms of rights, additional revenues and such (unless the usage is non-commerical and not-for-profit). Look up the guy whose image was used by the mass produced Nescafe coffee brand for many years and see how that turned out for a relatively extreme, but real, example. There was also another famous case where a photojournalist (and his stock photo agency?) benefited greatly from some images of a homeless man in the Middle East -- can't remember if it was actually in Israel or not.

Nowadays, everyone tries to be super careful about such things. Even I as an amateur street photog (not looking to make $) has to be concerned about it -- and actually bothered to buy a book on this stuff though I still haven't spent time digging into it yet (partly because I haven't been actively shooting in a good while). And in places like France, they've even started legislating laws that are quite unfriendly toward street photography and even general tourist photography and such.

And going back to the cinema, remember what happened w/ certain scenes in the movie Devil's Advocate? I suspect the studio could've paid their way to keep them unaltered, but they probably simply decided to save the $$$ and chose not to.

_Man_

 

[Douglas Monce]

Exactly. And part of what the whole writers strike a few months back was about was rights in new media. I don't know if they were specifically trying to get rights from bonus features on DVDs, but if they were then that will be something that will effect EVERY union film made in Hollywood. And the writers won't be the only ones demanding money for these things. Honestly this is the kind of thing that causes movies to cost $200 million dollars.

Doug

 

[Sam Posten]

The Thing is one of my top tens as well!

 

[Jesse Blacklow]

Pfft. Don't blame the unions for the rising costs of making films. The writers' strike exposed how little those costs could be; in fact, that was the major point of the strike. Not to mention that, by a extremely large margin, the largest union costs for a film are from the service workers, and rightfully so, given that they often make up a large (if not the largest) part of the crew.

But that still pales to the cost overruns from producers and directors who can't say "no" to any offer that comes their way. It's also been mentioned by at least one major series' crew that the California government has been largely responsible for runaway costs, since for some reason they feel like they don't need to offer incentives for their largest industry to produce product. That's like Illinois not fighting for corn subsidies, or Virginia not offering deals for tobacco farmers.

 

[Dave Moritz]

IMHO I am glad that Universal is onboard and has gotten around to releasing Blu-ray titles. While there are some other titles I would have preferred to come out first. There are some good titles there and I am encouraged by the reports of DTS-HD MA being used for The Mummy, The Mummy Returns and Scorpion King.

I plan to add the following Universal titles to my HD library:
The Mummy (Own HD-DVD version) - DTS-HD MA
The Mummy Returns (Own HD-DVD version) - DTS-HD MA
The Scorpion King - DTS-HD MA
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
The 40-Year-Old Virgin
American Gangster
U-571 (Own HD-DVD version)


DOOMSDAY (Not sure as I have not seen it yet but might buy it anyway)

Granted the purchase of above titles are based on titles having lossless audio tracks. As long as the Mummy movies do in deed have DTS-HD MA tracks or at least an equivalent lossless track. I will be double dipping the Mummy movies very soon. There are a number of Universal HD-DVD's that I would replace with Blu-ray's but only if they have lossless tracks. Otherwise I might as well keep my HD-DVD's as my primary versions I watch. I am also hoping that the rumor that Back To The Future coming out this year ends up being true. That movie is definantly on the top of my must haves and I hope Universal will release that with lossless as well. Based on what I saw with Universals HD-DVD releases I am very optimistic about the Blu-ray releases we will see in the near future. The video on there HD-DVD releases was very good IMHO but I would have preferred the use of lossless audio instead of lossy Dolby Digital Plus tracks, even though they where being recoded and decoded as DTS on my system.

Welcome to Blu-ray Universal.

I can see that Blu-ray titles are going to keep me very poor!



Anyway has there been any more official title releases for the end of 2008 or for 2009?

 

[Jesse Blacklow]

No, not yet. However, I'd be shocked if they didn't release at least one other film, "Forgetting Sarah Marshall", which did well at the box office, plus the Apatow name could tie-in with the Blu-rays of either "Knocked Up" or "40 Year Old Virgin" or both.

 

[Sam Posten]

Uni's HD DVD releases were low key in a lot of ways, especially on catalog titles and minor new releases, there wasnt a whole lot of hoopla for many of them. I'd suspect they would get a little bolder on Blu but don't be surprised if you walk into a store and see a few Uni catalog titles you dont even remember them announcing.