Disney & Sony Ink Deal For Sony To Take Over Disney's Physical Media Production (2 Viewers)

[Alex...]

“Disney and Sony have just inked a major deal for Sony Pictures Home Entertainment to take over all of Disney’s physical media production going forward.

This means that Sony will handle and oversee the actual authoring and compression of discs, that they’ll work with the replicators and packaging vendors, and that they’ll oversee the titles as they go out to the distributors and on to retailers.

I first received word of this deal about two weeks ago, apparently within twenty-four hours of the ink drying, and I’ve now confirmed it with multiple independent sources within the industry—people that I trust and have known and worked with for many years.”

EXCLUSIVE: Disney & Sony Ink Deal for Sony to Take Over Disney’s Physical Media Production, Disney Movie Club to Shut Down as a Result [UPDATED]

EXCLUSIVE: Disney & Sony Ink Deal for Sony to Take Over Disney’s Physical Media Production, Disney Movie Club to Shut Down as a Result [UPDATED]

thedigitalbits.com

 

[Sam Favate]

This is a very big deal for physical media enthusiasts. For Disney to let Sony handle their prized library... really says to me they have given up on physical media. I hope we can get some good things out of it in the short term, but I don't really see a long term here. I also hope they'll continue the Disney+ shows on 4k/blu-ray. Disney made a promising start with those last fall, but we've heard nothing since.

 

[Robert13]

I just saw the news earlier today. While it sounds great to "free 21st Century Fox movies!" I hope that it actually DOES just that. Sony isn't huge on physical media either. They release something now and then but they are not making regular announcements to even release their back catalog titles on bluray. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but does Sony license out their catalog titles? I can't recall seeing Kino or Shout releasing many, if any at all, Sony catalog titles.
It would be nice if this changed and at least gave boutique labels a shot at releasing 21st Century Fox and Hollywood Pictures catalog titles.

 

[Jake Lipson]

I also hope they'll continue the Disney+ shows on 4k/blu-ray. Disney made a promising start with those last fall, but we've heard nothing since.

I expect we'll here more details going forward and I could be wrong in the assumption I'm about to post. However, I would question whether Sony will have the authority to decide what to release or not release. I assume Disney will decide what to make available and Sony will just handle the creation and distribution of the discs. I would be very surprised if Sony gets to decide unilaterally to release Disney+ content without the blessing of the studio that owns it. I would imagine all of that is still Disney's choice.

 

[Randy Korstick]

I hope these means Disney will open up their large collection of Live action films from the 40's to early 80's. They have about 25% of them released on Disney plus maybe 40% if you add exclusives from DMC and digital only. Thats still alot of unreleased films.

 

[Ethan Riley]

Well, Sony likes money too. Maybe they'll say hey Disney--you've got this enormous catalog that you're not exploiting. (I doubt it, because Sony is deficient in terms of product too). But they should shake hands with Kino and get this product out there. They probably won't. They want millions and they're only going to get thousands.

 

[Kyle_D]

I expect we'll here more details going forward and I could be wrong in the assumption I'm about to post. However, I would question whether Sony will have the authority to decide what to release or not release. I assume Disney will decide what to make available and Sony will just handle the creation and distribution of the discs. I would be very surprised if Sony gets to decide unilaterally to release Disney+ content without the blessing of the studio that owns it. I would imagine all of that is still Disney's choice.

Agreed - this doesn’t sound like a licensing agreement. It sounds like an outsourced service agreement, although it’s possible Sony negotiated a minimum title guarantee to make the deal worthwhile.

EDIT: Deadline is now reporting that this is a licensing agreement

 

[tvwesternslover]

I hope we finally see the Disney treasures from the 1950s Swamp Fox, Texas John Slaughter, and Elfego Baca finally released.

 

[Jake Lipson]

it’s possible Sony negotiated a minimum title guarantee to make the deal worthwhile.

This would presumably include all future theatrical releases from Disney in addition to any catalog titles that Disney might want to put out. New stuff from Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars/Lucasfilm, and Disney's own live-action titles. That's a lot. I think it will be worth Sony's while as long as physical media is still around.

 

[SD_Brian]

does Sony license out their catalog titles?

They license stuff out to Criterion frequently, also occasionally to Shout! and Mill Creek. Oversees, they license out a bunch of stuff to Powerhouse, and probably some others that aren't on the top of my head.

I suspect this will ultimately be similar to the distribution deal Paramount used to have with Warner. The optimist in me says this news can only be an improvement over Disney's current physical media release pattern (an admittedly low bar to clear).

The pessimist in me predicts that all we'll see out of this agreement is an "Ultimate Spider-Man" box set, and that Sony will take Disney's place as "Worst Studio" in next year's HTF poll for sitting on the Disney and Fox catalogs.

Fingers crossed that the optimist is correct!

 

[Robert13]

Agreed - this doesn’t sound like a licensing agreement. It sounds like an outsourced service agreement, although it’s possible Sony negotiated a minimum title guarantee to make the deal worthwhile.

If that's the case, I wonder what happened to Mill Creek. Disney had previously had an outsourcing of product agreement with them. Are they adding Sony to the mix or replacing Mill Creek with Sony (meaning we'll just see Sony's logo now in place of Mill Creek on those releases). Mill Creek had already re-pressed some titles (including "Dick Tracy") on bluray and their logo appeared on the back of the case.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

This seems similar to the deal several years ago wherein Warner and Universal combined their home video units into a joint company, SDS. The mechanics here are somewhat different but the idea is the same: two larger companies are combining forces to release physical media, a reflection of the marketplace reality that it no longer makes financial sense for each studio to have its own physical media department.

I suspect that longterm, all of the major studios will be releasing their new release titles through a single distributor (probably SDS), and catalog product will mostly come from Kino, with special editions of select titles coming from boutiques like Criterion, Arrow and Shout.

For us physical media fans, anything that reduces overhead and thus reduces the number of units needed to sell to break even, prolongs the sustainability of our hobby.

Disney has historically been a company that, if they couldn’t make something work financially on their own, would simply abandon the pursuit altogether. I think this is ultimately a positive (if somewhat surprising) choice. The predictable move for Disney would have been to cease disc releases entirely. That they decided instead to make a deal with another company to handle this product line rather than eliminating it entirely shows a shift in the company’s thinking.

 

[Garysb]

I imagine this deal will start with Sony taking over what has already been released. The only difference will be Sony's logo added to the back of the package. I don't think this deal will mean that there will be more new releases then previously, just that there will be new releases. Rather than abandoning media, Disney has chosen to make it available through Sony. Disney will still control how much is released. I would look at this deal as a way to continue to make Disney product available rather than a way to release older or less popular titles or getting a 4K release of "The Sound of Music". Still much is unknown and maybe this deal will result in more releases from 2oth. The bits article mentions there are 20 classic 2oth films that have new 4k masters that Disney is doing nothing with on streaming or disc. I wish they could name the films.

 

[Jake Lipson]

Disney has already been releasing some smaller films on digital only. Theater Camp is the last one I bought this way because, as much as I would like one, a physical media release simply does not exist.

I buy Disney Blu-Ray titles most frequently of any studio out there. I want to continue to do that for as long as possible. This is kind of surprising because Disney was once so dominant in the physical media space. But if putting their titles out through Sony extends the viability of Disney films on physical media, that's fine. Like Josh Sid, Warner Bros. and Universal have already combined their distribution into one company, so this isn't even unprecedented.

 

[cineMANIAC]

This news coincides with the revelation that the Disney Movie Club is ceasing operations in May - any correlation to the Sony news?

 

[Garysb]

Here is the Deadline article about the deal.

Disney Reaches Licensing Deal With Sony Pictures Home Entertainment For DVD And Blu-Ray Releases Of Its Slate And Catalog

Disney has reached a licensing deal with Sony under which the latter's home entertainment division will handle Disney releases on DVD and Blu-ray.

deadline.com

 

[Into The Archives]

This is great news. Not only for the Touchstone/Hollywood Pictures that haven’t made it to BD (Think: Stakeout, Splash, What About Bob, Mr. Holland, etc) hope to see a rich selection of Fox titles, in HD, that have also not made it as well.

….and maybe Sony could take over the theatrical repertory business next!

 

[Josh Steinberg]

This news coincides with the revelation that the Disney Movie Club is ceasing operations in May - any correlation to the Sony news?

Yes, with Sony taking over the handling of physical media for Disney, part of that deal includes shuttering DMC as Disney is outsourcing the handling of physical media.

 

[Garysb]

This news coincides with the revelation that the Disney Movie Club is ceasing operations in May - any correlation to the Sony news?

Per the Digital Bits article, yes, it's part of Disney no longer producing it's own media. The bits expressed disappointment that Sony did not take over the Disney Movie Club.

 

[Filmfanatic10]

Wow, that was totally unexpected. When I first saw the headline, I thought it was about Disney taking over Sony's physical media business, but it's really the other way around.

And if Disney had already left the Australian physical media market last year, shouldn't Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment be releasing their product in that market as well?

Anyway, yeah, first Lionsgate, and now Disney. SPHE is really energizing and bulking up with those deals.