Warners announce Bette Davis Collection (1 Viewer)

Hard on the heels of Joan Crawford, aptly enough, comes Warners Bette Davis Collection:

Warner Home Video have announced the Region 1 DVD release of The Bette Davis Collection for 14th June 2005. This 5 DVD set features Davis in multiple Emmy-nominated performances as a captivating adulteress, a manipulative beauty, and a former Oscar-winning actress recovering from the end of her career. The films include new to DVD releases of Mr. Skeffington and The Star alongside newly repackaged DVD editions of Dark Victory, The Letter (1940) and Now Voyager.

The Bette Davis Collection will retail at $49.92 SRP. Individual titles will be priced at $19.97 SRP.

Details at DVD Times here.

I wish Warner would stop packaging previously released dvds with such boxsets. I'm okay with releasing maybe one title, but doing so with three titles is too much.






Crawdaddy

Agreed - BTW DVD Times rumoured R2 Warners schedule is showing an August release for an SE of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane.

Surely if this is imminent in R1 also, it should have replaced an already released title in either of the Crawford / Davis sets...

And all oscar-nominated performances. With these two new titles that's 5 Bette Davis films this year alone. Thanks for that Warner, but can't we have more?

Isn't the R2 Baby Jane release the same release as in R1 but four years later? They did the same last summer with Splendor in the Grass in Germany.

The more I think about this boxset, the more it bothers me, especially since "The Letter" just came out not too long ago. Warner, you could've released the following:

• The Great Lie
• A Stolen Life
• Dangerous
• The Man Who Came to Dinner
• Watch on the Rhine
• The Bride Came C.O.D.

And there are other films you could've substituted for "The Letter".






Crawdaddy

Luckily, I don't have any of these titles yet, so I'll probably grab this box even though I haven't seen any of the movies.

That said, I agree that re-packaging that many titles is not a wise decision. It seemed like for a long-time WB wasn't doing that as they avoided obvious chances to do so in "The Gangsters Collection", "The Comedies Collection", "The Errol Flynn Collection", & "The Classic Musicals Collection", but with the announcement of this & "The James Dean Collection", things seem to be shifting. This would be a very good point for someone to bring up at the upcoming chat.

Emmy-nominated?? I don't think any one of those titles was a tele-film.

Must be a Warners typo; I think we know what they mean

Well, I only have The Letter, so I'll be pleased to buy the box for two previously unreleased titles and two others without snappers. The duplicate of The Letter I'll give to my girlfriend's mum – at only $50 (probably less online) I don't have a problem.

I might avoid buying individually released Warner titles in future, however...

And therein lies the danger for the marketeers...

Yes, I might have to rethink how I buy individual Warner titles now.





Crawdaddy

Especially in light of how many WB Davis titles have not yet been released. We could list at least a dozen here in a heartbeat, all of which are A-titles.

I can see a definitive boxed set like the Hitchcock collection, let’s face it NxNW was one of his most beloved films and to exclude it would be silly. But to release a set where 3 out of 5 titles have already been released (even if Dark Victory is a remaster), seems rather lackadaisical. If they felt DV was worthy enough of being remastered, surely they’d have enough confidence in it selling on its own. Titles not yet released would be an ideal way to acquaint those not familiar with her films – doing so by getting them virtually free as the benefit of purchasing the box. They’re missing out on the potential of exposing older films to a broader audience – at no extra expense.

A silly decision IMO.

Is DARK VICTORY a remaster? It seems the same release as before.

Just looking at numbers is strange that the Joan Crawford boxset has three previously unreleased films while the Bette Davis one only has two. If they wanted to make an Oscar-nominated performance box, (which seems to be the reasoning behind it), why not include DANGEROUS?

Also, wasn't THE STAR a Fox film?

Well, you either own the snapper versions by now, or, like me in the Bette Davis case, you don't. So I don't see it affecting many future keep-case releases. The Letter being the one exception, which I understand the grumbling about, as it was a keep-case release to begin with and it also would have been cheaper to wait for the box, had it been known. But you can easily count that as one of the two "free films" in the box set, price-wise, and either sell, trade or give it to someone who doesn't have the film yet.

On the upcoming Doris Day set, I already own both Calamity Jane and The Pajama Game, but it's still cheaper for me to buy the box and give away the two repeats than to buy the new titles individually, so it's still a win for me economically.

Warners probably thinks everyone would want a repackage of the "dreaded" snappers that everyone complained about quite vociferously for years, and they've provided it for free in these box sets when you look at the price, and now people are unhappy about that.

I, for one, feel they've found a great price-effective way for me to replace the snappers in my collection, and I'm quite happy about it.

Herb,
Is it remastered? I thought the same dvd was just repackaged from a snapper dvd case.







Crawdaddy

Not when the previously released dvds outnumber the newly released dvds in the same boxset. I thought the Doris Day boxset has 6 or more titles to it.






Crawdaddy

That's what it says on the cover art.

I just checked the Doris Day boxset and it has six new releases along with two previously released dvds. Furthermore, doesn't one of the greatest actresses of all-time deserve more of an effort in releasing this boxset. When you think of Warner, you think of Bette Davis just like Cagney and Bogart.

Herb, you're right about the cover art which brings to mind that I probably wouldn't be complaining if Warner had substituted "The Letter" which came out in January for another unreleased title.

It's just that the cover looked the same.

If it's a new transfer it might be worth it buy the box and dropping the other two. But surely they would mention that in the press release, wouldn't they?

Actually, that's not quite true. The box sets are always half the price of the individual titles. So, in the Davis box set case, at a list price of $19.97 for each title and $49.97 for the box 2 and 1/2 movies are free. That means it would cost someone 10 additional dollars to convert the 2 snappers to keepcases ($5.00 a snapper), and they could easily trade or sell The Letter for almost that price. And the Bette Davis set does seem to be the exception with the most repeats. I can't remember another another WB box that had so many.