haineshisway
Senior HTF Member
I had occasion to watch the original Invaders from Mars on its rather sad-looking DVD from Image and so I went back and looked at the fourteen-page thread that involved Wade Williams, who purportedly holds the rights and some of the elements, about which there was some contention by an overseas company who went to court over it and won, if I read correctly. In that thread, Wade was responding but it got a bit contentious and the thread was closed. But the gist of it all was he owned everything, he was difficult to negotiate with, Kino had walked away from six months of negotiations, but according to him he was restoring everything and it would be out either through distributors he was negotiating with at that time and was close to making deals, or by his own company.
Here we are, four years later and nada, squat, nothing. So, all that palaver was just that, clearly. But the most interesting part of it, for me, was the discussion about Detour - he owned it, no one else could do it, he would only allow it if the remake he did was included and on and on - AND, he kept saying how Criterion was interested but they hadn't made a deal. Well, as you know, Criterion DID do a beautiful, stunning Blu-ray release of Detour and I just pulled it out and guess what? There's no remake, there's no copyright for Wade Williams (copyright line is for PRC, the company that made the film), there's no mention of Wade Williams at all. So, what's the deal there? Criterion obviously would not have done it if they could not have done it and just as clearly, Mr. Williams did not go after them. Was all that bluster? I'm honestly curious about it or if anyone knows anything about any updates with Mr. Williams or the overseas company that said they owned Invaders from Mars. It is criminal that this film sits in limbo. As do the rest of the titles he owns or says he owns.
Here we are, four years later and nada, squat, nothing. So, all that palaver was just that, clearly. But the most interesting part of it, for me, was the discussion about Detour - he owned it, no one else could do it, he would only allow it if the remake he did was included and on and on - AND, he kept saying how Criterion was interested but they hadn't made a deal. Well, as you know, Criterion DID do a beautiful, stunning Blu-ray release of Detour and I just pulled it out and guess what? There's no remake, there's no copyright for Wade Williams (copyright line is for PRC, the company that made the film), there's no mention of Wade Williams at all. So, what's the deal there? Criterion obviously would not have done it if they could not have done it and just as clearly, Mr. Williams did not go after them. Was all that bluster? I'm honestly curious about it or if anyone knows anything about any updates with Mr. Williams or the overseas company that said they owned Invaders from Mars. It is criminal that this film sits in limbo. As do the rest of the titles he owns or says he owns.
