Paramounts new bilingual cover in Canada (1 Viewer)

[Jeff]

I've noticed Paramounts new Canadian cover on Zoolander and Hardball. It has French and English on the front and back. I must say, I'd much rather have the "original" covers in my collection. I think if Forrest Gump had this, I would have gotten mine in the US.

Is anyone else anal about this like me? Maybe I'll get used to it.

Jeff

 

[Marc Deslauriers]

I'm pissed-off about it too. God damn Québec laws.

Marc.

 

[Hakan Powers]

I've noticed this on a couple of recent Universal DVDs.. Captain Corellis Mandolin had a bi-lingual back

 

[Andrew Budgell]

This was also the case with Life With Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows. Luckily I pre-ordered mine from the States.

Andy

 

[Michael Dueppen]

Is the spine bilingual as well? (like Jay and Silent Bob strike back from Miramax)

I can live with two languages on the back but two languages on the spine is really too bad.

 

[Dave Gilbert]

Alliance was doing OK by me until Jay & Silent Bob.

The reversible covers are a good idea, but why does the spine need to be bi-lingual?

 

[rhett]

I hate them, hate them, hate them!
A reversible cover is fine, but why then must the english side be full of french on the spine and back? I just hope Alliance doesn't start doing what they did with their first releases, like the first two Scream films, where the front was all english, then the back was the cover entirely in french.

 

[Kenneth Vestergaard]

I'm all for a petition and letter-writing campaign against this. Why must they annoy people with this stupid practice? Dual-sided covers with english on one side and french on the other was just fine.

If we don't make them aware that we don't approve of this, they'll continue with this practice.

Unfortunately I'm from Denmark and I guess it would be best if someone from Canada could start the petition? Probably makes more sense to the studios (Alliance, Universal, Paramount).

 

[Andrew Walsh]

It's all about laws and money. They're trying to find a way to save the costs of printing two different runs and potentially being stuck with too many unsold French DVDs. The reversible inserts don't help them since they still have to seal them with one side showing or the other. It's still preferable to their first choice, which was having the french cover on the back, covering all the details of the disc. Bottom line is, they're cheap bastards, and now that they've set their minds to this, nothing will stop them. I don't know if this is annoying enough to boycott them, and it's too expensive to import american versions.

 

[Chris Bardon]

I don't understand-what's wrong with having reversible art with the English facing outward? Hell, most discs don't even have a french cover, but just a sticker on the plastic that says "french version included". With the reversible art, the quebecios can buy their dvds of anglo movies, tear off the packaging, and immediately flip the covers to show the french. Rental outlets can do the same.

On a semi-related note, I've noticed Future Shop starting to put french inserts in with some of the Xbox games (B&W photocopy inside the security thing). Nice for the maybe two francophones who live here, but the rest of us are left unable to read the back of the game.

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

I agree this is a stupid practice, and had hoped it was over with Alliance's dual sided covers, which seemed a great accomodation. I opted for the US versions to avoid this before. If I wanted Frissons in my collection I would have bought it.

 

[Martin Fontaine]

I'm pissed-off about it too. God damn Québec laws.

WOW! I'm not alone! Judging by your location and name, I can tell your first language is french just like me, yet you understand the importance of watching movies properly, good for you.
Me too, I was annoyed by Jay & Silent Bob's spine, isn't this the point of a reversible insert, so that french is on one side and english on the other. On the disk itself, I don't mind it being bilingual. And if they want, they can package some disks with the french side outwards. THERE IS NO WAY IN HELL I WILL EVER BUY A FRENCH ONLY PACKAGING BECAUSE "WHO CARES, THE DISK STILL HAS BOTH LANGUAGES ON IT" this is unacceptable.
I'm so sick of those laws and manipulation happening around here centered around the idea that french speaking people should not even know the proper title of a movie. People in Montreal: you know that free paper they distribute in the metro, well, it's in big part because of me and the e-mail I sent (In multiple copies - 100s at a time after awhile since they were ignoring it) that now, when they announce new DVD releases they put "VF de ..." under. As if it was a crime to even tell people that OSL is better.

 

[Bill Harris]

speaking of the frenching up of discs. anybody else a little miffed that the Canadian version of Session 9 has a 2.0 track for english and a 5.1 track for french!.

 

[Peter_A]

God I hate the bilingual covers! Why does the rest of the country really need French on our DVD covers? Yeah, there's a real demand for French covers out here in BC. :rolleyes

 

[AnthonyL]

I also noticed this on Tuesday. It just ruins the covers.
What else can we expect?

 

[Anders Englund]

Curious: Does this mean I'll have to stop using DVD Boxoffice? So far I haven't ordered any of the titles you mentioned, but I really don't want these... things.

--Anders

 

[JulianK]

I've got the Alliance Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back disc, and the dual language spine is very annoying - even though the disc comes in a double-width case, because there are two logo's are on the spine, the title isn't large enough to read from any distance. (Of course, it's filed with all my other Kevin Smith discs, so it's easy to find, but that's not the point!)
Aesthetically the spine is horrible. At the moment I buy all my Region 1 discs from Canada - hello, DV-Depot! - but I might have to consider buying Alliance titles from the US in future...

 

[Jeff]

I think in order to help end this practice, online Canadian retailers are going to have to join the fight and in order to get them into this is for people, especially those overseas, to tell them that they will be ordering their Paramount, Alliance (Miramax), etc, DVD's from the US instead.

Jeff

 

[Michael Dueppen]

At the moment I buy all my Region 1 discs from Canada - hello, DV-Depot! - but I might have to consider buying Alliance titles from the US in future...

Exactly my problem. I get all my discs from DV-Depot but if this two-languages-on-the-spine thing continues I'll have to get my discs from the US. (which would suck because DV-Depot is great).

 

[Antonio Silva]

Same here. I just have to start ordering from the USA. It's more expensive, but i'd rather have the original covers. Nitpicking? Yes, and proud of it.

Cheers...