Some VERY bad new about bilingual covers (1 Viewer)

[Gui A]

I'm pretty sure I'm buying a lot less DVDs ever since bilingual covers came out. If there's a disc two discs I want to buy, I'll usually end up getting the one that's not bilingual. Really, I don't like the way the text looks, it's very cluttered.
And it used to be that reversible covers would have English on one side and French on the other, now both sides have both languages, making reversible covers somewhat pointless.
Another issue I have is with Alliance Atlantis. They're just a distribution company up here, but they've changed intro credit sequences to make it look like they've paid for a major part of the film. Not cool taking credit for other people's work.

To my knowledge, there is a law in Canada that says he studios HAVE TO release covers with both english AND french on both sides....

I think this law exists only in one province: Quebec.
It does not apply to the other English only provinces.

 

[Paul_Stachniak]

He's basically hating a specific cultural group in Canada.

So does that makes me like a... er... cannibal or something.

Brad, it was a poor attempt at humor. My apologies. (Incidentally, I removed my comment from the "said" post.)

 

[Tom Tsai]

^ sorry, didn't mean to make it sound like that. I was merely clarifying to Philip what Brad was saying. I don't really care about personal views of others.

 

[Sven Lorenz]

A friend of mine got his boxset from amazon.ca this morning and it had the same reversible cover with the same ugly red circle on it.

 

[CraigF]

amazon.ca only sells ONE version of this set, at least right now. When it says something like [Version Francaise] that means the "other" non-import version is English only. If you see what I mean... FWIW for future reference DVDSoon lists the English-only version and is cheaper.

 

[Magnus T]

O Peter, where art thou?

 

[Craig S]

I got my "M*A*S*H" S4 set from Amazon.ca today, and I had been prepared for something hideous, but it's not THAT bad. I thought the red circle was going to be much bigger than it turned out to be.

That said, it's certainly not ideal, and this will probably be my last order from Canada. The great discounts have pretty much dried up now that the exchange rate is around 1.3 (was well over 1.5 when I started ordering from Canada). That combined with the increasing incidence of bilingual covers makes it no longer worth the hassle.

 

[Sven Lorenz]

Regarding amazon.ca - when they label something as an [Import] it should be the US version, right ?
I'm thinking about ordering the special edition of 'Babe' and the new edition of 'Breakfast Club' - both are from Universal so the Canadian versions will be bilingual.
I've compared the ASIN numbers and the numbers of the amazon.ca [Import] versions have the same ASIN numbers that the US version have at amazon.com.
Titles that are bilingual in Canada and do not have the [Import] tag (like Scorpion King) have a different ASIN number than the US version at amazon.com.
Has anybody had any experiences with amazon.ca [Import] titles ?

 

[Ian Currie]

Yes, I've ordered quite a few [import] titles from Amazon.ca.

I live in Canada and use them to order the U.S. versions to avoid bilingual covers.

Most of the time it works out fine, but it's not guaranteed. For example, I ordered an import version of Undercover Brother from them and received the Canadian version. I sent it back thinking it was just a shipping error, but received the same one again. Even weirder, I sent it back and ordered it from Amazon.COM and received the Canadian version!! Returned that one too.

I ordered the import versio of The Piano from them and it WASN'T the imported version but the Canadian version. This time I sent it back and tried Amazon.com again with success.

I should repeat that 8 times out of 10 I *did* receive the proper (i.e. U.S.) version from them when it was listed as IMPORT. From your standpoint, it might be a bit risky in case you have to return it.

 

[Sven Lorenz]

amazon.ca is cheaper than amazon.com and you have to pay less money for quicker delivery - so I guess I'll take that risk. If I order one DVD from amazon.ca and use DHL delivery (3 days) the order ends up being lower than the magic 22 Euro line most of the time - which means that I don't have to pay any custom fees and taxes. Ordering a single DVD from amazon.com almost always crosses that line and it takes up to 14 days for the DVD to reach me.
Thank you for your reply - now I can at least hope to get a cheap US version of those discs.