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I wasn't saying 25th Hour couldn't happen, I just wanted to remind people Spike Lee is not a creditable source as far as Criterion goes. I'd love it to be true but don't be surprised if a non Criterion SE comes out.

Oh... okay. ](*,)

colinr0380 wrote:And The Last Cigarette would make a good companion film for The Insider!

And both the original broadcast and re-broadcast of the 60 Minutes story, at least the segments with Wigand, would be kind of nice.

It would be nice, the practicality of it would be way more tricky I'd imagine. I'm not sure what it would take for Criterion to get CBS to allow them use of two segments that left the news division a pretty big black eye.

EDIT:...no pun intended

flyonthewall2983 wrote:I'm not sure what it would take for Criterion to get CBS to allow them use of two segments that left the news division a pretty big black eye.

Free copies of Border Radio for everybody!

Anything at all addressing the controversy would be nice. Considering the blow out over the cuts then and once again when the film dug the issue back up, I'd think that someone would be happy to sit down and discuss whatever internal politics weren't depicted in the film. People who worked with Bergman then are still pissed with him about the movie.

flyonthewall2983 wrote:It would be nice, the practicality of it would be way more tricky I'd imagine. I'm not sure what it would take for Criterion to get CBS to allow them use of two segments that left the news division a pretty big black eye.

They got the 60 Minutes interviews on "F For Fake", before and after. So why not?

I'm not saying it's an impossibility, but it's understandable if CBS takes the position of not wanting to license out the segments (particularly the first one that aired) because it caused so much grief for the company. Especially considering The Insider is a Disney title, and that ABC and CBS have had some friction as of late.

Then again, it's tough to know the network's position as of now about the movie. A clip of it was shown late last year on CBS Sunday Morning on a profile about Christopher Plummer.

Disney releasing The Insider on Blu-ray 2/19/13, so that eliminates one of the more "Criterion worthy" of their library from making it's way to the Collection.

Is it going to be a Wal-Mart exclusive?

flyonthewall2983 wrote:Is it going to be a Wal-Mart exclusive?

I think they just happened to be the first retailer to list it.

A bit of idle speculation but I got confirmation via GKIDS that Disney still has the home video rights to Princess Mononoke. There was a brief period last year where Disney technically didn't have the rights (during the Miramax sale) but that was quickly resolved. I also got confirmation that Only Yesterday will be released on dvd/blu next year in North America. There was an indication that Disney had made a deal to license to a third party company. They wouldn't give me any more details than that. They also mentioned that Disney will no longer be involved in distributing new Ghibli titles theatrically or on home video in North America.

I asked Mulvaney if Criterion may be the third party company in question and just got a response telling me to visit the Criterion website to stay informed about forthcoming titles. I thought that was interesting as I've sent other emails recently about Dawn of the Dead, Tootsie, etc. which they flat out said that they have no plans to release those titles. It will be interesting to see who eventually distributes these two films. The now out of print Mononoke dvd was released under the Miramax banner and Only Yesterday had been shelved by Disney due to content they felt was not age appropriate for their target audience.

Besides the Wes Anderson upgrades and tweet from Spike Lee regarding new supplements and supervising a transfer for 25th Hour there hasn't been much reason to speculate that any new titles might be coming from Disney. Mill Creek has released quite a few catalog titles from Disney. I'll be very annoyed if they get the rights.

I find it really hard to believe that Disney has no interest in profiting off of Blu-rays of MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO or KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE, but who knows, maybe they sell worse than I think. ONLY YESTERDAY would be a perfect fit, though.

EDIT: Unless by "Disney is no longer distributing new Ghibli titles theatrically or on home video" they mean they'll continue to release the back catalog while "passing" on all new releases completely.

Sorry. By new releases I meant forthcoming titles titles like Miyazaki's The Wind is Rising or Takahata's The Tale of Princess Kaguya. I'm sure Disney will continue to handle Totoro/Kiki and the other catalog titles. I asked GKIDS if they would be distributing those forthcoming films and they said that like any other title that's available for sale, they could bid on them but the company isn't really set up to do wide releases, so who knows... they may wind up at Sony Classics/Focus or some other distributor like that. It won't be Disney though.

Not exactly suprising considering Ghibli's rather uncompromising output. It's probably hard to market some kind of painterly animated drama alongside the usual glut of Tinkerbell prostitution. I'd be surprised this was not a profitable partnership otherwise.

Couldn't find the Miramax thread and since they were owned by Bv.
Anyway it seems like the previous buyers are trying to sell the library which means that licences are going to be shuffled around soon.

Didn't those rights go to Lionsgate a few years ago?

Lionsgate and Echo Bridge each licensed part of the catalog from the current owners, but they don't own anything outright. Those deals would presumably continue for the duration of the contracts, at which point whoever owns Miramax could agree to re-up the licenses or shop them around to others.

And I'm no expert, but a billion really does seem like too much for Miramax, especially seeing how many titles have dropped out of the catalog in recent years as distribution rights expire. Even the three films mentioned in the Variety article (My Left Foot, Sex, Lies, and Videotape, and The Piano) were all pickups and could theoretically expire at some point. In fact Miramax doesn't actually own video rights to Sex, Lies, and Videotape, as is the case with a lot of their pre-Disney titles.

The Fanciful Norwegian wrote:And I'm no expert, but a billion really does seem like too much for Miramax ...

A billion for fucking Miramax???

Lucasfilm only cost $4 billion, including all of the IP that goes with Star Wars and Indy.

The current private equity owners paid $660 million for it, so they're looking for something like a 51% return on that price. And $660 was insane to pay for Miramax to begin with—clearly, Disney fleeced some middle eastern petro-tycoons who just wanted to be in the movie business, even if that meant buying The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill and Came Down a Mountain.

Thinking out loud here, but I wonder what will happen with regards to the Touchstone/Hollywood libraries, particularly titles that Criterion released or that look right enough for them to release. With the focus much more on Marvel and LucasFilm, those entities are all but done and dusted at this point, so I would imagine any enthusiasm Disney has for releasing them has diminished. Especially so considering that lesser titles have gone to Mill Creek.

I'm sure that a Black Cauldron Blu-Ray is on the horizon, though, as Disney made a new DCP that screened at their El Capitan theatre in Hollywood last October.
According to the film's producer, the original camera negative is the unexpurgated cut of it, so hopefully we'll finally, FINALLY see it as it was meant to be released.

Per the Guardian article on Criterion UK, "For the first time in 30-plus years of business, we have licensing arrangements with all the major American studios."

Anderson upgrades aside, they haven't released a title from Buena Vista since Chungking Express 350 spine #s ago. Disney seems content to release their traditional "Walt Disney" branded live action titles through the Disney Movie Club, and no chance they would ever license out any of their animated titles (which are mostly released on BD at this point anyway).

So... just a generic statement since they do technically have some licensed titles from BV still in print, or maybe a few Touchstone / Hollywood Pictures might squeak through?

I think they're using the Anderson titles to make that statement true, as they are using a license from that studio albeit with a weird caveat.

It'd be nice for more to come through but as of right now it seems Criterion's more interested in the Warner catalog it has access to and to be honest who can blame them.