Could Ultimate Disney produce a DVD/Blu Ray?

[disneyfella]

I was thinking. Most of us here are passionate about titles in the Disney library. Often times, the rare and obscure titles which the company finds no economic reason to invest in spark our interest and conversation the most.

I know that several distributors or other companies will actually produce the DVD or Blu Ray release of a film. Does anyone know how this is done, or whom to contact to see how to get this process started?

My thought is that it wouldn't be the first time that the fans produced or called for the release of a title. Why couldn't a few of us here at UltimateDisney.com produce a DVD/Blu Ray release?

This isn't a thread for people to just list what title they would like to have released, or what special features you would like to have released. Nor is this a forum to start petitions for titles to be released. Those comments all belong elsewhere here on this message board. This forum is place for business minded people with contacts, and those interested to invest their own money into producing a Disney DVD.

Maybe I'm just very tired this afternoon (I've been incredibly busy) and this is all a folly , but does anyone know the process of DVD production even? Are there resources out there? Could someone privately fund the restoration and release of certain films? How much does this type of endeavor even cost?





Anyone care to add thoughts or discuss?

[tlc38tlc38]

Not a bad idea but the pre orders would have to be huge. I know that CineQuest.com did this a few times with Buffy items, which I also collect. It seemed to be successful for them.

[Escapay]

I was thinking. Most of us here are passionate about titles in the Disney library. Often times, the rare and obscure titles which the company finds no economic reason to invest in spark our interest and conversation the most.

I know that several distributors or other companies will actually produce the DVD or Blu Ray release of a film. Does anyone know how this is done, or whom to contact to see how to get this process started?

You may want to send an e-mail to Craig Robbins (of ReplayDVD in the UK) to ask how to get started. He was a fan of the Steven Moffat series "Joking Apart" and was able to buy the distribution rights for the series from BBC and produced a DVD of the series independently. Much of it is covered in this article, but it's also good to pick his brain on other things to consider.

My thought is that it wouldn't be the first time that the fans produced or called for the release of a title. Why couldn't a few of us here at UltimateDisney.com produce a DVD/Blu Ray release?

Given that the average age of the forum member is in the teens/early20s range, I can think of a few reasons why we can't.

But I think if enough fans (be it on UD or other Disney places) pooled together enough capital to pay for all the things necessary (to name a few: distribution rights, royalties, authoring costs, payment to participants of the VAM, if any are included), and they managed to actually acquire the licence for certain titles, that it could be done.

At the same time, you also have to know when to not overstep the boundaries. Look at what happened with Anchor Bay in the late 90s. They acquired a licence from Disney to distribute various movies from the company (the late1960s-early1980s era), and got rave reviews from many DVD sites regarding their treatment of the films (16:9 widescreen, trailers). It was ticking Disney off, because all the attention that Disney SHOULD have gotten for those movies were instead going to Anchor Bay (this was when Disney made non-anamorphic widescreen barebones discs, and often times were only distributing movies from the 90s, not to mention the Limited Issue fiasco). Because of this, when Anchor Bay wanted to pull out all the stops and release a true Director's Cut of The Watcher in the Woods, Disney wouldn't let them, and they were actually two-faced a bit in what they told Scott Michael Bosco (the DVD producer) about what was available, what wasn't, what still existed in the archives, etc. Eventually Disney canceled their licence with Anchor Bay and re-distributed the movies under their own label.

Maybe I'm just very tired this afternoon (I've been incredibly busy) and this is all a folly , but does anyone know the process of DVD production even? Are there resources out there? Could someone privately fund the restoration and release of certain films? How much does this type of endeavor even cost?

In short, you'll need a lot of time, a lot of patience, a lot of know-how (or a lot of learnable know-how), and a helluva lot of money. Not like, millions of dollars, but just to throw this out there: it cost Robbins £1000 alone just to send the "Joking Apart" episodes to be classified by BBFC (who charge by the minute), and he saved £3000 by doing the Subtitles for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing himself rather than pay someone £30/hour to transcribe them.

There are independent companies that will author the discs for you, but the distribution will need to be worked out with the studio. They need to know how many units you can sell within a projected amount of time, and the means of selling them (online, B&M stores, etc.). And again, it's all out of pocket for the most part. They need you to prove you can actually make money for them releasing something they otherwise wouldn't put the effort into themselves (as many DMC-exclusive discs have shown).

albert

[yamiiguy]

Well firstly you would have to obtain the rights to it. And if your thinking down the Song of the South route there's more of a chance of Disney releasing it themselves than there would be of them giving the rights to a bunch of fans. I can't really see Disney giving the rights to their early shorts either, I can't think of anything really

EDIT: I know! Public domain titles like The Story of Menstruation restored and in glorious HD!

[Timon/Pumbaa fan]

Well, I do remember I made a faux UD Walt Disney Treasure press release waaay back when.

But considering how anti-Blu-Ray this site is, it would certainly be ironic for it to come on Blu-Ray

[disneyfella]

I don't necessarily mean purchasing the rights to a property entirely. I can understand that I don't have the resources to distribute or lease a license on a title.

What I was thinking was producing...like Mr. Bosco. So, Disney can distribute through BVHE, and maintain the rights to the title itself, but the production of the disc itself would be done by a private company. Sort of like the Treasures series produced by Leanord Maltin. Instead, though, this could be produced in cooperation of fans on the internet. In other words, all of the Disney websites would be able to add input on their production, and the demand to purchase the media would go up.

I wasn't thinking of anything as popular as Song of the South, but maybe the more thoughtful television programs (i.e. Escapade in Florence, The Prince and the Pauper, etc.)

[Escapay]

But considering how anti-Blu-Ray this site is, it would certainly be ironic for it to come on Blu-Ray

UD covers Blu-Rays when Aaron or Kelvin review them.

What I was thinking was producing...like Mr. Bosco. So, Disney can distribute through BVHE, and maintain the rights to the title itself, but the production of the disc itself would be done by a private company. Sort of like the Treasures series produced by Leanord Maltin. Instead, though, this could be produced in cooperation of fans on the internet. In other words, all of the Disney websites would be able to add input on their production, and the demand to purchase the media would go up.

Oh, okay. In that case, what Disney really needs is something akin to the "Doctor Who" Restoration Team (I can't seem to access the main site now, which stopped being updated about a year ago, but you can read more about them on the wikipedia page). It's a team of professionals in the industry who remaster "Doctor Who" episodes for BBC, and also hire fans (also professionals in the industry) to produce extras (e.g. well-known fan Ian Levine produced some documentaries for the DVD range). It's all done on their own time (extras especially), though the actual remastering has become something of a regular profession for some (Steve Roberts, Jonathan Wood).

I certainly wouldn't mind being a part of a Disney Restoration Team.

I wasn't thinking of anything as popular as Song of the South, but maybe the more thoughtful television programs (i.e. Escapade in Florence, The Prince and the Pauper, etc.)

Yeah, I would imagine Disney wouldn't let a big title like SOTS be handled by fans (no matter how professional/devoted they are). But I certainly wouldn't mind collaborating with others and Disney on a home video release for lesser-known material.

I think to do that, again, you'd have to contact BVHE (well, WDSHE as they're now abbreviated) about it, work up a proposal, ensure that the fans on the project know what they're getting into (and can actually do what is being proposed), etc. For example, being stuck in NJ, I doubt I'd ever be able to go to Australia and shoot an interview with Sean Scully about his work in "The Prince and the Pauper" and Almost Angels. But if there were an Aussie fan involved in the project, who could contact Scully, they could shoot the interview, airmail me the footage (or upload it HQ online) and I could edit it (if I had professional editing equipment) for the documentary, send the work-in-progress to whoever the producer of that particular project is, and they'd or whatever is working/not working.

Actually, now that I think about it, fella, maybe you should try to e-mail the Doctor Who Restoration Team members (try Steve Roberts first) to see how they went about doing it back in 1992 and how it evolved over the years.

albert

[2099net]

I always thought Disney clawed back the rights to their properties off Anchor Bay because it was company policy to "own" and distribute their own stuff.

Remember at the time Anchor Bay licensed the titles, DVD was very new and I'm sure to Disney it was a win-win situation: They got fixed, guaranteed income from licensing without themselves taking a risk and the Disney name was had a stronger link to the new format, again without Disney themselves taking any risk. As for the supplements and contents of the discs, I doubt the contract gave Disney nothing less then final veto on the contents of the disc.

But as DVD grew to the monster that it became, it simply made more sense for companies to keep hold of their own content and release and distribute it itself. It's not new, the BBC licensed out lots of Comedy to Universal, Network and Acorn Media in the UK at the start of the DVD cycle, but as rights expire, they themselves are slowly releasing the same titles through 2|entertain (such as Sorry! or Ever Decreasing Circles)

Of course, in Disney's case its a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because in theory (and I stress in theory) Disney should be able to create better DVDs than any third party licensee. They should have the materials, skills and knowledge in-house. And indeed do - when they want to put their mind to it. Regardless of recent releases, we've all been treated to some of the best DVDs ever released through Disney. The curse is, Disney simply doesn't see the worth in releasing the "smaller" titles themselves, but still (presumably) bound by the policy that product cannot be licensed. You have to keep in mind, in large monolithic corporations policy is sometimes set for the good of the majority, even it its at the expense of the minority.

It's been reported that Universal had the same company wide policy (again after licensing out titles at the start of the DVD boom to Image) which is what stopped the BBC from attaining the US/Worldwide rights to the Doctor Who TV Movie for so long. Not that the TV Movie had any particular value to Universal on its own - It was just victim to a wider, company wide policy.

But as The Doctor Who TV Movie has shown (and Shout! Factory with Boy Meets World) perhaps the big corporations are changing their minds about licensing out their properties once more?

I do have some sympathy for Disney - it is hard to get stores interested in stocking old "Unwanted" content. You can moan and complain as much as you want about the marketing for The Walt Disney Treasures line; but at the end of the day the number of copies in each run more or less decreased with each wave. Marketing could be better, but lets face it - product like the Lost Boys 2 direct to DVD release sold many more copies with just as little marketing as each wave of Treasures releases.

Where I don't have sympathy for Disney is I don't think they're trying hard enough to appeal to the [hard]core collectors market who would snap up such releases if they had more thought, care and love put into them. Warner Brothers constantly show the industry how archive film releases should be released; themed packs, decent restoration, commentaries and copious extras - archival and newly created - and all for a reasonable price.

Why can't Disney create a "must own" "Historical Novels" boxset for example containing Treasure Island, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Kidnapped and Rob Roy, The Highland Rogue? All with commentaries, a documentary on the films' inspirations, a history of Walt Disney live action films and more?

[BK]

Honestly, they should lease the titles out to some other company so that someone will at least try to create something and honour these movies because if they don't do anything about it unlike Warner the time will come where no one cares, knows or remembers their movies being so scarce and of such bad quality.

When that happens, anyone who could possibly have any information about the production of the movie would be deceased and they've lost the opportunity to make the cash they so desperately are greedy about. There's only so much you can make out of the Pixar films, the Diamonds and the small amount of 'recent' catalogue they have. I mean, even a year from now, who honestly would go to the store to purchase Old Dogs, hell no one even does now.

Then again I guess they could survive on short-term TV-tween cash constantly.

[milojthatch]

Honestly, they should lease the titles out to some other company so that someone will at least try to create something and honour these movies because if they don't do anything about it unlike Warner the time will come where no one cares, knows or remembers their movies being so scarce and of such bad quality.

When that happens, anyone who could possibly have any information about the production of the movie would be deceased and they've lost the opportunity to make the cash they so desperately are greedy about. There's only so much you can make out of the Pixar films, the Diamonds and the small amount of 'recent' catalogue they have. I mean, even a year from now, who honestly would go to the store to purchase Old Dogs, hell no one even does now.

Then again I guess they could survive on short-term TV-tween cash constantly.

To be fair, they did just let Shout! start making and releasing "Boy Meets World." So that right there is a prescience that it could happen.

That said, for it's more "Disney-like" titles, such as Mickey Mouse Club (old and new), Disney Afternoon Shows, Song of the South, Disneyland tv shows or anything like that, I think Disney is rather mean about the whole thing. They will only release of those what THEY feel the public will buy, but I don't think would ever let anyone else release it, even if they didn't have to do any of the work and they got pure profit from it. So they just basically sit on the fast majority of it. Somehow, I feel copyrights laws should make THAT illegal! I think there should be a claws where the copyright holder loosing the copyright if they do nothing with the property in question over a certain amount of time and just sit on it. You'll never see that added though, especially since Disney has such a hold on Congress over this law.

But this is a great idea, if it wasn't for the fact of who we are talking about working with. Just about any other studio would be more likely to go along with this idea.

[Mickeyfan1990]

[quote="milojthatch]To be fair, they did just let Shout! start making and releasing "Boy Meets World."[/quote]

Actually, Lionsgate owns Boy Meets World. I suppose if we produced a DVD or a set we should do what every fan wanted that wasn;t available before. If we were to produce with Disney a box set of classic cartoons, we should choose the top 60 cartoons for the set, make it unlimited, new restored and remastered transfers for cartoons that weren't, commentaries, and old and new extras.

[milojthatch]

[quote="milojthatch]To be fair, they did just let Shout! start making and releasing "Boy Meets World."

Actually, Lionsgate owns Boy Meets World. I suppose if we produced a DVD or a set we should do what every fan wanted that wasn;t available before. If we were to produce with Disney a box set of classic cartoons, we should choose the top 60 cartoons for the set, make it unlimited, new restored and remastered transfers for cartoons that weren't, commentaries, and old and new extras.[/quote]

You would be right, it was Lionsgate, not Shout! that revived the rights from Disney, my mistake. But Disney still gave them to Lionsgate to release the show.