52-59 / BD 36-37, 71-72 Late Mizoguchi: Eight Films, 1951-56

[NABOB OF NOWHERE]

There would be no precedent for £30 RRP on these films as separate releases and it wouldn't work commercially.

Nick isn't on the MoC team anymore.

This explains everything. I'll lower my expectations for the label in future.

Is there no-one else out there more deserving of your wrath? I'll give you Monsanto and SKB for starters who "gouge" most of the planet as opposed to a small coterie of sadfuck cinephiles ,of which I freely admit I am a fully paid up member.

[Tommaso]

Is there no-one else out there more deserving of your wrath?

Sure. He also has a gripe against Edition Filmmuseum....

[NABOB OF NOWHERE]

Is there no-one else out there more deserving of your wrath?

Sure. He also has a gripe against Edition Filmmuseum....

Well I'm with him there, those Werner Schroeters aren't worth the paper they're printed on

[MichaelB]

This is the same guy who called the standard list price of £20 for the Tarnished Angels blu-ray special edition a "gouge" because supposedly the same film on DVD retails for "£1-74" (that same odd hyphen usage is the only reason I remembered this), a price derived by dividing the current price of a 6 year old cheap Universal set by the number of films in it.

A set that retailed for about £70 when first released, making his argument even more ridiculous.

[zedz]

"bdlover" is such a disconcerting username. I keep thinking I've opened the wrong online forum by mistake, especially since he's so free in his use of words like "gouge" and "force".

[PillowRock]

There would be no precedent for £30 RRP on these films as separate releases and it wouldn't work commercially.

There's also no precedent for investing in creating individual releases of movies that you know in advance that you're losing the rights to that soon after the release, either. Needing to recoup the costs on the fewer copies that you can expect to sell in the shorter time frame is why the unit price goes up.

And the fact that selling the individual movies at that price wouldn't work commercially was the precisely the point that was being made about why they're only being released as a set and not individually.

[MichaelB]

There would be no precedent for £30 RRP on these films as separate releases and it wouldn't work commercially.

There's also no precedent for investing in creating individual releases of movies that you know in advance that you're losing the rights to that soon after the release, either.

Actually, there is - but the BFI's Tati releases are a very different kettle of fish, since they were guaranteed to do well enough to justify releasing them even though the BFI only had the rights for a strictly limited period.

But this argument doesn't apply to the Mizoguchis, which clearly have nothing like the appeal of Mon Oncle, asa comparison of the MoC's and the BFI's DVD sales of those respective titles will make very clear indeed! In fact, because MoC has put them out already, and also because they've upgraded two of the packages to BD, they can presumably have a very accurate idea indeed of the likely sales figures.

[Michael Kerpan]

> they can presumably have a very accurate idea indeed of the likely sales figures.

One might guess not (nearly enough) better than Naruse. ;~{

[OnOnt]

Even if you sell off your old discs - an investment of time many won't be able to spare - you're likely to end up at least £10 worse off than if these had just been individually released.

Ridiculous, you'd only be £10 worse off if you didn't sell your old copies. The cheapest Sansho Dayu was sold for used in the last two weeks on eBay was £11.99, and Ugetsu went for £10.50. So £22.49 minus £4 for postage makes £18.49, which will get knocked off Amazon's current price for the box set (£38.92) making the total price spent on the remaining 4 films you want to buy only £20.43, almost £10 cheaper than what the individual releases would've costed on Amazon (approx. £14-£17 each).

[bdlover]

I just think in principal it's not a good idea to try and compel your customers to repurchase discs they already own, or to willingly let the license on such major films as Ugetsu or Sansho lapse. I don't think either of these would've happened on Nick Wrigley's watch. Perhaps the smarter move would've been not to release the lower selling titles at all and to funnel this money into re-securing the license on the editions already in print.

[MichaelB]

I just think in principal it's not a good idea to try and compel your customers to repurchase discs they already own, or to willingly let the license on such major films as Ugetsu or Sansho lapse.

They're undoubtedly major films culturally, but if they're not selling in sufficient quantities, what's the point of throwing more money away? Renewing the rights involves making a financial commitment, and if you're an independent label with limited resources, you have to make a hard-nosed decision about whether it's worth it - or whether the money can better be diverted towards securing other rights.

(Incidentally, was it even their choice? The BFI would certainly have renewed the Tati rights given their druthers, but the decision wasn't theirs to make.)

[tenia]

I just think in principal it's not a good idea to try and compel your customers to repurchase discs they already own, or to willingly let the license on such major films as Ugetsu or Sansho lapse. I don't think either of these would've happened on Nick Wrigley's watch. Perhaps the smarter move would've been not to release the lower selling titles at all and to funnel this money into re-securing the license on the editions already in print.

It seems to me a bit unfair to say it wouldn't have happened under Nick's supervisation. MoC let at the time a couple of titles go OOP, so that's clearly not new.
But if this is the only way to get them, I much prefer having 4 new upgrades, than securing rights for renewing existing HD releases, IMO.

[bdlover]

Thing is these aren't just any old titles but their two best known Asian films. In the early days of the label they would've killed to get their hands on such well established classics. It's hard to imagine, for comparison, that Janus would ever willingly relinquish the US rights, even considering their Ozu and Kurosawa holdings which Masters of Cinema lack. Whether or not they are the very best sellers, I can't imagine how they'd ever be throwing money away to retain such an important cornerstone of their catalogue.

[matrixschmatrix]

A.) We don't know that they willingly let these lapse and b.) even assuming this was their call, it's not a matter of how famous these movies are, it's a matter of what MoC can afford

[swo17]

Hard to imagine that Criterion would ever "relinquish" The Third Man, Grand Illusion, Nights of Cabiria, Notorious and Rebecca, Contempt, Pierrot le fou, Ran, Army of Shadows, Last Year at Marienbad, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Diary of a Country Priest, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, or Chungking Express.

But it did happen.

[Jonathan S]

"bdlover" is such a disconcerting username. I keep thinking I've opened the wrong online forum by mistake, especially since he's so free in his use of words like "gouge" and "force".

What with all the talk of dungeons and sling rooms in Technical Issues, and the richly deserved ambiguity of abbreviating "Twilight Time" to "TT", maybe we need a "Sub" Forum....

[MichaelB]

A.) We don't know that they willingly let these lapse and b.) even assuming this was their call, it's not a matter of how famous these movies are, it's a matter of what MoC can afford

Indeed. But since bdlover was previously berating MoC for not attempting to price-match massively discounted six-year-old Douglas Sirk DVDs, I don't think economic realism plays much of a role in his arguments. Or indeed consistency.

[Michael Kerpan]

bdlover -- do you have even the teensiest sense of business reality? I am assuming you are being sincere, rather than trolling, but you really are getting downright silly.

The rights holders of classical Japanese films are (typically) notoriously arbitrary and unreasonable in their licensing decision-making (and not very canny in their marketing, either). Shochiku seems to play fairer than most -- Toho (being the biggest) is the biggest bully. Kadokawa (the successor to Daiei) often seems rather clueless. If the Japanese right holder demands a huge increase in license fee in order to renew a license a small (or even medium to large) company may understandably decide the cost is too great.

I was grateful when MOC issued a Naruse set -- but would never second guess their decision to drop their planned Naruse series (and let Vol 1 go out of print). Ditto for the Mizoguchi stuff. I was pleased when they took on the project -- and hoped it would fare better than the Naruse one. But I am not the least bit surprised that it didn't wind up successful enough to make license renewal worthwhile. One needs to snap up what becomes available while its available (if you want it) -- and not cry too much when it stops being available.

[tenia]

In all honesty, I perfectly understand the consumer point that you have to buy AGAIN 2x2 titles to get the new upgrades. It is always frustrating. But on the other way, I totally get MoC position where, well, they basically say it was the only option.

So yeah, I prefer to pay a bit more to get my new upgrades, and I will find something to do with my old discs.

[zedz]

Thing is these aren't just any old titles but their two best known Asian films. In the early days of the label they would've killed to get their hands on such well established classics.

In the early days of MoC, the DVD market was radically different from what it is today. And at that time they would have been first on the block with those titles on home video. Now, they've been on the market for years and years and - as you've pointed out many times - people who want the films have bought them multiple times. MoC would have to be insane to assume that the market for them going ahead is as strong as it was when they first obtained the licence.

And quite frankly, I would much rather they invested their licencing pounds in films that aren't already available in fine editions.

[zedz]

I was grateful when MOC issued a Naruse set -- but would never second guess their decision to drop their planned Naruse series (and let Vol 1 go out of print).

Do you want some really depressing news? That Naruse set is currently going for 185 quid on Amazon Marketplace. And MoC couldn't give the thing away when it was in print.

Which should also put the 'value' of the Mizoguchi BluRay set in perspective.

[Michael Kerpan]

All my MOC duplicates so far have been donated to the Harvard Film Archive. ;~}

> Do you want some really depressing news? That Naruse set is currently going
> for 185 quid on Amazon Marketplace. And MoC couldn't give the thing away
> when it was in print.

To quote Joni Mitchell:

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone

[matrixschmatrix]

Doesn't necessarily seem depressing- it suggests to me that everyone who actually gets the set wants very badly to hang on to it, and therefore parts with it dearly. Selling for a high price doesn't mean a lot of copies are being sold.

[bdlover]

matrix, swo and Michael, if you review the thread you can read it from the horse's mouth:

we are extremely close to the end of our licence period on these with no intention to renew (they really haven't sold in huge numbers)

So because the numbers aren't 'huge' they have no intention of renewing the two most canonical Asian films in their catalogue. Surely then this does suggest a break from the established model for this kind of label, that lower-selling but canonical titles are balanced by less important but more commercial releases. Or if you like that Fantastic Planet makes the money whilst Ugetsu monogatari earns the prestige.

[Donald Brown]

The simple fact is MoC would lose money on individual releases. The only hope for them to recoup their costs is to issue a box. If you don't think it's worth it, don't buy it.