Camera Obscura: The Walerian Borowczyk Collection

[Dr. Face Head]

I don't believe anything is an artificial situation at all. It's a real problem and you can either choose to try ideas or scoff at them and keep them in the state of inaction.

You just find out the titles, categorize them with a little basic homework, and reach out to the company first to present your case, tell them up-front their (bullshit) catalog is loaded with over-priced films (junk) - just say it a lot nicer than that of course, but that you'll "happily do the due dilligence of trying to find buyers for their films in order to secure Jeckyll". Point being, if they get on board with the idea of splitting it up between other buyers in a pool in the first place, then you can proceed ethically to step two: actually call other people and try. Here's the kicker: this process will actually work at best, or become a grounding tactic at worst because you then keep the communication lines open and transparent and let the fool selling this rubbish see how nobody is biting. Let him watch! Copy them on the email chains that say statements like, "Seriously? No way in hell are we interested in buying bullshit so you can get your film." Oh no. It will be so sad when they don't bite, and the person reluctabtly comes back down to earth.

Everything needs a fair shake of elbow grease and manipulation to get done.

[zedz]

Well, now I think you're getting even further into pure fantasy. Presumably the rightsholder already knows that nobody is interested in most of his holdings, or he wouldn't be opting for the 'all or nothing' approach in the first place.

And you do realize that in your hypothetical situation, you'll almost certainly still end up without the film you wanted in the first place, unless the rightsholder is gullible enough to sign over the rights to one film in exchange for you acting as an amateur sales agent for the rest of their holdings, with no conditions about getting actual results.

[David M.]

Actually, something like that has happened with one company I worked with. We got a new scan done (it was a romantic movie about a monster) and as part of the deal the company took the rights to a less well known film along with it (it wasn't junk, just not as in demand).

Don't take that to imply anything re Jekyll though.

[Dr. Face Head]

Well, now I think you're getting even further into pure fantasy. Presumably the rightsholder already knows that nobody is interested in most of his holdings, or he wouldn't be opting for the 'all or nothing' approach in the first place.

And you do realize that in your hypothetical situation, you'll almost certainly still end up without the film you wanted in the first place, unless the rightsholder is gullible enough to sign over the rights to one film in exchange for you acting as an amateur sales agent for the rest of their holdings, with no conditions about getting actual results.

Excuse me, but I never indicated any scenario including the "signing over one film in exchange for acting as an amateur sales agent". I never posited anything even in the ballpark of that sort of idea.

My aim is to suggest a shared purchase by a group. One with all parties doing some portion of the purchasing. The point being, you round up a group of people interested in enough individual fragments of the catalog in question, and you do a group buy. You sub-contract between yourselves who gets what. First, of course, you mention this to the rights-holder, to let them know you cannot possibly afford (nor are you interested in) their entire holdings, and so this will be your approach to obtaining a deal that works for you both. You would though, indeed "purchase" Jeckyll under this arrangement of course.

Furthermore, I wouldn't get into a critique of "fantastic" ideas designed to diffuse a lunatic seller, because there's actually a hell of a lot more room to discuss "pure fantasy" on the rights-holder's side of things. Let's think about this a second. If they truly believe a viable solution to off-loading their catalog is to hold out for a zillion bajillion dollars...good luck to them. It will sit forever, effectively earning nothing. It will sit forever, like the wares of some clueless jackass on eBay who unwittingly put on rare DVD in with a lot of mass-produced dreck. Sure, someone probably PM's them from time to time about the rare disc. But who is the fool if the seller suddenly believes that because of that it necessarily follows that all their Wedding Crashers, James Bond and Alvin and the Chipmunks DVDs are worth $75 a piece (because that was your offer)? NOPE. That lot will sit and rot.

[zedz]

My aim is to suggest a shared purchase by a group. One with all parties doing some portion of the purchasing. The point being, you round up a group of people interested in enough individual fragments of the catalog in question, and you do a group buy. You sub-contract between yourselves who gets what.

But your speculation entirely depends on the assumption that the rest of the catalogue is stuff that somebody would be interested in, and all the (sketchy) evidence suggests that this isn't the case. Arrow is a much broader church than most DVD companies, and they evidently saw no value in the other holdings. You're also making the totally unfounded assumption that the buy-in-bulk asking price is magically going to work out to be a reasonable figure when you split it across all of the films, with a strict allocation for each film according to their individual commercial viability. It's more likely that the attractiveness of a single film in the catalogue is going to make the rightsholder overvalue the rest of them.

Also, what I was responding to in my previous post was your scenario of copying the rightsholder into all your correspondence and rubbing his nose in the fact that everybody hated his films and nobody wanted to buy them, and the Bizarro assumption that this was going to get you what you wanted!

[zedz]

Furthermore, I wouldn't get into a critique of "fantastic" ideas designed to diffuse a lunatic seller, because there's actually a hell of a lot more room to discuss "pure fantasy" on the rights-holder's side of things. Let's think about this a second. If they truly believe a viable solution to off-loading their catalog is to hold out for a zillion bajillion dollars...good luck to them. It will sit forever, effectively earning nothing. It will sit forever, like the wares of some clueless jackass on eBay who unwittingly put on rare DVD in with a lot of mass-produced dreck. Sure, someone probably PM's them from time to time about the rare disc. But who is the fool if the seller suddenly believes that because of that it necessarily follows that all their Wedding Crashers, James Bond and Alvin and the Chipmunks DVDs are worth $75 a piece (because that was your offer)? NOPE. That lot will sit and rot.

Well, I'm suggesting that this is actually a likely scenario. I doubt the rightsholder is actually actively trying to exploit his rights. He's got an asset that's pretty much worthless (and honestly, the commercial demand for the Borowczyk is exceedingly modest) and which he probably doesn't want to even be bothered with. He sticks a figure on this asset that would make the hassle worthwhile and is happy to wait and see if anybody is going to bite. If they don't, it's no skin off his nose.

Have you even been to a record store and seen a not-particularly-rare album sitting up on the wall with a ridiculous pricetag attached? It can sit there for years and years and years waiting for somebody desperate enough or stupid enough to walk through the door and then one day - poof! - it's gone. It's not as if it's the only record the shop had to sell, and the owner had been fretting for years that he'd overpriced it and he'd never be rid of it. He figures it was worth holding out for the eventual big payday. In the meantime, it's just business as usual.

[Dr. Face Head]

Yeah. I've been to a record store. I own a record label, and have for the last ten years. Thanks for the bad analogy though, which equates a shop owner who sells thousands of different albums, and who can afford to prop up an artificially inflated tag or two on his shelf and let it sit, with a totally unrelated, not even possibly fair comparison to the owner of a small collection of film rights, who actually does likely need to sell them at one point or another. Furthermore, all I am trying to say is that everything is worth a try. Of course we are both speculating.

Anyway, moving on!

When is this box set going to be finished and ship to those who involved themselves in the support via Kickstarter?

[criterion10]

Not sure if it's frowned upon to post this sort of thing, but for those who have not yet seen the film (myself included), Docteur Jekyll et les Femmes is on Youtube in full, although it seems as though it is an English dub with forced Dutch subtitles.

[MichaelB]

Arrow has just confirmed that The Beast is getting a separate release on July 28th:

The Beast (Arrow Academy Dual Format Blu-ray & DVD)

Originally turned down flat by the British Board of Film Censors and initially released exclusively in London in a version heavily cut by its nervous distributor, The Beast is Walerian Borowczyk’s most notorious film, although it’s much wittier and more playful than its subject matter might suggest.

Lucy Broadhurst (Lisbeth Hummel) is due to inherit a substantial fortune, but on condition that she marries the son of her late father’s best friend. But Mathurin de l’Espérance (Pierre Benedetti) seems more interested in his horses than in his bride-to-be, and when Lucy finds out about the story of his 18th-century ancestor Romilda (Sirpa Lane) and brings her to life in one of the most outrageous dream sequences in cinema history, we begin to realise just how bizarre Mathurin’s bloodline truly is.

Receiving its Blu-ray world premiere, this new high-definition restoration by Argos Films is supported by the original short-film version of The Beast, and Venus on the Half-Shell (1975), Borowczyk’s portrait of the painter Bona Tibertelli de Pisis and her erotic fusions of men, women and molluscs.

Special Edition Contents:
- New high definition digital transfers of the feature and the shorts;
- Uncompressed Mono 2.0 PCM Audio;
- Optional English subtitles;
- Introduction by film critic Peter Bradshaw;
- The True Story of the Beast of Gévaudan (1972), the original short-film version of The Beast;
- Venus on the Half-Shell (1975);
- The Making of ‘The Beast’: camera operator Noël Véry provides a commentary on footage shot during the film’s production;
- Frenzy of Ecstasy, a new visual essay on the evolution of Borowczyk’s beast and the sequel that never was, Motherhood;
- Theatrical trailer;
- Reversible sleeve featuring original poster design;
- Booklet featuring new writing on the film by Daniel Bird and archive pieces by David Thompson and Craig Lapper, illustrated with original stills.

Released 28th July

[Dr. Face Head]

Michael,

Is Brief von Paris or L’Amour monstre des tous les temps included in the box? I'm curious what he can do with a Krasnogorsk!

[MichaelB]

Is Brief von Paris or L’Amour monstre des tous les temps included in the box? I'm curious what he can do with a Krasnogorsk!

L'Amour monstre is included on the shorts disc. Brief von Paris isn't because it's more of a mini-feature and it doesn't currently exist in HD, although I certainly wouldn't rule out an appearance on a future Borowczyk disc (assuming the box sells well enough to justify such a thing).

[Drucker]

We at Arrow are extremely excited about our upcoming release of Camera Obscura: The Walerian Borowczyk Collection. This is truly a milestone release for us, and one that we can't wait to share with you. We're now into the final stretch of production, and we're currently keeping very busy checking and double-checking, proofreading, finessing and subtitle-spotting everything that appears on the set.

As many of you know, this release has grown exponentially since announcing our fundraising campaign to restore Goto, Isle of Love last tear. Thanks in large part to your contributions, we were able to add a number of films that we didn't initially plan to include. In addition to all of the short films he made for Argos Films, we've managed to track down some of the commercials Borowczyk made during the 1960s, including a ten-minute animated short for a cigar firm that needs to be seen to be believed! We've also added trailers, alternate versions and even the short film Au Bout des Fusils directed by Borowczyk's friend Peter Graham, and lensed and edited by the man himself.

With every one of these films, we have created 2K scans from the best existing film elements available, to ensure that the presentations of every title will be definitive. In addition to the films themselves, the list of extras, many of them new and exclusive to this release, has also grown by leaps and bounds - in addition to numerous interviews with Borowczyk's former colleagues, we've also secured an hour-long interview with the man himself, filmed in the mid-1980s for Channel Four's Visions series but never broadcast. With the page count now into well into triple figures and the word count likely to exceed 50,000 (and that's before the extensive illustrations are taken into account), the "booklet" can no longer be referred to as such. Without doubt this will be the most comprehensive document on Borowczyk ever published in English.

With all this in mind, we must now let you know that we've had to move our release date for this release back in order to accommodate all this extra content, and all the additional work this entails. The new release date will be August 18th. We hope this news isn't too discouraging, but we feel we need just this sliver of extra time to make sure that this release is the absolute best it can be. Believe us, it'll definitely be worth the wait!

Many thanks for your patience and understanding.

Arrow Films

[MichaelB]

I cannot stress enough that this is not a Manos: The Hands of Fate situation where Kickstarter backers are apparently still waiting for their Blu-rays literally years after the promised delivery date.

Arrow has made it very clear that the few additional weeks are absolutely conditional on us hitting the new release date, and since I'd quite like to continue producing stuff for them I have even more incentive to stick to the agreement.

That said, I'm very glad that they bowed to the inevitable. What with all the additional films (and scanning/restoration thereof), the ever-expanding book (we weren't expecting quite so many creators/rightsholders of rare archive material to say "yes" quite so enthusiastically!), and all the newly-shot extras, most of which are in French - quite aside from all the other Borowczyk stuff that Daniel (especially) and I were involved with throughout much of May - it was clear that something had to give, and it duly did.

[NABOB OF NOWHERE]

Well at least it's still on track for release of the year 2014. And even more so!

[Emak-Bakia]

I am, of course, bummed to see the set pushed back, since it’s probably my most anticipated release of the year, but I know it will be worth it. This announcement had me salivating over the keyboard. What’s a few extra months now for something I will likely enjoy for the rest of my life? Plus the release date is now on my birthday, and I really cannot think of too many better gifts.

[L.A.]

I can wait.

[EddieLarkin]

My schedule over June/July is so crammed (Robbe-Grillet, Herzog, Twin Peaks et al) that I can almost appreciate the delay, even though the set is my most anticipated release this year.

[Finch]

Have to say the delay suits me since my husband and I will be in the US from 20 June to 7 July so this saves me having to collect the set from the postal office. Will the delay have any bearing on the L'Assassino Blu (since that was delayed to allow for more prep time on the Borowczyk set) or is that still on track for July (I think it was)?

[MichaelB]

Will the delay have any bearing on the L'Assassino Blu (since that was delayed to allow for more prep time on the Borowczyk set) or is that still on track for July (I think it was)?

L'Assassino is completely on track - the sleeve is already done bar tiny corrections, I delivered the copy-edited booklet text (8,000+ words) to the designer this morning, and David Mackenzie will have all the video elements that he needs for the actual disc by the end of this week.

In other words, barring unexpected complications (and there shouldn't be any as it's a much, much simpler project), it should not only comfortably make the release date but there's a distinct possibility that finished copies might be sent out early - but don't hold me to that!

[htshell]

The new release date doesn't bother me (and is understandable w/r/t the extra value being added) but it will affect where I want the box set to be shipped. I can't remember if I entered an address or if I will be prompted for a delivery address when the time comes for the item to ship.. Any ideas?

[MichaelB]

The new release date doesn't bother me (and is understandable w/r/t the extra value being added) but it will affect where I want the box set to be shipped. I can't remember if I entered an address or if I will be prompted for a delivery address when the time comes for the item to ship.. Any ideas?

Don't worry - everyone's going to be prompted for an up-to-date delivery address prior to shipping. With 400+ backers, it's statistically not at all unlikely that a handful of addresses may have changed.

[Drucker]

Great. I'm in the process of house hunting and could easily be moving between August and September, so I'll probably have it shipped to another address.

[zedz]

I'm delighted about the delay. Now is not the time to cut corners with a set that's exceeded everybody's wildest dreams.

[swo17]

I don't know that "delighted" is the right word, but I can certainly understand the need for the delay (which really isn't that long in the grand scheme of things), and I am very excited about all the additional effort that's going into this thing!

[Drucker]

The best thing about a set like this, especially for a novice like me, is that I won't feel like I'm missing anything (even if technically I am). This could be all the Boro I ever need, and will likely give me a totally fair and pretty full look at the director's career (as opposed to, say, the Lubitsch silents or Naruse boxes, which while fantastic, are just a small, small part of a brilliant career).