The complete run down for Warner over 2008!

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 07 Feb 2008, 00:20

The planned 2008 slate itself is broken up into NINE different promotions: Oscars, Gangsters, Sinatra, Dirty Harry, 85 Years of Superheroes, Westerns, Musicals, Horror and Holiday. Warner revealed that Best Buy and Amazon.com are set to be the studio's official retail partners for these promotions.

Starting in the 1st Quarter, the Oscar and Gangster promotions will include the Bonnie and Clyde: Ultimate Collector's Edition (available on DVD, Blu-ray and HD-DVD) and the Bonnie and Clyde: Special Edition, along with such titles as the Goodfellas: Special Edition, the Heat: Special Edition, the Once Upon a Time in America: Special Edition, the Departed, the True Romance: Special Edition, the Film Noir Classics Collection: Volumes 1-4, the Warner Bros. Tough Guys Collection, the Warner Gangsters Collection (featuring titles like Public Enemy, Little Caesar, etc) and more.

The Sinatra and Dirty Harry promotions will debut in the 2nd Quarter. Sinatra will include the Sinatra mini-series, along with the four box sets we mentioned yesterday (The Early Years, The Golden Years, the Sinatra & Kelly Collection and the Rat Pack: Ultimate Collector's Edition - the Rat Pack: UCE will include "first-run" stamps, a music CD and other rare collectibles). The Dirty Harry promotion will include the Dirty Harry: 2-Disc Special Edition, the Magnum Force: Deluxe Edition, The Enforcer: Deluxe Edition, the Sudden Impact: Deluxe Edition and the Dead Pool: Deluxe Edition. All five films will also be included in a Dirty Harry: Ultimate Collector's Edition box set (available in DVD, Blu-ray and HD-DVD), which will also feature the Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows bonus disc.

The 3rd Quarter will offer Superhero fans something exciting: a Batman Begins: Limited Collector's Edition Gift Set on DVD and Blu-ray Disc, as well as a Batman Anthology box set of all the feature film titles on Blu-ray Disc. These are obviously timed to coincide with the DVD and Blu-ray release of The Dark Knight. Additional superhero releases are TBA. The 3rd Quarter will also offer several Western releases, including a How the West Was Won: Ultimate Collector's Edition and a How the West Was Won: Special Edition, along with such titles as The Searchers, The Wild Bunch, The Cowboys, an Errol Flynn Westerns Collection and a Western Classics Collection. Finally, the 3rd Quarter will see a Music promotion featuring new special editions of An American in Paris and Gigi, as well the debut of the Classic Musicals from the Dream Factory: Volume 3 box set, featuring Hit the Deck, Kismet, Deep in My Heart, Broadway Melody of 1936/Broadway Melody of 1938, Born to Dance/Lady Be Good and Nancy Goes to Rio/Two Weeks with Love.

Rounding out 2008, the 4th Quarter will see the debut of a new DVD Horror collection with titles featuring Boris Karloff, Peter Lorre and others, as well as more horror releases from Val Lewton and Joel Silver's Dark Castle label, re-promotion of Kubrick's The Shining and a number of new Raw Feed direct-to-DVD and Blu-ray titles, including Otis: Uncut. The 4th Quarter will also see a Warner Bros. Holiday Collection and A Christmas Story: Ultimate Collector's Edition.

As part of the year's overall slate, more than 50 new-to-DVD feature films will be restored and released from the Warner catalog alone, including such titles as All This and Heaven Too, The Beast with Five Fingers, Black Legion, Brother Orchid, Deception, Flamingo Road, Gold Diggers of 1937, Inside Daisy Clover, Kid Galahad, Lady Killer, The Mayor of Hell, Night Nurse, None But the Brave, Pete Kelly's Blues, San Antonio, Thank Your Lucky Stars, Three on a March, Virginia City and Watch on the Rhine.

Other titles set to be given special edition treatment this year are Cool Hand Luke, Gypsy, Risky Business, Splendor in the Grass and others yet to be announced. Additional thematic box sets will be drawn from Warner's classic MGM and RKO collections. It was also revealed that a collection of Natalie Woods titles is in the works.

Several special events will be held throughout the course of the year, including an August 31st Warner Big Picture night at the Hollywood Bowl, celebrating the studio's musical legacy. The highlight of the year's events will be the broadcast and DVD release of Richard Schickel's 5-part documentary series You Must Remember This: The Warner Bros. Story on the history of the studio, narrated by Clint Eastwood. The broadcast version will debut in September, as part of PBS's American Masters series, and a 550-page companion book (by Schickel and The Times of London film critic George Perry) will be released as well. As part of last night's event, Schickel gave the media a 10-minute sneak peek at a portion of his documentary series examining Warner films in the context of World War II.

The studio also revealed during the event that last year's Blade Runner: Five-Disc Ultimate Collector's Edition and Harry Potter: Years 1-5 - Limited Edition Collection were tremendously successful releases, generating more than $20 million in combined sales in the 45-day holiday period alone.

In terms of new titles in the year ahead, you can obviously look forward to the DVD and Blu-ray debut of such theatrical release films as The Dark Knight, Speed Racer, Get Smart, Where the Wild Things Are, 10,000 B.C. and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Price, later in 2008 and early 2009.

Finally, studio reps revealed that 4 major catalog titles (The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, Woodstock and North by Northwest) are all soon going on moratorium. The good news is, each will reappear in 2009 in day-and-date DVD and Blu-ray Disc releases, complete with stunning new high-definition restorations to celebrate their own individual anniversaries.

Taken from the digital bits

Source: http://www.theimportforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=11983

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 07 Feb 2008, 01:31

Dirty Harry: 2-Disc Special Edition

I'd be interested in that one.

They should make it clearer which titles are Blu-Ray and which are DVD-only.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 07 Feb 2008, 01:38

I'm concerned of a Goodfellas SE when there is already a BD and DVD SE!

The following interest me:

* Heat: Special Edition
* True Romance: Special Edition

I hope Heat now gets a new transfer. It needs one! Does "Gone with the Wind" also need a new DVD? The 4 Disc SE is already perfect. That must mean BD.

Markgway wrote:They should make it clearer which titles are Blu-Ray and which are DVD-only.

I'm pretty sure most if not all are both. It doesn't read like a press release though and more info written by The Digital Bits.

Killer Meteor · Post by **Killer Meteor** » 07 Feb 2008, 02:48

The Beast With Five Fingers is especially good news

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 07 Feb 2008, 07:44

It's good they are revisiting Goodfellas... the HD discs was the pits, with I remember a vertical red line stretching across the screen near the 1H20 mark, during a shot of De Niro talking. This is inadmissible on HD.

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 07 Feb 2008, 10:04

I may get Once Upon A Time In America/Bonnie and Clyde.
As for GWTW/Wzard of Oz, the transfers on the 2004 SEs are very good already IMO.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 08 Feb 2008, 23:06

grim_tales wrote: As for GWTW/Wzard of Oz, the transfers on the 2004 SEs are very good already IMO.

new restorations on blu-ray will blow the arse out of those releases.will get wizard of oz,the batman & dirty harry sets on blu-ray.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 08 Feb 2008, 23:22

dvdvision wrote:It's good they are revisiting Goodfellas... the HD discs was the pits, with I remember a vertical red line stretching across the screen near the 1H20 mark, during a shot of De Niro talking. This is inadmissible on HD.

I'm not sure they are or at least it could just as easily be a mistake. I mean it would be odd for Warner to re-release them this quickly after the last ones.

Are you ever happy with a DVD/HD Disc transfer?

, even by usual standards you're super picky

saltysam wrote:new restorations on blu-ray will blow the arse out of those releases.

The article implies they're getting DVD restorations too, which IMO isn't remotely necessary.

grim_tales wrote:I may get Once Upon A Time In America

Don't you already have it?

I'm surprised no one else is as excited as me to get these two in HD -

bradavon wrote:The following interest me:

* Heat: Special Edition
* True Romance: Special Edition

Nothing else hugely interests me enough to upgrade.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 08 Feb 2008, 23:50

oops missed True Romance,one of my favourite films,i'll be getting it. I own Heat but i generally think it's an overrated film and overlong, a possible pick up at a decent price maybe.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 09 Feb 2008, 00:35

I think both are excellent, Heat more so.

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 09 Feb 2008, 10:59

Brad, no I dont have OUATIAA (Once Upon a Time in America) but I have seen it.
Sam, are new restorations of "Oz" and "Gone With the Wind" only on Blu-ray or DVD too?

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 09 Feb 2008, 11:02

Oh, Oz and GWTW seem to be getting new DVDs too

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 09 Feb 2008, 12:13

Yes I'm picky, but the vertical red line was probably from the original interpositive they used, and not digitally erased !

As for True Romance, I was the one who reconstructed the longer cut on HD, so I assume they will use my transfert, thought I cannot be certain at this point.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 09 Feb 2008, 16:35

How do you work for again? A subsidiary of Warner?

I thought the True Romance Extended cut was just a myth?

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 09 Feb 2008, 20:55

I worked on this one for Metropolitan Samuel Hadida, producer of the movie.

True Romance was shown cut in the USA, it was if you want a watered down, R version.

It was released cut on VHS, but uncut on LD and early DVD, from a grainy beta transfert reconstruction of the "uncut" cut.

For the HD remaster back in I think 2003, (which was released on SD as "remastered"), I used both the negative and an interpositive of the uncut version, to reconstruct in HD the complete movie using the Scott uncut version as a guide. I reinserted all the cut scenes shot by shot and even counting frames to make sure it was right. We color timed the whole movie again, and then submitted it to approval for Tony Scott.

It's the version released in france on Pal double disc, it's not the 2002 US uncut double disc version, for reasons I cannot fathom. (I think they did use their own transfert for this one).

I guess I'll have to buy it and watch it to see if this is my master they used, or not. Probably is.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 10 Feb 2008, 00:11

Thanks DVD Vision, interesting stuff.

So it's the same cut in France and UK, USA right but a different Master was used in France, correct? I presume the current 2 Disc SE is uncut? There was talk of Extended Scenes. I thought you meant those, but I guess not.

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 10 Feb 2008, 08:31

Yes, the movie is uncut on most DVD releases, unless censorship, here's the version I mastered

http://www.amazon.fr/True-Romance-Coffr ... 0001NDG70/

I think the american double disc was a SD transfert not HD, so I hope they used my restored version. I'll ask the producer next time I ran into him.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 10 Feb 2008, 16:51

Thanks.

Now I've got your attention I've wondered in the past: Aren't you concerned so many 5.1 soundtracks would affect the picture quality? Two DD5.1 and two DTS soundtracks is a lot.

I'd have preferred it if the French DTS was dropped myself. That's some stella set of extras though, wiping the floor with the UK and USA releases:

http://www.dvdcompare.net/comparisons/film.php?fid=192

Do you have any say over forced French subs? That really pisses me off! There are so many excellent French DVDs that go and blow it by forcing subtitles when you pick the English soundtrack. I'd have bought many if they didn't cock them up like that.

So you've not seen the UK or USA 2 Disc SEs to compare? I'd be interested to know if your French 3 Disc SE beat it, or not.

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 11 Feb 2008, 06:54

I did the master, but not the DVD itself. Generally yes, I'll drop any french DTS track because I don't care, but some publishers think that the general french public prefers the DTS track in french. I think thos DTS are not full blown, but half anyway. That's why they also port the extras to disc 2, to have enough room for the movie itself.

The forced subs are legally obligatory, if say New Line allows a french DVD to be issued, they ask by contract for the subs to be forced. Also asks for R2 protection.

I've seen the other SEs, as they were issued before I did my restoration. I'd say mine is closer to the american SE, with some minimal differences in color timing. The first one was really red in some places.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 11 Feb 2008, 12:50

Thanks for the info.

but some publishers think that the general french public prefers the DTS track in french.

How close to the truth is this in your opinion?

I think thos DTS are not full blown, but half anyway.

I'm sure they would be.

The forced subs are legally obligatory, if say New Line allows a french DVD to be issued, they ask by contract for the subs to be forced. Also asks for R2 protection.

I've heard this before but find it weird they only seem to enforce this in France and Germany. Surely New Line deal with many European countries and those rarely have forced subs.

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 12 Feb 2008, 07:42

I haven't read the contracts, but I remember when The Killer was issued on HKV with the longer version with the un-enforced french subs (with english subs burned in), the only complaint came from Bey Logan, and it was just voiced in person, (not a legal complaint). It's about making sure each territory can make good of the issues, without worrying about the other taking it's market.

As for DTS french dub, this is a joke IMHO, they issued Batman Begins on HD-DVD in france with the Dolby True HD french only, doesn't make sense to me (i want the original language in True HD, not a dub)

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 12 Feb 2008, 17:06

Bey Logan complained that the Killer Extended Cut didn't have forced subs? I always thought he was fore the fan, especially when HKL never released the extended cut anyway.

As for DTS french dub, this is a joke IMHO, they issued Batman Begins on HD-DVD in france with the Dolby True HD french only, doesn't make sense to me.

OMG! Really. That's diabolical.

Especially when they could've fitted TrueHD English and French.

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 13 Feb 2008, 15:10

Well, you have to understand, here was a version with english subs being sold, it's was (in theory) less sales for his own version, that's probably why he was a bit taken aback by this release.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 13 Feb 2008, 22:34

I know but it's bollocks when you consider HKL had no plans to release the Extended Cut themselves anyway.

That strikes me as sneaky. To get pissed off then not release that version yourself anyway.

dvdvision · Post by **dvdvision** » 14 Feb 2008, 08:19

I didn't say he was pissed, just that he was the only person who "complained" meaning he remarked HK was not supposed to issue movies with english subs. I can understand his reservations (I was one of the guys who lobbyed for the french subs to be removable on the long version so I expected someone to take notice somewhere) but quite frankly, what was at hand was the preservation of the longer cut, if not for HKV, this cut would not exist on DVD (correct me if it's been issued somewhere else since).
Not that it matters anymore now