DVD subjugation of the consumer masses

[Neon Noodle]

Okay folks - it's time to tackle the cruelty of DVD merchandising.

I picked up a bargain at Best Buy a few weeks ago - I bought a compilation called "The Franchise Collection" and got Pitch Black, Dark Fury and The Chronicles of Riddick in a little box set for $15 total. Good deal, right?

I started to think about the other DVD's that came out before this. No big surprise, each of these movies were available individually and they costed about $15-$20 each. So if I bought these movies one at a time as they came out, I would have spent $60.

Okay, I know what you're thinking, they didn't plan to have 3 movies in the beginning, so this is just clever merchandising.

Then I remembered the Sin City merchandising scheme. That was a pretty good movie, and when it came out on DVD, it was available to buy in 4 different covers. Now this means some serious collectors probably bought each of these DVD's in different covers, so they spent about $80, right? But you take the regular joes like myself who probably bought the $20 version, which is still okay. But NOW, months later, there is a "Director's Cut" version that retails for $31 that has an 3rd extra disc of features. (Folks who bought Gladiator know about this marketing ploy already and are pretty p**sed, since a new 3 disc edition for Gladiator is also available for about that same price.)

This seems to say to me that the "powers that be" knew these DVD's would sell and just milked comsumers for as much money as they could before coming out with another version.

Want another example? Take the movie SAW, the little horror movie that could. I couldn't wait to get this one on DVD. However, something told me to wait. I could easily afford the $20 price tag, but it turns out waiting was the right idea....about 8 months after the first version had been out, an "Uncut Version" came into stores. It cost me $25, but it has the extra disc and trailers/interviews and the like (plus the hilarious "saw in 60 seconds" easter eggs!)

You'd think this means that waiting for every DVD to come out with a new version is the right thing to do, yes? Well......yes and no.
The Daredevil movie (I know, most of you hated it, but it's my favorite comic character so pbhtt!) came out with a  2-Disc edition when it first hit the shelves. The 2nd disc had comics, interviews,  bloopers, all kinds of good stuff. Then a full YEAR later, they came out with a Director's Cut. I picked it up, of course. This was a longer version of the film with a much better story, but all the extra features from the first 2-disc edition were not here. You know why? Because this version only has ONE DISC!
I ended up spending $20 for the first movie and $20 on the Director's Cut, so there is no "complete" DVD version for this film - to get all the features I had to buy both versions.

Another example of milking DVD consumers dry? Oh yes, there are tons. How about The Bourne Identity? Most folks who like action thrillers picked this one up...but before The Bourne Supremacy hit theaters, a new version of the DVD came out with bookended scenes that weren't in the original film, and some places even sold movie passes to the sequel with the purchase of this new DVD!!! They almost always do this now with sequels hit theaters.

Now, there are a LOT of movies that I would love to buy - - Saw II is one of them. But I know, from past history, that the way the marketing works, there will be another version, probably with more extras, that I have to wait for.

Now when I go to buy movies, I look at the "Blu-Ray" discs on the shelves, which are a mix of new and older movies going for about $25-$35. They hail Blu-Ray as the next generation of DVD for High-Definition televisions, because it can pack more information than a standard DVD. However, upon reading more, I found that the data is stored closer to the surface of the disc, so Blu-Ray discs are not only initially going to be more expensive, but they can get damaged by dust and scratches more easily. This is all public information, available at Wikipedia.com, but in the rush to have the coolest technology, how many people are going to do their homework?

Okay, I think I've rambled enough. I guess the golden rule here is, don't buy the first version of DVD's that you see on the store shelves, because anything can get a stamp of "Director's Cut", "Unrated Cut", "Extended Edition", "Reserve the Curse Edition",  "Dread Pirate Edition", "Special Collectors Edition", "Unrated/Extended Cut", "Criterion Collection", "Special Edition" and I'm sure there will be more.

[Ash]

This somewhat fits right in with the, "Do Filmmakers Think We Are Stupid?" thread that WyreWizard wrote recently.

Yes, movie distributors do think we are stupid.

What irks me even more is when a fullscreen edition contains 2 discs but the widescreen version does not.
I recently purchased Minority Report and such was the case.


If I bought the fullscreen version, it came with 2 discs and a s**tload of extras.
The widescreen only has one disc and less than half the extras.

I bought the widescreen version.

I absolutely refuse to buy fullscreen and will only do so if a particular film hasn't been released in widescreen.

[ulthar]

My family (sisters) PREFERS full screen; they find the letterbox format of widescreen annoying.  It drives me nuts!  (When they buy DVD's for us or our children, they get full screen only versions as often as not).

They are casual movie watchers.  They rent mostly new releases and generally yack to whatever through most of what they watch.

So, if they are at all representative of an average DVD consumer, there does seem to be a market for the full screen version.  I don't get it; you miss half the stuff (I HATE pan and scan with a passion).  Maybe the decision makers lag on the features for the full screen sets due to a smaller niche market (the movie lover vs. the movie watcher).

[Ash]

ulthar Wrote:
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(I HATE pan and scan
> with a passion)

Same here.
It looks so cheap.

How would you describe what pan & scan is to someone who doesn't know what it is?
I recently tried to explain it to a friend and had a hard time doing so.
I eventually had to pop in a DVD that had it to show them an example.

What would be a good verbal description of pan & scan?

[dean]

Explaining pan and scan?  Just say that they trim the edges off, essentially cutting out 1/4 of the picture [ok so it's not that much, I'm not sure how much they cut out, but 1/4 seems pretty dramatic enough to scare people away!]

And yes, consumers often suffer for their passions, as so many companies learn to exploit our need for particular editions of dvds.

I don't let it bother me too much, since I'm one of the type who generally copies a dvd unless it's one I'm really obsessed after [that mention of the V for Vendetta version with Guy Fawkes mask sounds great to me].  Wait did I say copy? I meant 'rent'...

My argument is that if the dvd itself is worth it I'll buy the proper copy, so the simple solution to me for stopping piracy is to make good movies which you just have to buy because they're so good.  In an ideal world at least...

[Neon Noodle]

Good examples of widescreen vs. pan and scan? One of my favorites is the sequence in Star Trek II, Wrath of Khan. Remember when they were all talking to Paul Winfield in the Genesis cave? In the Pan & Scan version, while Paul Winfield is talking you can literally only see 1/2 of his face while he's talking. In the Widescreen version you can see everyone.

Another good one is the movie Fists of Fury with masta Bruce Lee. The whole fight scene at the icehouse looks better. One scene always bothered me because Bruce looks like he just turned around and threw a spinning back kick and clipped one dude in the face Daredevil style, there was no warning in the Pan & Scan version that he was even there!!!! But in the Widescreen version, you could clearly see this guy trying to sneak up on Bruce and he wasn't being very stealthy.

Mrs. Noodle just came up with a few stellar examples. In Rocky 2, When Adrian had the baby and they're in the hospital and Mickey says "What are we waiting for? TAKE THIS!" in the Pan & Scan version you have no idea what he was talking about, or who he was talking to. In the Widescreen version, you realize he was talking to Mickey and he was handing him a champagne glass.

Another good one she mentioned was the Mission Impossible knife scene. In the pan & scan version when Tom grabs the knife and says "Zero body count!" they focus on his face, not the knife. When they do the flashback scene later in the movie, it isn't really clear that the knife was the same. In Widescreen you can see both their faces and the knife, so it's easier to spot.

However, I remember one person who had a vivid description why he hated widescreen. Keep in mind this was while I was working at Blockbuster, years ago. He stated that the scene where Robert Deniro drags Sharon Stone across the bedroom floor to the closet sucks in widescreen because you can't see up her skirt in that version, you can only see it in pan & scan.

Whew! anyways, those are the best examples I can think of.

[Neon Noodle]

Here's a site with a few examples: http://www.widescreen.org/examples.shtml

[ulthar]

Siskell and Ebert did a whole show on this a while back, and I remember two of the specific examples they used:

(1) The "leg scene" from THE GRADUATE, where Ben is talking to Mrs. Robinson in the bedroom while she is putting on (or was it taking off?) her stocking.  In the Pan and Scan version, all you can see is her foot, and the total effect of the erotic tension Ben is feeling is lost.  It turns one of the most ingenuously framed shots into just some dweeb yacking away nervously.

(2) The opening shot in BLADE RUNNER:  In widescreen, you get the effect of this enormous panorama of huge megalopolis as the flying car flies out.  It is a breathtaking shot.  In Pan and Scan, you see the flying car center-screen with some lighted buildings in the background.  The shot that sets the stage for the entire culture (and it's problems and issues) is completely neutralized.

The ones that really annoy me are the ones that have two characters talking side by side and the P&S images slides back and forth between them.  This introduces a LOT of camera movement not included by the original direction and editing, and generally looks very ham-handed.

[Fearless Freep]

Yes, movie distributors do think we are stupid.

Since they keep making money doing it...apparently they are correct

[Gerry]

dean Wrote:
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> Explaining pan and scan?  Just say that they trim
> the edges off, essentially cutting out 1/4 of the
> picture

In some aspect ratios (2.35:1) for example, you lose almost 1/2 of the original picture.

[Jim H]

I usually just don't upgrade.  The only discs I can remember doing that for are the Evil Dead films (and in the case of Army of Darkness it was the significantly different European bootleg cut thing).  I still have my very early snapper DVD of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (at the time I got it, probably in 1999 or 2000, it was $10, which was an awesome deal then).  Much as I love the film, I'm not rebuying it.

Probably the exception to my "no upgrades" guideline are Director's Cut/Special Cut/Etc versions which are actually major improvements - Aliens, for instance, though I never had to upgrade that (I have the 4 movie set, the original single disc for each movie one, not the Quadrilogy, which is just too expensive for me to consider upgrading - though I really do want to see the supposedly much improved version of Alien 3).

[Andrew]

Good points here.  I love widescreen and quickly convinced Katie to hate pan and scan too.  Point out a few scenes where it appears a pair of noses are talking and you start converting people.

Upgrading to the better versions is always heck.  I reserve that for the really special films and still do that only rarely.  (I have yet to upgrade my version of "The Dark Crystal" and I love that movie.)

[LilCerberus]

My first dvd was a copy of Cat People (1982) that I got for $7.99 back in 2000.
Abeit, I didn't get to watch it for almost a year before I finally built a propper multi-media machine.
That version was in a 4x3 letterboxed format. A couple of years later, I came across the special anniversary edition, which was in 16x9 format & had higher resolution & quite a few extras.
The drawback was, this newer, more expensive version was heavily interlaced, which wasn't that big of a problem when the movie was running, but made it impossible to take screen caps.

One of my favorite examples of this whole 4x3 vs 16x9 debate, is the British & Italian imports of Galaxy of Terror (1980). Even though the Italian import has superior picture & sound quality, with better chapter selection & a few good extras, I always recomend the British import for one simple reason: In order to achieve the 16x9 aspect ratio boasted by the Italian import, they took a 4x3 print & cropped the top & bottom of the screen. Trust me, you do miss something.

[Scottie]

It has been said before but it bears being said again. Movies in the theater today are just one big advertisement for the DVD. Because, when was the last time you paid $20 to see a movie in a theater and then come to find out six months later they are showing a new version with extra stuff in the theater? Wouldn't you feel cheated? We're already paying $7.00+ for our tickets to see night showings to see the movie once, and that's about one third of the price to buy the DVD six to eight months later.

And yes, people are going to keep falling into the trap of "director's cut" or "extended scenes" home videos. This was even going on in the VHS market. I remember buying three versions of Close Encounters of the Third Kind because Spielberg rereleased his movie without certain scenes that I liked into a special shiny silver sleeve. When I bought the second VHS, it was extended, but full screen. Screw that, Spielberg shot the movie in 2.35:1 aspect ratio. If you are going to cut the 2.35:1 ratio down to 1.3:1 (4x3), you're eliminating almost half of the viewable area. Half!

Pan and scan sucks. There was a great little documentary on TCM with Scorcese and his contemporaries talking about what pan and scan does to tear up good movies. They showed the chariot race of Ben Hur and with pan and scan, the viewer only being able to see Ben... and not the guy trying to bring him down. They showed a dance sequence from the movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and in the wide screen version the shot is a lockdown with no camera movement while the seven brides and seven brothers dance around a stage. In the pan and scan, the new editors move the viewable area around creating really poor composition and hokey motion.

Back to the DVD thing, think about what Lucas is doing to his fans with the rerelease of all his Star Wars movies in SO MANY FORMS. Can anybody tell me how many different releases there have been for that movie? Probably enough to cost a few thousand dollars at retail price. I don't think there is an answer to the question of what to do about high costs for movies. I'd like to take the approach that Dean takes and just "rent" the movies to make "copies," but I don't like to do that. So, I'll just be satisfied to rent movies from the library for free.

[Scottie]

It has been said before but it bears being said again. Movies in the theater today are just one big advertisement for the DVD. Because, when was the last time you paid $20 to see a movie in a theater and then come to find out six months later they are showing a new version with extra stuff in the theater? Wouldn't you feel cheated? We're already paying $7.00+ for our tickets to see night showings to see the movie once, and that's about one third of the price to buy the DVD six to eight months later.

And yes, people are going to keep falling into the trap of "director's cut" or "extended scenes" home videos. This was even going on in the VHS market. I remember buying three versions of Close Encounters of the Third Kind because Spielberg rereleased his movie without certain scenes that I liked into a special shiny silver sleeve. When I bought the second VHS, it was extended, but full screen. Screw that, Spielberg shot the movie in 2.35:1 aspect ratio. If you are going to cut the 2.35:1 ratio down to 1.3:1 (4x3), you're eliminating almost half of the viewable area. Half!

Pan and scan sucks. There was a great little documentary on TCM with Scorcese and his contemporaries talking about what pan and scan does to tear up good movies. They showed the chariot race of Ben Hur and with pan and scan, the viewer only being able to see Ben... and not the guy trying to bring him down. They showed a dance sequence from the movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and in the wide screen version the shot is a lockdown with no camera movement while the seven brides and seven brothers dance around a stage. In the pan and scan, the new editors move the viewable area around creating really poor composition and hokey motion.

Back to the DVD thing, think about what Lucas is doing to his fans with the rerelease of all his Star Wars movies in SO MANY FORMS. Can anybody tell me how many different releases there have been for that movie? Probably enough to cost a few thousand dollars at retail price. I don't think there is an answer to the question of what to do about high costs for movies. I'd like to take the approach that Dean takes and just "rent" the movies to make "copies," but I don't like to do that. So, I'll just be satisfied to rent movies from the library for free.