Warner Brothers Archives & HTF Chat

[Livius]

Currently, they only accept orders to ship to US postal addresses.

[Alan George]

Originally Posted by saltysam

Can you definitely order any of these titles from UK? There's one title i'll pay daft money for but when i get to check out i get a message elling me they don't ship internationally

Warner did say that they were going to start shipping internationally, but I think that was just to keep people quiet. They could (& should) have done things so much better.

[aceofwands]

Originally Posted by saltysam

Can you definitely order any of these titles from UK? There's one title i'll pay daft money for but when i get to check out i get a message elling me they don't ship internationally

Hunt it down on ebay - the US site is useful too and some listings wont appear on the UK one even if the seller ships to the UK

[DavidRayner]

Originally Posted by JoelCairo

Many thanks.

I don't think I ever saw Wichita in a cinema. It's been on TV a few times - panned, scanned and ruined of course. I'd love to see a widescreen presentation. (Is this movie where there's a Lawrence Of Arabia type sustained shot near the begining where the foreground shows cowboys making camp for the night and approaching from a long way off is Joel McCrea? Or am I thinking of another movie?)

I saw Wichita at the cinema in 1957, when I was ten years old, while it was still going the rounds and it looked excellent, with spectacular CinemaScope and beautiful colour. It has been run on BBC 2 a few times in 16 x 9 wide screen, but should be seen full width. Yes, you're quite right, the scene you mention was in Wichita at the beginning, with Joel McCrea starting off very small in the distance and getting nearer and nearer as the cowboys in the camp watch him. Wichita is a classic Western with an excellent title song sung by Tex Ritter (I was always singing it as a little boy) and should be given a proper release so that we could order it through amazon.

[siriami]

Originally Posted by Alan George

Warner did say that they were going to start shipping internationally, but I think that was just to keep people quiet. They could (& should) have done things so much better.

I did manage to order one DVD from them a couple of weeks ago,and had it delivered, but I tried again as an exercise the other day, and the website wouldn't let me complete my order as I live in the UK.
So it was possible for a short time, but not now - just as well, as the exorbitant cost of the DVD's, plus the huge postage cost, and the possibility of a UK Customs charge, make this series too pricey for UK film fans - well me, at least.

[Livius]

The Beaver's review of Brainstorm.

[JoelCairo]

Originally Posted by DavidRayner

Yes, you're quite right, the scene you mention was in Wichita at the beginning, with Joel McCrea starting off very small in the distance and getting nearer and nearer as the cowboys in the camp watch him. Wichita is a classic Western with an excellent title song sung by Tex Ritter (I was always singing it as a little boy) and should be given a proper release so that we could order it through amazon.

Many thanks. I agree a proper release is required. As Warners is making this new series available only in USA, it is still possible that their arrangements for Region 2 will be unchanged. Let's hope so!

[NickLondon]

Originally Posted by JoelCairo

Many thanks. I agree a proper release is required. As Warners is making this new series available only in USA, it is still possible that their arrangements for Region 2 will be unchanged. Let's hope so!

You know the more I read and think about this Warner Archive situation, the more dispondent I become.
In the past I have bought almost all of Warner's archive releases on DVD and had hoped that this would continue for many years to come. Especially as Warners have so many more titles I want to see.
However, off the top of my head I cannot think of any old titles in boxsets that Warners have announced to be released in the coming 6 months or so. Are there titles I have missed?
I think of all the wonderful Warner boxsets I own, with each title costing no more than say £6 or £7, and then I think of the Warner Archive programme (which appears to be replacing DVD releases) and how as a bare minimum (before factoring in possible customs charges) individual titles would cost nearly £30. However much I love watching old movies, I feel this price is simply too high and in a way I am glad that international shipping is not available as I do not have the worry of whether or not to go for the odd 1 or 2 titles.

[Alan George]

Originally Posted by JoelCairo

Many thanks. I agree a proper release is required. As Warners is making this new series available only in USA, it is still possible that their arrangements for Region 2 will be unchanged. Let's hope so!

Yes, but Warner are very picky about the catalogue titles they release in the UK (the rest of Europe, yes, but not the UK). There's a whole mountain of titles that never got a release here.

[DavidRayner]

Yes, the 1955 CinemaScope film Moonfleet, starring Stewart Granger and Jon Whiteley and with it's spectacular Miklos Rozsa score, was only released in France and even that was about five years ago. No sign of a UK release yet, though. I ordered mine from amazon France at the time. Bit of a dark transfer of the film as a whole, though, although curiously, the extracts from the film on the "making of" extras on the DVD are much lighter. That wants attending to before any US or UK release is planned.

[aceofwands]

7 years after its US release the classic Time After Time with Malcolm McDowell remains unreleased in the UK.

Warner also refuse to release many of the dvd and Bluray boxsets in the UK.
Forbidden Planet dvd.
Dirty Harry BD
Harry Potter BD (although I think thats on the way now)
Blade Runner BD

[Livius]

Originally Posted by aceofwands

Warner also refuse to release many of the dvd and Bluray boxsets in the UK.
Forbidden Planet dvd.

Forbidden Planet

[Livius]

The Beaver's review of Wichita.
I really have a hard time believing that a title like this couldn't sell as part of a proper western box.

[Alan George]

Originally Posted by aceofwands

7 years after its US release the classic Time After Time with Malcolm McDowell remains unreleased in the UK.

Warner also refuse to release many of the dvd and Bluray boxsets in the UK.
Forbidden Planet dvd.
Dirty Harry BD
Harry Potter BD (although I think thats on the way now)
Blade Runner BD

Warner did release "Forbidden Planet" in the UK, but it's deleted now. Has anyone bought the french version of Errol Flynn's "The Master Of Ballantrae", it's deleted in the US & quite expensive, but quite cheap from France, but the specs. on Amazon only mention a french track, which I'm sure is wrong.

[Livius]

I don't have the French disc (managed to pick up the R1 while it was still in print) but I've never seen a Warner release from France that didn't have the original English audio and removable subs.

EDIT: You can read the specs here. Both French and English tracks are included.

[JoelCairo]

Originally Posted by NickLondon

I think of all the wonderful Warner boxsets I own, with each title costing no more than say £6 or £7, and then I think of the Warner Archive programme (which appears to be replacing DVD releases) and how as a bare minimum (before factoring in possible customs charges) individual titles would cost nearly £30. However much I love watching old movies, I feel this price is simply too high and in a way I am glad that international shipping is not available as I do not have the worry of whether or not to go for the odd 1 or 2 titles.

I certainly agree that the much higher price will make buying DVDs casually a thing of the past.

I'm not qualified to judge if Warners have been clever or foolish with this new method of marketing their product. Elsewhere on the Internet, various scribes are declaring that Warners have been very shrewd in recognising that the market for old movies on DVD has dried up. I have no idea if the demand for old movies has declined but I am sure that for many, many years now Hollywood has been living off its capital. Most new movies lose money and the handful of commercially successful blockbusters do not in total finance the whole industry. Revenue from old movies via television and mainly from DVD has kept Hollywood prosperous for decades and if that revenue stream dries up, Hollywood will be in big trouble - which of course is why they all hope Blu-ray will generate masses of money.

My own feeling is that the studios need to tread very carefully in giving up a traditional market for their product. If they mis-judge this, they could lose out in a big way.

[JoelCairo]

Duplication

[DavidRayner]

Originally Posted by Livius

The Beaver's review of Wichita.
I really have a hard time believing that a title like this couldn't sell as part of a proper western box.

It looks like a nice, clear transfer and it makes a pleasant change seeing the image full width for the first time in over fifty-two years. A pity that I can't order a copy from them, but then again, I would be reluctant to pay $20 for postage when amazon.com can post a DVD to the UK for less than $5. Warners are really profiteering on the postage (or shipping, as they like to call it).

[Alan George]

Originally Posted by Livius

I don't have the French disc (managed to pick up the R1 while it was still in print) but I've never seen a Warner release from France that didn't have the original English audio and removable subs.

EDIT: You can read the specs here. Both French and English tracks are included.

Thanks for the reply young Livius. I tried to order it, but they keep asking for my address (I think!), & they have all my details. I'll wait 'till my brother-inlaw comes round, he speaks & reads French. When I bought "The Great Race" from Amazon Germany, I thought I'd paid a lot for the p&p, & when it arrived it seems I'd asked for it to be gift wraped!

[DavidRayner]

I had the same trouble ordering from amazon France, too. I solved it by writing down the words I didn't understand on the order pages (which was all of them really) and then typing the words into Alta Vista Babble Fish Internet Translator and translating the French words and lines of French instructions into English. It was time consuming, but at least I didn't end up paying for muliple copies of the same DVD or paying an extortionate postage for it.