This morning, a story about Warner Home Video hit the media and was quickly distributed very widely:
The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Video Business, Home Media Magazine and
Variety are among the outlets reporting about it. The announcement is that Warner has begun offering "MOD" (manufacture on demand) DVD titles of vintage films from their library, available for consumers to order directly at
WarnerArchive.com. Some of the 150+ movies available right away are older classics such as
Ice Follies of 1939 and Clark Gable's
Strange Interlude, or more recent films such as Paul Simon's
One Trick Pony and Kristy McNichol's
Just the Way You Are, or cult titles along the lines of
Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze or
I Was a Communist for the F.B.I. Cost is currently $19.95 per title. Warner expects to add around 20 titles per month, finishing out 2009 with over 300 choices there.
However, there are no TV-related plans in the pipeline just yet, despite what the various reports have said this morning. The
Variety story was quoted as saying that "
Likely upcoming TV additions to the MOD service, said (George)
Feltenstein (senior VP of theatrical catalog marketing at Warner Home Video)
, include "Maverick," "77 Sunset Strip," "Bourbon Street Beat," "Bronco," "Lawman" and "Hawaiian Eye."" We've been in touch with Warner since then, though, and were told by our contacts there that the list of shows mentioned in the quote is NOT confirmed yet, and were actually told that "no shows have been identified yet" as for-certain becoming a part of this program. Although our contact didn't say so directly, it is apparent to us that Feltenstein was giving examples of shows that possibly could be candidates for this program, not titles that were already in the works.
Warner isn't the first studio to look into MOD releases. It's been over a year since we
reported that Sony, First Look, Arts Alliance America (now Virgil Films & Entertainment) and Gaiam had allied themselves with a plan by HP to do MOD releases. At the time I wrote that "
as a consumer, I haven't seen any advertising yet telling me where or how to buy these. Have you?" After 14 months, I still haven't seen anything on this. And, in the meantime, Virgil (nee Arts Alliance) has instead
joined Amazon's "CreateSpace" MOD effort, which also includes a large number of titles from Paramount's Nickelodeon library. So more "TV-on-MOD" is coming, and we'll cover new titles with release listings (and the most important titles may additionally get a news report). Stay tuned!
