BDs That Are Out of Print (OOP)

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by Jay H.

Honestly, do you know many people who want to buy Chain Reaction?

Authenticated photo of crowds awaiting the Blu-Ray re-release of Chain Reaction:

[neo_reloaded]

From your list, the following are readily available from the distributor and/or multiple large national chains:

Cast Away
Cleopatra
The Counselor
Ever After
Jackie
Master and Commander
Slumdog Millionaire
That Thing You Do
Towering Inferno
Ad Astra 4K UHD
The Post 4K UHD
Prometheus 4K UHD

A few others were available from one large national chain but not multiple (28 Days Later, Romeo+Juliet, and I think a few others), and the vast majority of the list was readily available and cheap from suppliers such as DeepDiscount/DirectToU, but I was very conservative in constructing the list. Many of the titles are very niche and not remotely surprising that they would not receive a repressing after taking a decade to sell out of their first pressing. A few I would expect to eventually see a repress (Marilyn Monroe films and Murder On The Orient Express 4K in particular).

None of this remotely strikes me as unusual compared to other studios. Represses have been extremely slow since the pandemic, and lots are likely not coming - but not just from Fox. I've had this exact experience with lots of older Paramount, WB, and Sony titles I've been looking for. Universal is the sole studio to really be doing good with transitioning its catalog to pressed MOD and keeping up with represses, IMO.

And again, when you create a scare about titles going OOP, lots of old titles finally running through their stock should not be a surprise. Both fake and real OOP scares absolutely have this effect. Gone With The Wind temporarily being taken down from HBO Max resulted in years worth of old stock being bought up over night. The Shout Factory MGM OOP announcements resulted in dozens of titles selling out - some overnight, some over a few days or weeks. And that was not a situation where Shout was regularly pressing titles and abruptly stopped - most of the titles were, like I've been saying, on YEARS OLD pressings, which I know for a fact because I myself bought a bunch and most were manufactured by a replicator that hadn't been used by Shout Factory for years and wasn't even in the business of replicating Blu-ray movies anymore (Sony switched them to solely PS4 game replication).

[James Luckard]

There will never be a smoking gun proving things one way or the other.

Not since Disney took down the wonderfully useful foxconnect.com, which conveniently listed exactly which titles were still available directly from Fox.

Barring that, we're only ever gonna have our best guesses, and we've both given them.

[houseca]

It appears Neo Reloaded has the time, resources, and motivation to defeat the mighty James Luckard in this clash of Blu-ray titans.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by houseca

It appears Neo Reloaded has the time, resources, and motivation to defeat the mighty James Luckard in this clash of Blu-ray titans.

I mean I do want to be clear that I'm not battling this out to prove or win some meaningless point.

People routinely ask if a certain Fox title is just temporarily out of stock, and could return in a few weeks or months, as happens with Universal titles all the time lately, for example.

I have rarely seen Fox titles that have vanished reappear. It happens, it's true, but I don't regret for a second the Fox titles I snapped up soon after Disney bought them.

Will they all reappear at some point on BD? Anything is possible, but that seems exceedingly unlikely.

I'm grateful I got some of those titles for a fraction of what they're going for now, and I simply want to help others who are also shopping.

Waiting on a Fox title that's rarely seen in the wild is much more likely to lead to it being a lot more expensive a few months down the road than it is to seeing it restocked anywhere.

I've made a point of being clear that I tend to go primarily by Amazon for the sole reason that they have reliably tended to be the canary in the coal mine on other titles drying up, especially catalog titles that other retailers may still carry stock of.

I still respectfully stand by all my assertions, and Neo clearly respectfully stands by theirs. With foxconnect.com gone, there's really no way for either of us to prove anything definitively, we're both just trying to help.

[James Luckard]

Also, I should add that even when the dear departed wbshop.com was active, there was never a consensus about titles that vanished from there, partly because OOP and OOS get confused so commonly.

When a title vanished from wbshop.com, I took it to mean that Warners had put it out of print, even if a few retailers still stocked it. Others disagreed.

And then there's the difference between something being permanently OOP and simply between pressings. It's never simple, for better or worse.

[bipbop13]

"That Thing You Do" is in the latest Disney pamphlet for this month, and on sale as well.

[noiradelic]

Originally Posted by James Luckard

Good luck trying to find new copies of any of these titles directly through most major retailers:

28 Days Later
28 Weeks Later
Australia
A Bigger Splash
Cast Away
Cleopatra
The Counselor
The Devil Wears Prada
Entrapment
Ever After
From Hell
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
In Time
Jackie
Joy Ride
The Last King of Scotland
Master and Commander
My Cousin Rachel
Never Let Me Go
Once
One Fine Day
The Poseidon Adventure
Romeo + Juliet
Shallow Hal
Shame
Sleeping with the Enemy
Slumdog Millionaire
Sunshine
That Thing You Do
Tigerland
Titanic (1953)
The Towering Inferno

Ad Astra UHD
Eddie the Eagle UHD
Exodus: Gods and Kings UHD
Murder on the Orient Express UHD
The Post UHD
Prometheus UHD
Widows UHD

they were pretty much all readily available until the Disney boyout, when they all quickly started vanishing.

These are all readily available from multiple major retailers:

Cast Away
Devil Wears Prada
Slumdog Millionaire
28 Days Later (as a standalone title only)
Romeo + Juliet
That Thing You Do
Master and Commander
Poseidon Adventure
Towering Inferno
Cleopatra

Ad Astra 4K
The Post 4K
Prometheus 4K


I didn't check all of the titles on the list because some seem to me to be such likely OOP candidates, like Tigerland.

Many of the titles that are OOP are older BDs of movies that are now largely forgotten. I'm not the least bit surprised the Widows 4K's OOP because it wasn't that popular a movie (think it's underrated). Fox stopped putting out films on the Studio Classics line in 2015, so not a surprise that the less well-selling titles like The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (and some others you didn't list) went OOP a few years later.

To be clear, those are just the Fox titles from my own collection that Amazon doesn't stock new, and hasn't stocked new in many months.

Hope you checked other sites in addition to Amazon, because I find them to be one of the less consistent major online retailers when it comes to determining what's OOP.

[CelestialAgent]

Looks like the first season of Portlandia is gone



Btw, as for the Fox debate, I refuse to own any repressings with Disney’s silver template or the 20th Century Studios logo.

[DeusExMacarena]

Originally Posted by Jay H.

Honestly, do you know many people who want to buy Chain Reaction?

There are dozens of us! Dozens!

[Nightman04]

Originally Posted by Jay H.

Honestly, do you know many people who want to buy Chain Reaction?

I definitely don't want to buy it...because I already did.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by noiradelic

I didn't check all of the titles on the list because some seem to me to be such likely OOP candidates, like Tigerland.

Many of the titles that are OOP are older BDs of movies that are now largely forgotten. I'm not the least bit surprised the Widows 4K's OOP because it wasn't that popular a movie (think it's underrated). Fox stopped putting out films on the Studio Classics line in 2015, so not a surprise that the less well-selling titles like The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (and some others you didn't list) went OOP a few years later.

Yes, some of the titles are older, but from what I saw, they were all still readily available until some months after the Disney purchase. Is it possible that's a pure coincidence? Sure. But, again, 3/4 of a studio's catalog drying up within a year of it being sold seems like an awfully big coincidence.

Originally Posted by noiradelic

Hope you checked other sites in addition to Amazon, because I find them to be one of the less consistent major online retailers when it comes to determining what's OOP.

I've found just the opposite. In general, I've found that Amazon tends to sell out of many titles first, because people go there first, it does such huge volume. Other retailers like Best Buy, Walmart and Target tend to carry titles a bit longer before running out of stock.

I really feel Amazon tends to be the first sign that something is vanishing, with some exceptions.

The logic of my method can certainly be argued, but I find it usually holds up.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by bipbop13

"That Thing You Do" is in the latest Disney pamphlet for this month, and on sale as well.

The shame of Fox titles ending up there is that it's a membership service, right? Is this that Disney Club thing where they issued The Black Hole and other titles?

[neo_reloaded]

Originally Posted by James Luckard

But, again, 3/4 of a studio's catalog drying up within a year of it being sold seems like an awfully big coincidence.

I don't accept the 3/4 number without first looking into it more thoroughly so I hesitate to engage with this statement, but the "coincidence" thing really gets to the heart of the issue. The alternate theory is not "it's a coincidence" - the alternate theory is "multiple Blu-ray enthusiast forums have been nonstop repeating a narrative of all Fox titles going OOP for multiple years now, so a number of old titles drying up in that period is not a surprise." If there were a pervasive "all WB titles going OOP" or "all Sony titles going OOP" narrative, there would be additional titles drying up for those studios too (and plenty already are drying up for those studios in the absence of this narrative, just in a slightly more piecemeal fashion). There are massive numbers of titles for nearly all studios that are available now but such slow sellers that they will never be repressed. Titles in this category finally selling out is not indicative of a studio making some new anti-catalog decision - those titles' fates are already set by virtue of their multi-year sales histories.

You can verify how old the pressings are for these titles by a number of means, as I've explained repeatedly. I guarantee that My Cousin Rachel and Tigerland and One Fine Day have not received new pressings in the last half-decade or longer. There were many much more popular Fox titles that I bought in 2020 that also had ancient pressings. If those titles had dried up in 2018 before the sale, Fox would not have repressed them. If they were still available today, it'd still be the ancient pressings. Them selling out in 2019/2020 does not present any information about Disney's overall attitude to the Fox catalogue because there's just no universe where these were getting repressed.

Originally Posted by James Luckard

The shame of Fox titles ending up there is that it's a membership service, right? Is this that Disney Club thing where they issued The Black Hole and other titles?

Kind of a membership. You are "obligated" to buy a certain number of titles (like 5?), but once you hit that, there's never an obligation ever again, and no monthly dues or anything. You just have to remember to decline various offers they send you. I don't love it, but at least it's a venue for Disney to release some niche back-catalog stuff.

And the Fox titles people are referencing as being available there are not exclusive to there - The Thing You Do, for instance, is widely available at other sites and available from the distributor. But its availability at the Disney Movie Club is one more bit of evidence as to Disney still selling and even promoting Fox titles.

[neo_reloaded]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

Btw, as for the Fox debate, I refuse to own any repressings with Disney’s silver template or the 20th Century Studios logo.

Do you own any Fox titles released by Twilight Time or Kino? Or any MGM titles released by WB or Fox? Or any RKO titles released by WB? Or any Miramax titles released by Lionsgate or Paramount?

[CelestialAgent]

Originally Posted by neo_reloaded

Do you own any Fox titles released by Twilight Time or Kino? Or any MGM titles released by WB or Fox? Or any RKO titles released by WB? Or any Miramax titles released by Lionsgate or Paramount?

I would rather own Miramax titles released by Lionsgate and MGM titles released by WB, unless they produced a new disc. RKO hasn’t made a theatrical film in decades so doesn’t matter, neither does titles licensed to different labels? I just prefer original pressings in general and they don’t change the name of the studio on all those other examples.

[neo_reloaded]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

I would rather own Miramax titles released by Lionsgate and MGM titles released by WB, unless they produced a new disc. RKO hasn’t made a theatrical film in decades so doesn’t matter, neither does titles licensed to different labels? I just prefer original pressings in general and they don’t change the name of the studio on all those other examples.

For the older MGM films that WB owns, they don't put the MGM logo anywhere on the package. The MGM logo is at the beginning of the actual movie, but otherwise utterly absent from the Blu-ray. That's now the position 20th Century Fox films are in. Disney owns them, it can put whatever label it wants on the packaging, but the original logo/fanfare will remain as part of the actual movie. This is not some novel scenario - movie studios have changed hands regularly in the past and will in the future. Any consistency in this "I'll only purchase releases from the original production studio" stance would block an enormous amount of film history.

[CelestialAgent]

Originally Posted by neo_reloaded

For the older MGM films that WB owns, they don't put the MGM logo anywhere on the package. The MGM logo is at the beginning of the actual movie, but otherwise utterly absent from the Blu-ray. That's now the position 20th Century Fox films are in. Disney owns them, it can put whatever label it wants on the packaging, but the original logo/fanfare will remain as part of the actual movie. This is not some novel scenario - movie studios have changed hands regularly in the past and will in the future. Any consistency in this "I'll only purchase releases from the original production studio" stance would block an enormous amount of film history.

You’re misinterpreting what I’m saying. I was referring to the MGM titles that WB now distributes, that Fox used to distribute. I couldn’t care less than WB/Turner’s logos appear on the titles MGM owned before the 80s.

The fact is Disney shouldn’t own Fox, I’ll accept stuff like Speed 4K which was released recently with 20th Century Studios logos but I don’t see what’s so controversial in wanting to own an original pressing with the logos the disc originally had than a repressing with different logos.

20th Century Studios is a dreadful name anyway.

[neo_reloaded]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

You’re misinterpreting what I’m saying. I was referring to the MGM titles that WB now distributes, that Fox used to distribute. I couldn’t care less than WB/Turner’s logos appear on the titles MGM owned before the 80s.

Why is WB owning 50-year-old MGM films different from Disney owning 50-year-old Fox films?

The fact is Disney shouldn’t own Fox,

I think it's terrible for the movie industry, terrible culturally, and terrible politically - but it's now the reality, and I'm personally not going to let it prevent me from enjoying Fox films or other films.

If your issue was that you were boycotting a company you thought was unethical, I'd honestly be fine with that and say more power to you. But your issue is routinely phrased solely in the context of the irrelevant Blu-ray cover art now saying one thing instead of saying another thing, and just - wow - that strikes me as so inconsistent given the *gestures around wildly* constantly shifting nature of film rights.

20th Century Studios is a dreadful name anyway.

For pre-buyout films, the only place you'll see this name is a half-inch by half-inch logo in the bottom corner of the back cover art.

[houseca]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

20th Century Studios is a dreadful name anyway.

You would think that if they are going to change the name, they would at least update it to the correct century.