Twilight Time Discussion Thread

[thatguamguy]

Originally Posted by RCRochester

If you're just after the movies themselves on blu-ray, the Flint movies and The Blue Max have both been released in Europe. I have the French release of The Blue Max which was put out by Fox themselves.

I know they're there, and I will probably wind up picking them up at some point, but I'd pay the extra TT money just for the convenience.

[silverlakephil]

Originally Posted by Dailyan

Still nothing on the News page ? Weird.

[noirjunkie]

I understand that there was a legitimate sale that took place from the original owners of TT to SAE, but I wonder if this was all part of a larger plan. Go "out of business" to clear out as much stock as possible because people believe that everything will soon be gone forever, wait a while to make it seem like the label really is dead, then make a big announcement that the company is coming back. I know that sounds cynical, but I just can't shake the feeling that this was planned by SAE since the "going out of business" announcement.

[StarDestroyer52]

Originally Posted by RCRochester

I would like to see them do more Encore editions too. I was never a huge fan of the Limited Edition aspect of their business model.

If you're just after the movies themselves on blu-ray, the Flint movies and The Blue Max have both been released in Europe. I have the French release of The Blue Max which was put out by Fox themselves.

Same here, I would hope they could re-release the Flint films, but being with Disney that might be quite difficult. I haven't got the French releases yet, but probably will soon enough.

[StarDestroyer52]

Originally Posted by silverlakephil

Still nothing on the News page ? Weird.

I don't believe they ever posted the new TT releases on the News page.

[UnionJackMix]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

I understand that there was a legitimate sale that took place from the original owners of TT to SAE, but I wonder if this was all part of a larger plan. Go "out of business" to clear out as much stock as possible because people believe that everything will soon be gone forever, wait a while to make it seem like the label really is dead, then make a big announcement that the company is coming back. I know that sounds cynical, but I just can't shake the feeling that this was planned by SAE since the "going out of business" announcement.

I'm sure you're not the only one thinking that.
By the way does anyone know these two titles? Are they titles that TT would have released themselves or is SAE's TT taking a different direction?
Should they have chosen bigger sellers to "relaunch" the label?

[Mister_Kidd]

So will all those titles that went OOP during their time off come back into print?

[Dollar Colonel]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

I understand that there was a legitimate sale that took place from the original owners of TT to SAE, but I wonder if this was all part of a larger plan. Go "out of business" to clear out as much stock as possible because people believe that everything will soon be gone forever, wait a while to make it seem like the label really is dead, then make a big announcement that the company is coming back. I know that sounds cynical, but I just can't shake the feeling that this was planned by SAE since the "going out of business" announcement.

Originally Posted by UnionJackMix

I'm sure you're not the only one thinking that.

I hear you, but if that were the case they didn't need to discount the soon-to-be rare titles and could have just relied on FOMO.

[Cremildo]

Awesome news and, at least to me, totally unexpected.

[78deluxe]

Originally Posted by Mister_Kidd

So will all those titles that went OOP during their time off come back into print?

I was someone that predicted they bought the label not for just the stock (as we also saw lots of that stock went to HB, not SAE) but to actually have rights to release films in the future under the label.

That said, it would depend on the arrangement for a particular title. Most titles they were signing 3 year exclusive rights deals. Many OOP titles that are in demand are well past that period and they likely don't have the option to release something like "the Egyptian" otherwise you have to image they would have blasted something like that out of the gate knowing it would instantly sell like hot cakes, unlike these 2 films virtually no-one asked for or cares about.

[noirjunkie]

Originally Posted by Dollar Colonel

I hear you, but if that were the case they didn't need to discount the soon-to-be rare titles and could have just relied on FOMO.

The only way they were going to clear out existing stock was by heavily discounting them. They even had to sell of large chunks of stock to Hamiltonbook, which now has many titles still available for $7.95. The model was just flat-out no longer working.

[noirjunkie]

Originally Posted by UnionJackMix

By the way does anyone know these two titles? Are they titles that TT would have released themselves or is SAE's TT taking a different direction?

The Man From Hong Kong is a crazy 1970s Ozploitation action film. It already has a stacked region free Australian release with five of the director's early films as just some of the release's many bonus features, so the TT release won't be topping that one.

[Dollar Colonel]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

The only way they were going to clear out existing stock was by heavily discounting them. They even had to sell of large chunks of stock to Hamiltonbook, which now has many titles still available for $7.95. The model was just flat-out no longer working.

I've always said that the physical media market is small. If they can't sell out 3,000 titles on clearance, it doesn't bode well for the majority of obscure titles.

In this case, though, if there was funny business between TT and SAE, I think we would have seen less of a fire sale and more of a "get them while you can" with countdown inventory counters and mysterious additional copies being discovered weeks afterward, like with Code Red.

[klauswhereareyou]

I think when they went to 4 titles a month they were probably putting out more than the market could handle.

[Aclea]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

The Man From Hong Kong is a crazy 1970s Ozploitation action film. It already has a stacked region free Australian release with five of the director's early films as just some of the release's many bonus features, so the TT release won't be topping that one.

The problem is that, like too many Umbrella releases, they put several films and a wealth of extras on a single disc when it should be at least two, with the result that the transfer of the feature itself noticeably suffers. That's something that could be improved on.

[ChristianB]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

The only way they were going to clear out existing stock was by heavily discounting them. They even had to sell of large chunks of stock to Hamiltonbook, which now has many titles still available for $7.95. The model was just flat-out no longer working.

Another problem: As a European customer I pay for the first movie 13USD and for every other 3 plus. Unless they do sales, there is just no way I can justify this kind of surplus for regular prices.

[AgentOrange]

Originally Posted by klauswhereareyou

I think when they went to 4 titles a month they were probably putting out more than the market could handle.

They stepped in and released some niche titles when the catalog market was looking a bit grim (this was before Arrow stepped into the U.S. market, before Scream really started getting more active and doing their own remasters, before Kino started doing huge volume of licenses, etc). There was about 1-2 years where they had a nice little space for themselves with the Sony and Fox titles (that titles were selling out, was a sign they were onto something).


But eventually once they started doing MGM releases, some of those diminished their quality a bit due to the poorer masters MGM provided. To make matters worse, other labels re-issued several of their titles with superior quality or at least just started cranking out more catalog in general at a cheaper price.

[SeanJoyce]

Originally Posted by AgentOrange

To make matters worse, other labels re-issued several of their titles with superior quality or at least just started cranking out more catalog in general at a cheaper price.

Yeah it started to make sense to wait for other labels to get hold of certain TT titles, where they'd almost always release it with a superior encode and a helluva lot more supplements.

[Monterey Jack]

Originally Posted by AgentOrange

To make matters worse, other labels re-issued several of their titles with superior quality or at least just started cranking out more catalog in general at a cheaper price.

I'm still miffed that I spent $35 on Christine, when I upgraded to the 4K UHD earlier this year...for $7.99. Plus Scream Factory's loaded reissue of The Blob, which wiped the TT disc off the map.

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by noirjunkie

I understand that there was a legitimate sale that took place from the original owners of TT to SAE, but I wonder if this was all part of a larger plan. Go "out of business" to clear out as much stock as possible because people believe that everything will soon be gone forever, wait a while to make it seem like the label really is dead, then make a big announcement that the company is coming back. I know that sounds cynical, but I just can't shake the feeling that this was planned by SAE since the "going out of business" announcement.

I don't know if I feel the same, but I can't say that that vibe isn't there.

And while I hate to be a Negative Nancy about this, am I the only one who doesn't think of this as "Twilight Time is back"? I mean, yeah, technically it is. But without Nick, Julie, and Brian involved, it just seems (so far) like TINO (Twilight In Name Only). I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, but we'll see how it goes from here.