Twilight Time Discussion Thread

[ROclockCK]

Originally Posted by Danny4

The site crashed at 4pm est. about an hour later it was up and running again. i have a firefox add on which makes it possible to automatically refresh webpages.
I went on watching a movie and peeked to my computer now and then.
About an hour later, the site was working again and i was able to buy an autographed copy. so they were not sold out at 4 pm or a few minutes later. they were probably sold out an hour later in a few minutes when the site was working again.

That jibes with my experience too Danny. There was a very brief window when the site kinda sorta worked. It was very slow and most pages would not load fully, but the key eCommerce pieces seemed to work well enough to get you to the Confirm button. Even though I received no SAE site response to that submission, I did receive an e-mail shortly afterwards. Then everything went to hell again.

Eye of the hurricane passing over?

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by Arkadin

imo they should have made the 100 signed copies random. you place an order you have a 1 in 30 chance of getting a copy that is signed. makes a lot more sense than creating total chaos and frustration with "first 100 copies" etc. etc.
many people had the autographed copy disappear from their cart and thus you have a bunch of pissed people that thought they were going to get one.
overall, because of that issue, imo the promotion was a total fiasco--just like the entire pre-order sale.
trying to place an order for 4 and a half hours is a extremely frustrating to say the least.
SAE MUST improve their servers imo.

I was able to get a signed copy in my cart right as the promotion started but it took me over an hour, maybe more like a hour and a half, to get to the last stage of checkout only to find that the signed title sold out right before I could finished checking out. Wasn't too happy when that happened. SAE could have handled this much better and it sounds like we should expect the same type of behavior next month according to TT.

[Seymour]

Originally Posted by Persianimmortal

Seems fairly obvious that most of the crush was due to people trying to get the autographed copies.After all, if you're a fan of the movie, and it costs no more to get a signed copy than a regular one, why wouldn't you want to get one? So come 4PM EST everyone jammed the site constantly refreshing in an effort to grab one, and hence it allegedly sold out within minutes and crashed the site.

Even though I wasn't interested in Journey, I wouldn't want an autographed copy. I have no desire whatsoever to obtain a blu-ray with somebody's signature on it--but that's just me.

On another note, I did preorder The Big Heat. Bring on As Good as It Gets!

[Persianimmortal]

Originally Posted by Seymour

Even though I wasn't interested in Journey, I wouldn't want an autographed copy. I have no desire whatsoever to obtain a blu-ray with somebody's signature on it--but that's just me.

Yes, I think that is just you. I don't think a lot of people are Pat Boone fans, but for most people, having a principal cast member sign a blu-ray only adds value (even if it's just novelty or conversational value) to a copy of the movie.

Originally Posted by Danny4

About an hour later, the site was working again and i was able to buy an autographed copy. so they were not sold out at 4 pm or a few minutes later. they were probably sold out an hour later in a few minutes when the site was working again.

Fair enough, I'm wrong there. It wasn't literally "within minutes" of the launch, but within minutes of the site actually being available again for orders. This post in the Journey thread here indicates that within around 20 minutes of the site actually being available, the autographed copies were marked as sold out. Oddly, at least one person in that thread says "...I have my completed Order # for my 2 signed copies." which tends to indicate the one-per-customer limit wasn't working.

My experience was different in that from the moment the launch began until around an hour or so later I couldn't get the site to load a single time, not even partially. Seems I gave up about 15 minutes too soon, but it was 7:00am here on a cold morning and having wasted an hour already I just went back to sleep.

[SolidBlu]

Originally Posted by HonestJohn

Yeah, no problem now. Ordered both Journey and Big Heat. All autographed copies of Journey are sold out now which may have something to do with it.

same here, was able to secure my copies

[iap738]

Just put in an order for The Big Heat. Blind buy, but I have a feeling that I will love it.

[JoeDeM]

Originally Posted by rdodolak

I was able to get a signed copy in my cart right as the promotion started but it took me over an hour, maybe more like a hour and a half, to get to the last stage of checkout only to find that the signed title sold out right before I could finished checking out. Wasn't too happy when that happened. SAE could have handled this much better and it sounds like we should expect the same type of behavior next month according to TT.

That's pretty much what happened to me, so I started the process over again to try and pre-order a regular copy, which took another hour and a half. I'm just glad I got a copy, I was afraid it would sell out.

[dumb_dutchman]

They should have put the autographed copies up at a different time than the regular pre-order...possibly put up the signed copies a day or two ahead of time.

That being said, I wasn't able to get an autographed copy either. Although, today I think I have hit a new low at even attempting to get a Pat Boone signed copy of anything. I was actually getting giddy in anticipation...man I need help.

[TJS_Blu]

Originally Posted by TJS_Blu

After banging my head repeatedly, I took my nephew to see the Hunger Games, & was able to quickly place an order for Big Heat & Swamp Water without problems when I got back home.

[fdm]

Originally Posted by Seymour

Even though I wasn't interested in Journey, I wouldn't want an autographed copy. I have no desire whatsoever to obtain a blu-ray with somebody's signature on it--but that's just me.

Me too, though I suppose if it was somebody really worthwhile, e.g., somebody that isn't Pat Boone (he's still alive? ) But don't really care about autographs any more. Think the last thing I got that came with autographs was a poster of Renaissance when they came through Denver in the 80s. (Though I remember in the mid-60s as a tyke going ape about getting a couple dozen pro bowlers' to autograph my program booklet during a tournament stop in Chicago.)

Will probably get Journey... Good chance for The Big Heat also, though want to view at least some of the dvd beforehand to make sure.

[RodneyOz]

Originally Posted by Persianimmortal

Fair enough, I'm wrong there. It wasn't literally "within minutes" of the launch, but within minutes of the site actually being available again for orders. This post in the Journey thread here indicates that within around 20 minutes of the site actually being available, the autographed copies were marked as sold out.

That's right, that post's from an hour and a half after the 4pm EDT crush started. Which matches my experience - the servers crashed right on 4pm their time (6am our time in Australia) then somehow flickered back to life bewteen about 7.20 and 7.30am our time, which is when a handful of people reported getting their autographed copies; then a few minutes later came other people with reports of having it in their carts and having it removed, and then the autographed item listing being removed all together.

(and full disclosure: that's the time when I got mine ordered too. I had the 'Journey' thread open in a different tab while I refreshed, checking for every scrap of info as people posted.)

What was weird though is that shortly after they crashed again! After I got my email I tried to return to the website to check my orders page (I'm paranoid) and the server was down again. My theory is that enough people had left/got bored/weren't refreshing as frequently, allowing some traffic to get through; then, when those people read that the site was back up - CRASH!! as they all tried to get back on again.

[cobravenomous]

Will Twilight Time announce if and when Journey sells out? Any guesses whether it will?

[JoeDeM]

Originally Posted by cobravenomous

Will Twilight Time announce if and when Journey sells out? Any guesses whether it will?

SAE will probably mark it sold out on their website, when it sells out.

[Seymour]

Originally Posted by cobravenomous

Will Twilight Time announce if and when Journey sells out? Any guesses whether it will?

Originally Posted by JoeDeM

SAE will probably mark it sold out on their website, when it sells out.

Twilight Time made an announcement on their Facebook page when 500 copies were left of Fright Night. Screen Archives might've also sent out an email. Once it's sold out on the site, they basically remove it completely. You can't find any trace that Fright Night even existed on SAE's website.

[ROclockCK]

Originally Posted by Seymour

Twilight Time made an announcement on their Facebook page when 500 copies were left of Fright Night. Screen Archives might've also sent out an email. Once it's sold out on the site, they basically remove it completely. You can't find any trace that Fright Night even existed on SAE's website.

True Seymour, but the question is "how quickly will that happen?" And by extension, "how much time will it leave buyers to respond?" When Fright Night passed the 500 left mark, the run on its remaining discs lasted barely a day.

So here we are, 18 hours after the pre-orders for Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Big Heat tripled Fright Night's traffic and brought down SAE's Amazon-hosted servers not once but twice on both coasts, and now SAE's top 10 Sellers list for the week looks like this:

1 JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH (1959) (PRE-ORDER)

2 THE BIG HEAT (1953) (PRE-ORDER)

3 STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT

4 GALAXY QUEST (3000 EDITION)

5 BELL, BOOK AND CANDLE (1958)

6 THE BLACK CAULDRON

7 DESIREE (1954)

8 RUN OF THE ARROW / THE BRAVE ONE (PRE-ORDER)

9 HOOK (2 CD / 5000 EDITION)

10 BITE THE BULLET (1975)

FWIW, the following explanation for this calamity was posted on TT's Facebook site, which I requoted on the Journey thread:

Twilight Time DVD Label (Nick Redman?): "SAE were as prepared as they could be...we all anticipated Fright Night levels of frenzy, but the site was apparently hit by the largest one-day traffic event in its history. SAE is hosted by Amazon and they have two big servers, but the activity today more than TRIPLED the "Fright Night" pre-orders...we ask your understanding in that this is not an exact science, and is very hard to predict...TT is more well-known now than 6 months ago when FN happened but this still a steep learning curve...we will now have to quadruple expectations when "As Good As It Gets" hits next month..."

So picking up the pieces the morning after, what have we learned here? Clearly, both Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Big Heat are hotly in demand movies...classics worldwide. There were only 3000 of each made. They won't be reissued or relicensed again for at least 3 years. They're Region Free. And 6 months after the Fright Night sell out, that TT Blu routinely sells for $125 to $150 plus on eBay (if you can even find one - collectors don't seem to be parting with them).

After the server-trashing sales rush we saw yesterday, does anyone still think those remaining TT Blu-rays of Journey or Big Heat will hang around for months...or weeks...or even days? If I didn't have these Blu's yet, I certainly wouldn't be sitting on my thumbs. These are not 'business-as-usual' home video releases.

[Lemmy Lugosi]

Anyone know how many copies of Journey are left?

[nateynate87]

Originally Posted by Lemmy Lugosi

Anyone know how many copies of Journey are left?

Well we at least know 100 are gone lol but beyond that is anyone's guess at this point. If they do like they did with Fright Night we will get an email when 500 are left like ROclockCK mentioned above.

[Yami]

I personally doubt they'll manage but TT have said on Facebook that they "would kill" to get their hands on Powell/Pressburger's A Matter of Life and Death.

[ROclockCK]

Originally Posted by Lemmy Lugosi

Anyone know how many copies of Journey are left?

Why not try 'gaming the cart' Lemmy? We know that's not accurate, because not all discs available will show in SAE's stock system at any given point (some remain with TT's manufacturer Cinram or in their own offices). But with a handful of TT's titles*, this has been known to put you more or less in the ballpark...at very least indicating how quickly a particular disc is selling.

* I think the Fright Night cart read reasonably close because SAE anticipated a quick sellout of that title and made sure the total number available was input so they didn't risk overselling it during the final rundown on stock.

[ROclockCK]

Originally Posted by Yami

I personally doubt they'll manage but TT have said on Facebook that they "would kill" to get their hands on Powell/Pressburger's A Matter of Life and Death.

If anyone gets it Yami, I'd bet on Criterion. They have all the other major Powell/Pressburger titles.