Third Window Films Discussion Thread

[Mansinthe]

Watched Yesterday one of the DVDs that i got a while ago



Really good movie of a young director. (and the actress from Love Exposure has a pretty cool part here)

[Le Grande Blu]

Originally Posted by Mansinthe

Watched Yesterday one of the DVDs that i got a while ago



Really good movie of a young director. (and the actress from Love Exposure has a pretty cool part here)

Really good film. I wish Third Window could upgrade some of their older DVD releases to Blu, as they have some great titles.

[Mansinthe]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Blu

Really good film. I wish Third Window could upgrade some of their older DVD releases to Blu, as they have some great titles.

Sawako looks already pretty good upscaled on DVD
doubt there is money for upgrades of old movies..

wondering if dual format would be a option. I wouldnt mind dvd size for those.


Watching Mitsuko Delivers right now.

[thirdwindowfilms]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Blu

Really good film. I wish Third Window could upgrade some of their older DVD releases to Blu, as they have some great titles.

to be honest, most of these titles have a limited reach, and tend to reach a decent audience as they're cheap DVDs which allow people the chance to try out a title they've never heard of, such as in the case of Sawako Decides.

If it were bluray, the price would need to go higher and I can't really imagine there are so many out there who would only watch the movie on bluray, or not at all, and in the case of most of our titles which are obscure comedies from unknown directors, the difference in bluray and DVD quality is not something which would be massive enough that would make a huge difference, especially since bluray players upscale DVDs, and also with the main fact that a lot of titles like Sawako Decides we only have on digibetas and therefore a bluray release would just be upscaled anyways.

When a title like Tokyo Fist or Bullet Ballet, of which a lot of time and money was spent on remastering from original negatives to create a release which is available for the first time ever on bluray, sells only 200 copies each in the UK on blu-ray after 1 year of release, then there just makes absolutely no point whatsoever to focus on a back-catalogue of releases where the quality difference would not be major upgrading to bluray, and their would be not enough people double-dipping and not enough extra people who haven't already been reached with the dvd...

[Le Grande Blu]

Originally Posted by thirdwindowfilms

to be honest, most of these titles have a limited reach, and tend to reach a decent audience as they're cheap DVDs which allow people the chance to try out a title they've never heard of, such as in the case of Sawako Decides.

If it were bluray, the price would need to go higher and I can't really imagine there are so many out there who would only watch the movie on bluray, or not at all, and in the case of most of our titles which are obscure comedies from unknown directors, the difference in bluray and DVD quality is not something which would be massive enough that would make a huge difference, especially since bluray players upscale DVDs, and also with the main fact that a lot of titles like Sawako Decides we only have on digibetas and therefore a bluray release would just be upscaled anyways.

When a title like Tokyo Fist or Bullet Ballet, of which a lot of time and money was spent on remastering from original negatives to create a release which is available for the first time ever on bluray, sells only 200 copies each in the UK on blu-ray after 1 year of release, then there just makes absolutely no point whatsoever to focus on a back-catalogue of releases where the quality difference would not be major upgrading to bluray, and their would be not enough people double-dipping and not enough extra people who haven't already been reached with the dvd...

That's really depressing. I feel for you. Makes it all the more impressive that you're still willing to persevere though.

[Ste7en]

Originally Posted by thirdwindowfilms

If it were bluray, the price would need to go higher and I can't really imagine there are so many out there who would only watch the movie on bluray, or not at all...

Wow, since going BD I've hardly bought any DVDs. I bought The Devils and a few Shameless Screen Entertainment DVDs but that is all.

About the same as VHS cassettes when I went to LD.

Once I adopt a new format I'm almost always exclusive to that format, until the next one comes along...

[Mansinthe]

sells only 200 copies each in the UK on blu-ray after 1 year of release,

200 copies of these amazing movies? how about stuff like "woodsman and the rain" and "Kotoko" ?
maybe its time to leave the UK market and release in the US

[tenia]

Originally Posted by Ste7en

Once I adopt a new format I'm almost always exclusive to that format, until the next one comes along...

Same here.
I'm at a point when there are so many great releases worldwide that if something is announced on DVD, I don't even look at it at all. Whereas if it's a BD announcement, then, I'm interested.

This being said, 200 copies ?! That's even worse than some titles in France (which is a smaller market than the UK).

[Mansinthe]

i would have missed out on so many awesome DVD releases if i would still think "bluray only". Im very glad i watched all these Tsukamoto DVDs that have not been released on bluray yet. same for a lot of thirdwindows "obscure comedy" movies. Or some classics from Moc like Kwaidan. Plenty of stuff from suzuki and naruse on Hulu. Or Kurosawa in the eclipse Series.

200 sold copies is really sad for a Tsukamoto movie with sex and violence. I thought these are the "big sellers" for Japanese Cinema. But that should give us a idea how bad some other movies probably do.

Im wondering if way to many people just pirate movies or watch everything on netflix , Hulu , amazon , itunes etc on their phones and tablets these days

[Ste7en]

I'm going to have to slum it and pick up some DVDs...

Those boxes are just so darned big!

[Mansinthe]

Originally Posted by Ste7en

I'm going to have to slum it and pick up some DVDs...

Those boxes are just so darned big!

there are plenty of storage solutions to save up on space
if i would own a HTPC i would probably just rip them to a HDD and store the DVDs somewhere else.

anyway.. you dont want to miss out on movies like Shady i recommend Bleak Night as well if you like Korean movies like "friends"


and to be honest.. if you buy some of them used they are already avaible for 2-3 GBP.

one of the best DVDs i own




But its no wonder that movies Like Bullet Ballet have bad Sales numbers if Amazon has the price up at 19 GBP +

some marketplace seller are alot cheaper on plenty of Thirdwindow Movies.. Kotoko amazon = 18 GBP , thirdparty = 6 GBP (bluray !)

but its interessting that the new directors from Japan set did so well compared to these 2 tsukamotos 0_o.

[Yami]

Originally Posted by Mansinthe

but its interessting that the new directors from Japan set did so well compared to these 2 tsukamotos 0_o.

I'd be willing to bet that if they were limited to 1000 copies, they would have sold out by now

[Mansinthe]

Originally Posted by Yami

I'd be willing to bet that if they were limited to 1000 copies, they would have sold out by now

yeah maybe adam could do that in the future. just call 1000 , 4000s prints "limited edition".

Works well for plenty of labels that usually wouldnt print and sell more anyway.

[sjconstable]

Originally Posted by Mansinthe

and to be honest.. if you buy some of them used they are already avaible for 2-3 GBP.

...which doesn't support Third Window whatsoever.

[Le Grande Blu]

Originally Posted by Yami

I'd be willing to bet that if they were limited to 1000 copies, they would have sold out by now

Or if Adam just got with the program, and started releasing 'Limited Edition Steelbooks'. He might as well grab a slice of that OCD market.

[thirdwindowfilms]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Blu

Or if Adam just got with the program, and started releasing 'Limited Edition Steelbooks'. He might as well grab a slice of that OCD market.

Do you know how much a steelbook costs to produce at low run numbers for small companies who don't place regular big orders? It's like £6 per unit if doing 1000 run. That's over 6 times the cost of a normal bluray release plus all the regular costs of a bluray release such as paying AACS and sony mastering costs (the charges are actually per layer so it costs double for a bd50 and that's not cheap at all)

[sjconstable]

Originally Posted by thirdwindowfilms

Do you know how much a steelbook costs to produce at low run numbers for small companies who don't place regular big orders? It's like £6 per unit if doing 1000 run. That's over 6 times the cost of a normal bluray release plus all the regular costs of a bluray release such as paying AACS and sony mastering costs (the charges are actually per layer so it costs double for a bd50 and that's not cheap at all)

You can get Zavvi to pay you the money upfront for steelbook exclusivity, I believe. I'm personally not bothered about steelbooks though, I find them a bit gimmicky.

[thirdwindowfilms]

Originally Posted by sjconstable

You can get Zavvi to pay you the money upfront for steelbook exclusivity, I believe. I'm personally not bothered about steelbooks though, I find them a bit gimmicky.

You can if you're a larger company of whom zavvi regularly buy from and place large orders with, though zavvi has barely any of our stock on hand (not for lack of trying on our part) so i can't imagine they'd front that much up front on a small run as would be a whole lot of money

[Mansinthe]

would it be possible to do Kickstarters for "2 layer" upgrades ? to cover extra costs from sony etc.

[samdvd1]

Originally Posted by Mansinthe

would it be possible to do Kickstarters for "2 layer" upgrades ? to cover extra costs from sony etc.

You're obsessed with Kickstarter. Business and associated costs is a lot more in-depth than people think, and with Adam's years in the business with this small niche, I'm sure he knows better than anyone the best way to release these titles by cutting costs in certain areas to make them viable.