Aussie DVD While International get Blu-Ray

[Cevolution]

Originally Posted by BIGRED1977

Fair point re: my comment on the quality of the local Gentlemen Blu, I probably still wouldn't have purchased it though if there was a 4K version available locally..... which unfortunately there wasn't.

I generally don't care too much about packaging and rating logos etc..... slips are generally a waste of time but I do care when we get lesser versions of the content itself. I probably buy most new releases locally other than in situations like Gentlemen..... the bulk of my buying would be re-releases of older films, remasters, special editions etc which are often more attractive/readily available from the US/UK......I support local releases where I can though, very much looking forward to Umbrellas Uncommon Valor!!!!

I'm starting to see a trend of more and more enthusiasts jumping ship to streaming, particularly for 4K content that's not available on disc, or when the streaming version offers Dolby Vision, and the disc doesn't. Some of these people seem to have no problem abandoning physical media in a heartbeat for this (also for cheaper content from online services), whereas for me it's not always about quality... I'm loyal to physical media, because I have complete control over my collection of discs that I have bought, unlike content sourced from online services. I care about physical media and the perks that it offers over online digital distribution, and if it means that sometimes I am going to have to settle for a 1080p Blu-ray disc, over say 4K Apple TV content, then that's what I am prepared to do... That's me doing my bit to help physical media to stay above water for longer.

[PT Ryan]

Originally Posted by Brayden96

Disney's press release for The Call of the Wild said DVD only after there were listings for months on Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray.

https://twitter.com/daveleedwnundr/s...819840/photo/1

Underwater releases this week on DVD only after until just recently listing it for Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray for months as well.

That's still no proof that they're abandoning those formats. Both of those films were theatrical flops, so there might not be any point spending money on Blu/UHD releases. Or they may be holding off on those releases until retail is properly up and running again. Or there might be a general holding pattern on 20th Century releases until the company further reorganises (lots of jobs across Disney and 20th Century were shed after the merger worldwide). You don't know and I don't know. This entire thread is speculation and nothing else.

[Alister_M]

Underwater isn't even getting a DVD release in NZ now. Must have been a pretty serious flop, even though it looks interesting. Probably because Kristen Stewart has become the new Clive Owen - mysteriously "box office poison" despite a proclivity towards appearing in good movies and being pretty good at acting to boot.

[Auss1e]

Just to leave a quick comment about The Gentlemen Blu as I saw that bought up.

I watched it with my Mum for Mothers Day. It's a perfectly fine Blu-Ray. Granted, we didn't watch it on a home theatre set up or anything but it was of a perfectly good quality from what I could tell. Specs on paper don't tell the whole story.

Would I have preferred for it to be on a BD50? Absolutely. Do I think Roadshow need to stop "cheaping out" (for lack of a better phrase) on their non-Warner releases? Definitely. But is the disc bad? Not at all. It's still 5.1 lossless audio. The video is still good. I doubt you'd find anything actually wrong with it unless you went pixel peeping.

[Cevolution]

So far on here and another Australian forum, I've seen roughly 10 people complain about Underwater not being released here on 4K. Based on most of these peoples comments, they wait for the majority of new release titles to be around the $15-$20 mark before considering purchasing them. $17.50 is the middle of those amounts, $17.50 multiplied by 10 is $175... There is a lot profit there for the distributor, keep those signatures coming boys, you're not far off your target

[Alister_M]

I mean, maybe there'd be some sort of semi-legit complaint to be made if Underwater had a 4K release anywhere else, but it doesn't.

[BIGRED1977]

Originally Posted by Cevolution

I'm starting to see a trend of more and more enthusiasts jumping ship to streaming, particularly for 4K content that's not available on disc, or when the streaming version offers Dolby Vision, and the disc doesn't. Some of these people seem to have no problem abandoning physical media in a heartbeat for this (also for cheaper content from online services), whereas for me it's not always about quality... I'm loyal to physical media, because I have complete control over my collection of discs that I have bought, unlike content sourced from online services. I care about physical media and the perks that it offers over online digital distribution, and if it means that sometimes I am going to have to settle for a 1080p Blu-ray disc, over say 4K Apple TV content, then that's what I am prepared to do... That's me doing my bit to help physical media to stay above water for longer.

Totally agree, I feel the same way about physical media

[LMFAObros]

I think what could be potentially happening is due to the pandemic and 4K discs being made overseas somewhere likely being delayed and having transportation delays and issues, that many 4K releases that were scheduled here pre pandemic have been cancelled or even outright delayed till these supply issues are resolved. This is all speculation and I am not 100% sure this is the case but it might be a reason why a few of our releases are delayed and/or cancelled

[Cevolution]

Originally Posted by LMFAObros

I think what could be potentially happening is due to the pandemic and 4K discs being made overseas somewhere likely being delayed and having transportation delays and issues, that many 4K releases that were scheduled here pre pandemic have been cancelled or even outright delayed till these supply issues are resolved. This is all speculation and I am not 100% sure this is the case but it might be a reason why a few of our releases are delayed and/or cancelled

It's good to see when someone realises this point... I've seen a number of comments recently from enthusiasts completely disregarding this, and I wonder where their head is at. One of the worst offenders I've seen is a dude on Whirlpool named Newman, who has continuously been giving Kicks.com.au a hard time during this pandemic (and seems to be trying to convince people not to order with them), because of some of the minor errors that they have made and in his opinion their customer service team is too slow dealing with them. Even with everything going on, he expects A1 customer service, which I think is unreasonable. Based on his comments, I don't think he has ever worked in retail before. To be honest, he comes across as grouchy old c*nt, that just doesn't like the majority of "big evil" retailers in general.

[SillyG]

Originally Posted by LMFAObros

I think what could be potentially happening is due to the pandemic and 4K discs being made overseas somewhere likely being delayed and having transportation delays and issues, that many 4K releases that were scheduled here pre pandemic have been cancelled or even outright delayed till these supply issues are resolved. This is all speculation and I am not 100% sure this is the case but it might be a reason why a few of our releases are delayed and/or cancelled

To top all that off, the crappy state of the Aussie dollar would have undoubtedly contributed to the decision to cancel many local UHD and Blu-ray releases, at least for the foreseeable future.

I had noticed that blank Blu-ray prices had also spiked, but I managed to come across some sensibly priced discs last week and bought a couple of spindles.

[Brayden96]

Originally Posted by PT Ryan

That's still no proof that they're abandoning those formats. Both of those films were theatrical flops, so there might not be any point spending money on Blu/UHD releases. Or they may be holding off on those releases until retail is properly up and running again. Or there might be a general holding pattern on 20th Century releases until the company further reorganises (lots of jobs across Disney and 20th Century were shed after the merger worldwide). You don't know and I don't know. This entire thread is speculation and nothing else.

Retail has been going great in Australia despite the pandemic. JB and Sanity have remained open without issue.

[koberulz]

"Remaining open" and "making as many non-essential sales as usual" are very different things.

[Rick Grimes]

Just found out about Underwater. It is a genuine shame. Especially since it is available on BD pretty much everywhere else.
I saw a preview on Foxtel. I would have bought it on BD, but I’m not paying for or watching a PAL SD DVD.

BD is suffering badly here and has been for a while. Streaming has won and DVD is still the preferred format for troglodytes. My in-laws have a $3500 Sony OLED UHD. While I bought them a BD (and converted them), they continue to select SD channels instead of their HD twins. My mother in law says she can’t see the difference! As well as the decrease in detail, I can see artefacts, banding and all sorts of shit that others can’t. It’s a waste of a very expensive TV I would love to own.

Sadly, with DVD being the physical disc market leader in AU/NZ, and for those who simply stream (and thus miss out on a lot of quality films), they also don’t get that quality is paramount (1080p-2160p to lossless-object based audio).

My workmates think I’m nuts buying physical media, but I guess unless you are a cinephile, people just don’t get it. I try to explain my set-up, but their happy to watch shit on their laptops, if they don’t have set-ups that send pics to their TV.
They have no clue when I talk about DTS-HD, Atmos etc. and when I explain my surround sound set-up, it falls on deaf ears. I used to talk about “True Cinema”, 24fps on BD vs. PAL speed-up on DVD, which was too technical and only a handful of people recognised the shift in pitch and tempo of music on DVD.

While at least BD beat DVD in the US before streaming won out, the proles down under never took up BD, and now, we are all suffering the consequences.
At least we can still import from the US. I am so f*cking glad I own a Region A player, ‘cos I am positive we are going to see much less on BD than our yankee allies will get across the Pacific.

[PT Ryan]

Originally Posted by Brayden96

Retail has been going great in Australia despite the pandemic. JB and Sanity have remained open without issue.

My point remains that you don’t know about their reasons for not doing these titles on Blu and 4K anymore than I do. You’ve made an assertion that they’re no longer doing HD and UHD physical media releases with nothing to substantiate that claim.

[PT Ryan]

Originally Posted by Rick Grimes

Just found out about Underwater. It is a genuine shame. Especially since it is available on BD pretty much everywhere else.
I saw a preview on Foxtel. I would have bought it on BD, but I’m not paying for or watching a PAL SD DVD.

BD is suffering badly here and has been for a while. Streaming has won and DVD is still the preferred format for troglodytes. My in-laws have a $3500 Sony OLED UHD. While I bought them a BD (and converted them), they continue to select SD channels instead of their HD twins. My mother in law says she can’t see the difference! As well as the decrease in detail, I can see artefacts, banding and all sorts of shit that others can’t. It’s a waste of a very expensive TV I would love to own.

Sadly, with DVD being the physical disc market leader in AU/NZ, and for those who simply stream (and thus miss out on a lot of quality films), they also don’t get that quality is paramount (1080p-2160p to lossless-object based audio).

My workmates think I’m nuts buying physical media, but I guess unless you are a cinephile, people just don’t get it. I try to explain my set-up, but their happy to watch shit on their laptops, if they don’t have set-ups that send pics to their TV.
They have no clue when I talk about DTS-HD, Atmos etc. and when I explain my surround sound set-up, it falls on deaf ears. I used to talk about “True Cinema”, 24fps on BD vs. PAL speed-up on DVD, which was too technical and only a handful of people recognised the shift in pitch and tempo of music on DVD.

While at least BD beat DVD in the US before streaming won out, the proles down under never took up BD, and now, we are all suffering the consequences.
At least we can still import from the US. I am so f*cking glad I own a Region A player, ‘cos I am positive we are going to see much less on BD than our yankee allies will get across the Pacific.

I don’t blame them, personally. In the last twenty years we’ve gone from VHS to DVD to Blu-Ray to UHD, and the last two of those were within a decade. That’s a lot of technical change for many people to keep up with, both financially and in terms of understanding how to get the best out each format. People resent feeling like they have to repurchase films they already own just to keep up with new formats. And yes, the technical stuff is overwhelming for a lot of people.

I adopted Blu-Ray, and have a large-ish collection, but if a film is available in a comparable edition on iTunes or Google Play, I’ll buy it to help keep my shelf space in check. While I *may* buy a 4K TV, I don’t see myself adopting yet another disc format, and will likely just stick with my iTunes library for UHD titles. I appreciate why surround sound is a thing, but I’ve never had any interest in buying a speaker setup, because it’s just not a meaningful part of the film watching experience for me.

[L-Rouge]

Heck, that is a big submission to market. Do we have a link to read about this?

[Alister_M]

Originally Posted by PT Ryan

I don’t blame them, personally. In the last twenty years we’ve gone from VHS to DVD to Blu-Ray to UHD, and the last two of those were within a decade. That’s a lot of technical change for many people to keep up with, both financially and in terms of understanding how to get the best out each format. People resent feeling like they have to repurchase films they already own just to keep up with new formats. And yes, the technical stuff is overwhelming for a lot of people.

Gotta say, the transition to 4K was far more annoying than any previous one. Thought I had a faulty TV for a couple of weeks before I figured out how many settings had to be changed to stop it from making my audio system cut out while the TV was switched off, and having to adjust the HDMI settings to stop the TV from going into protection mode. Gear is becoming too complicated for its own good these days, no wonder people are going for the simplest available option

[Rick Grimes]

The adoption of DVD was forced, when between 2003-2005, studios stopped releasing films on VHS, forcing many to adopt DVD (Attack of the Clones was on VHS, Revenge of the Sith was not).

If in circa 2012-2013 (four to five years after BD’s intro), studios did the same with BD, and stopped releasing films on DVD, people would have had to adopt the new medium, or be content to pirate film and TV.

Blu-Ray’s marketing strategy was executed very badly in Australia.
The US, Germany and to a lesser extent, the UK, have had more adopters of Blu-Ray... Especially the US, where market share of BD is more than DVD (or at least 50/50).
In AU/NZ, it’s not even close. I’m guessing BD has a 15-20% share of the physical media market, at most.
The only reason I can see us being any different from the US, from a market perspective, is that Australian’s generally don’t give a shit about quality and piracy was rampant. The proles couldn’t care less about having 1080pHD quality. And hence, in 2020, we find now that everyone is streaming, with only a handful of us diehard film and TV lovers, trying to defy the trend and continue to view the content we like, in the highest quality medium possible.

While my collection takes up a lot of room, I am glad I own these films and they will always be in my collection.
If I am paying for a streaming service, I am always going to be renting... And well Sir, I don’t like it.

[Alister_M]

Originally Posted by Rick Grimes

The adoption of DVD was forced, when between 2003-2005, studios stopped releasing films on VHS, forcing many to adopt DVD (Attack of the Clones was on VHS, Revenge of the Sith was not).

Revenge of the Sith was, in fact, the last major studio film released on VHS

[kuzronk]

Originally Posted by Alister_M

Revenge of the Sith was, in fact, the last major studio film released on VHS

Madagascar came out a few weeks later.