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The Double Life of Veronique

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The Double Life of Veronique

Old 02-17-05, 11:12 PM
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The Double Life of Veronique

I'm sure this question has been asked before, but I thought I'd start a new thread to see whether or not any new information is known.

I'm a professor at Valparaiso University, and I scheduled to teach a grad seminar on Kundera and Kieslowski in the Fall. I really want to teach The Double Life as part of the class, and I'm hoping that the class will turn into a paper for me as well (for which I'd definitely need to re-watch Double Life, which I haven't seen since 1994, I think.

Does anybody know when this might come out? How about what studio owns the rights and would be most likely to release it. Is it Miramax? Who might I contact?

Also, does anyone know if this was ever out on laserdisc? If I could hunt one of those down, that would do until the DVD gets released.

With all the Kieslowski films available, I can't believe this one isn't. Especially after all the work on releasing The Decalogue.

Please help, and hello to you all.


Thanks,

Ron
Old 02-17-05, 11:31 PM
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Hello and welcome to the board. Nice to have you here.

Miramax owns the rights for the states. No release in the near future is planned. You could look for my old thread I had about a year ago. The only available version is a semi-boot (in my opinion) disc that came out in Greece. There is no French R2 version available either.

Again, welcome to the forum!!

Regards,
Pro-B

ps
I highly doubt it, it would help if you wrote to the distrib heads at Miramax. I spent hours and hours writing to Universal to release BEFORE THE RAIN...a year later=nothing. With another member here we even went to the point where we had the Macedonian government semi-involved.

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Old 02-17-05, 11:37 PM
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Hey--you live in my neck of the woods.

Any reason why Miramax won't release it? They did a nice job on the Three Colors boxed set. Why no Veronique. It's such a pivotal film for what I want to do with this class.

Anybody have a line of used laserdiscs? I think I remember Veronique being on laserdisc, back at the beginning of the 1990s. I fear buying VHS copies--God only knows what condition they're in.

I'll keep looking for help.

I teach a film course at least once a year, and I'm trying to build up a nice collection of films that can be used in these courses. You'll be seeing a lot of me, asking questions about availablity, lower prices, etc. Hopefully I won't become too irritating.
Old 02-17-05, 11:38 PM
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Would sending the letter on university letterhead help? I have a couple of colleagues at other univeristies in the area who also teach Kieslowski--perhaps I could get them in on the plan. What do you think?
Old 02-17-05, 11:49 PM
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welcome to the forum. I have never seen this available on laser disc. A sealed vhs on amazon is going for around 75 dollars right now. Very expensive. I doubt that university letterhead would help get the dvd released. However they might loan, rent a copy of the film print to a university for a fee. You might see if a local art house theater would split the cost, and run it for a night the same day your class is taught.

welcome again, and I hope you make that paper available to us here when it is finished.
Old 02-17-05, 11:50 PM
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You could always do that...and hope for the best. My experience is that when it comes down to World Cinema and a few of the notorious studios (at least on this forum) nothing really happens. There were rumors that MK2 (Marin Karmitz's empire in France) will release the film this Fall. So far however I have not seen any confirmation. I keep in touch with a few editors from French/Italian news sites so if they get any news be sure to check the International section...it will be posted there.

If you are also looking for some other ideas regarding European Cinema...feel free to drop me an email. In a way...that is my niche/passion so to speak...

Best Wishes,
Pro-B

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I spent 6 years at IU-Bloomington.........so you are correct.
Old 02-17-05, 11:54 PM
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Maybe I could get the library to buy the $75 VHS copy. Can you copy VHS onto DVD? What problems and expenses might I have to incur?
Old 02-18-05, 12:02 AM
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it can be done...but this is not the place to discuss it....it will get you kicked out of here on the double...numerous websites can tell you how to do this, and its just a google search away.

here is a link to all vhs copies for sale at amazon, the sealed copy is at the bottom
Old 02-18-05, 02:06 AM
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My suggestion would be to contact Annette Insdorf at Columbia University. Since her collaboration on the superb Three Colors: Blue/White/Red (also Miramax) was so successful, I have to believe she'd be involved with a release of The Double Life of Veronique by the company.

At the very least, she should have some contacts at Miramax who could inquire about its production status.

If you're able to find out anything, please post an update.

The Kieslowski section of my collection is complete except for this one film. Get the lead out, Harvey!
Old 02-18-05, 02:38 AM
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I have the laserdisc which was actually released by Paramount. I don't know if the home video rights still belong to them or not. last I heard Artificial Eye (R2) is working out rights issues to do a release asap, but i've been hearing that for a long time now.
Old 02-19-05, 01:46 AM
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^^ Excellent idea. I've emailed Prof. Insdorf, and will post any info I get in this thread. I've only recently become faculty, and forget sometimes that I'm now able to contact people like this as a fellow professor instead of a sycophantic graduate student.

I thought I remembered a laserdisc release, ages ago, back when I used to make frequent visits to Ken Cranes. I should have bought the damned thing when I had a chance. Is it widescreen by any chance? Maybe I should pay you a visit when I come to visit the family in Long Beach this summer.
Old 02-19-05, 02:14 AM
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Originally Posted by Ron G
^^ Excellent idea. I've emailed Prof. Insdorf, and will post any info I get in this thread. I've only recently become faculty, and forget sometimes that I'm now able to contact people like this as a fellow professor instead of a sycophantic graduate student.

I thought I remembered a laserdisc release, ages ago, back when I used to make frequent visits to Ken Cranes. I should have bought the damned thing when I had a chance. Is it widescreen by any chance? Maybe I should pay you a visit when I come to visit the family in Long Beach this summer.
not letterboxed, but i believe the OAR is 1.66:1.
Old 02-24-05, 06:53 PM
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Okay, I received a reply from Annette Insdorf.

She has contacted several people, and says that Paramount does indeed still own the video rights, but has not committed to putting the film on DVD. She tried to get the name of someone at Paramount to contact, but no luck.

I'm not sure what, if anything, can be done about this. I suppose we could try some sort of online petition and call it to Paramount's attention, but I'm not sure how many signatures we'd get. Perhaps people who have enjoyed the Three Colors trilogy would be interested in this earlier film. I think Irene Jacob has a website, but I'm not sure whether she is connected with it or not.

It's a shame this film is being withheld like this. I really want to use it in my class, but if I can't locate a copy, I won't be able to. And I just can't drop $70 on a VHS tape, particularly since I would need to put it on reserve in the library for student use. Hell, by the end of the term, it would probably already be showing signs of wear.
Old 02-24-05, 07:50 PM
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Thanks for the info---very interesting. I had forgotten that Paramount released the VHS and laserdisc editions, and was trusting IMDb's info that Miramax held the rights (which is never a good idea).

You might ask Annette Insdorf if she's contacted Martin Blythe (Vice President of Publicity for Home Video) or Liz Haggar at Paramount. Mr. Blythe has made himself very accessible over the years, both at the DVD Talk and Home Theater Forums (he also participates in annual online chats at HTF). He tends to be very up-front and knowledgeable about Paramount's DVD plans.

The contact information for Mr. Blythe and Ms. Haggar is easily found through Google (for example).
Old 02-24-05, 08:42 PM
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Okay, well, she's contacted someone at Paramount through her connections with Miramax, and the problem is the quality of the transfer that was used for the VHS and LD releases.

The Paramount contact said something about how a TV sale would speed things along, and Prof. Insdorf mentioned that the tenth anniversary of Kieslowski's death is next year.

I emailed her back and suggested that perhaps IFC would be interested in putting together some sort of week-long celebration of Kieslowski to honor this anniversary. If they were to make "Double Life" a part of this celebration, then their purchase of the TV rights might convince Paramount of the economic viability of remastering the film.

Anybody know of an IFC contact?
Old 02-24-05, 08:50 PM
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Old 02-24-05, 08:54 PM
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and this one...

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Old 02-24-05, 09:04 PM
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I sent something to info@ifc already. I'm just not sure how long it takes the readers of those general accounts to sift through the amount of mail they must receive.

I wonder whether anyone is in possession of an individual's email address?
Old 02-24-05, 09:06 PM
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And I've cut and pasted that message and sent it to the "programming" address as well.

I'll keep you all posted.
Old 02-24-05, 11:19 PM
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So a company the size of Paramount doesn't want to spend the money on a new transfer of this film and they're waiting for someone else to pick up the tab? I don't know whether to laugh yell or cry. There's no way they can partner with a company in another country to finance this?

Thank you very much Ron G for your efforts and replies on the status of this release. Veronique is one of my favorite films, and Kieslowski one of my favorite directors.

Regarding a LD I see there's one currently listed on Ebay. As a last resort you should be able to obtain a used VHS there for under $25.

Last edited by philo; 02-24-05 at 11:32 PM.
Old 02-25-05, 09:49 AM
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Just wanted to give a to everyone in this thread for the effort so far.

Welcome to DVDTalk Ron... There is definitely a market for this film. Any future updates would be greatly appreciated.
Old 02-25-05, 10:28 AM
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Miramax owns the rights to the film not Paramount.....

Pro-B
Old 02-25-05, 03:18 PM
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I dug this up from a HTF chat with Paramount's Martin Blythe and Michael Arkin dated September 2000.

When asked about Veronique Martin Blythe was unsure at first that it was a Paramount title but later on Michael Arkin steps in with this...

[michaela] To answer an earlier question, the Double life of Veronique is a Paramount release, but we haven't scheduled a DVD date for it.
Old 02-25-05, 04:52 PM
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Just to muddy the waters a little further, I made an email inquiry at Paramount today and was told "I don't believe we retain the rights anymore to Veronique....."

I've also contacted Miramax today---if I get any information from them, I'll post it.
Old 02-25-05, 08:57 PM
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According to Prof. Insdorf's contact at Paramount--a man who used to work at Miramax--Paramount does indeed own the home video rights to this film.

But, it is indeed disturbing that there is such confusion over the film's ownership. You'd think a studio would know if it owned the rights to a Kieslowski film.

Sigh.

Thanks for the welcome, Johnny Zhivago. I'll keep plugging away at this.

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