Adam Tyner

Wouldn't be the first time that's happened, though.

NoirFan

Five weeks, actually - the pre-order went up on 11/12. I see your overall point though. However, if 1,000 copies were in fact purchased only to be sold, wouldn't the eventual (re)purchase of those 1,000 copies by genuine fans cancel out the opportunistic motivation that might have initially causes such (relatively) brisk sales?

kbarkerok

Haha

3000 isn't a good for the amount sold , it's only been out for 1 week ?

3,000 copy limited run sold out within 1 week after release is amazing

Especially when it's not available in any store and little to no promotion for this at all


I'm sorry the dvdtalk or bluray or hd forums hit less than 1% of the bluray buying community. Just cause youve heard if it for months. The average person and average fan has no clue this was coming out.

Paul_SD

I thought the Harryhausen title would have a good shot at selling out fairly quick, but there is still at least 1500 of those left available. I had no interest in Fright Night, but they burned through that stock quick considering how relatively low profile this release was.
I guess the mid 80s nature of the title, which I expect puts the majority of the fan demographic right in that age ~35 window, is a big reason for the rabid demand.

It's inevitable that this will influence future acquisitions- but I just hope that we get broad swath of other material before the flood of 80s stuff takes over.

islandclaws

I'm hoping the sellout influences them to acquire Fright Night II.

NoirFan

I can't see the sequel being a big seller - the film bombed during its theatrical release and doesn't seem to have improved its reputation since. Plus, Lionsgate has the rights. I would love to see TT issuing more Columbia horror titles though, like Curse of the Demon, The Blob (1988) and Christine.

Gizmo

Check eBay today and for the next few weeks. Count.

This films fans likely didn't know about the Blu-ray. 99.9% of the buying public didn't.

I bought 5 copies. Probably a lot of others to nab that autographed copy. Gonna make nice tradebait/profit.

Gizmo

It's been available for purchase for 5 weeks. That's 35 days. Take away the 100 "given away" and that's about 83 copies a day. You would call that good?

Gizmo

Sure. But they didn't by them in the timeframe discussed and didn't even know where to find them cheaper. They were selling for $50 when they were still available directly for $30. Not too bright....

Gizmo

We should be asking the studios why they won't release these titles themselves.

islandclaws

I don't need to ask a studio to know that Fright Night II isn't going to sell like hot cakes on Blu-ray. I'd rather see Twilight Time give it the same loving restoration they gave the first film, and, yes, I'd plunk down another $34.xx for it.

clappj

So was Anchor Bay (once upon a time).

NoirFan

From TT's Facebook page:

DVD Polizei

Because we can't even expect a half-decent Blu-ray release for dozens of titles already, and they manage to fuck them up, I really don't expect them--NOR DO I WANT THEM--to play around with flicks like this.

Gizmo

But Twilight Time didn't do the restoration - Sony did (or at least it's widely believed they did). So Sony could have easily released this and it would have looked and sounded the same. Possibly even with special features (no idea if the previous DVDs had them or not).

Sony likely did the restoration, and after the remake bombed, Twilight swooped it and bought the BD Rights for x amount of time for x amount of money for 3,000 copies. Sony still has the HDTV/Streaming rights, which are likely going to make them far more money than a BD catalog release (which is probably true for a lot of catalog nowadays hitting disc). I know you have horror contacts from previous posts, so maybe you could look into that.

True - but they actually numbered their discs.

Haha. Can't disagree with that. Sony really hasn't done a whole lot of catalog in the past few years that wasn't a big title like Taxi Driver. It appears they would rather license out to Echo Bridge or whatever instead.

Lastdaysofrain

The original DVD release had zero extras (I don't believe even a trailer was included) but I was happy to be able to see it in widescreen again for the first time since I saw it in theaters.

LosingMyMind

Yep, more copies will definitely be printed for this one. If you have extra copies, sell while you can.

NoirFan

As has been mentioned repeatedly, TT's license was for only 3,000 copies.

xage

Regardless of what number or computation you stated.

Bottomline is - Its SOLD OUT!

And that means good

What bad is , the term SOLD OUT will now be the driving force for.... the greedy re-sellers that will capitalize the term

The freakin law of Supply & Demand

Gizmo

No, it doesn't.

If they produced 25 copies would you say it was good?
3k is a low number for any release. Being available for 35 days and selling only 3k is not good.

But hey - at least us people who like money can resell them for more. Not that is a good thing.

joltman

Do you have numbers for a similar catalog title to give us an idea of how good it is or isn't?

Gizmo

85 copies a day - or about 500-600 a week - isn't good.

Superdaddy

I agree with you. Do I prefer paying this much for a BD? Heck no. My overall average price per disc is probably between $10-12. But...

I don't consider downloading a movie owning it. I don't consider streaming a movie owning it. I have very minimal interest in these options. I like physical media. I believe we are now in the twilight era for physical distribution of audio and video content. They won't disappear soon, but they will become increasingly marginalized as time goes on.

Many catalog titles released on DVD will never make it to BD. If it's a movie I like, and the only way to get it is through a boutique label, I'll gladly pay extra for the physical disc.

Bought Mysterious Island too, for more than Fright Night, and I don't regret a penny of the cost.

Sondheim

Well, not any release. Depending on how deep into the catalog you go, some titles are only expected to sell in the low thousands. In some cases, they sell less than a thousand copies. Of course, those types of titles are generally the ones distributed by boutique labels (like Olive Films and Flicker Alley in the US, and Masters of Cinema and Second Run in the UK.)

In this case - it seems strange to say it sold "low numbers" when it sold exactly how many the company decided to print. In other words, it's apparently not too unexpectedly low of a number of sales, because that's the amount they released for sale. If they had printed 10k copies, and only sold 3k you would have a point - because if they had made 10k copies that would have indicated that they expected to sell 10k copies. Here they printed 3000 copies and they sold 3000 copies - that it took a month probably isn't a big deal, because they're making the same money regardless.

The fact they sold the entire run of a "limited edition" catalog title over the relatively short period of 35 days is actually quite relevant.Yep. If they produced 25 titles that would indicate that they had decided that 25 titles was the amount they needed to sell to turn a profit (and, most likely, to create some demand and hype for other "limited edition" releases.) With a limited edition like this, the amount of copies they produce is the best indication of the amount of titles they hope to sell. That it took 35 days to sell them is less relevant than the fact that they sold at all. (I imagine it would have been more of a problem if it had taken years to sell them, when the profits would have been split over several fiscal years - but that's not the case here.) I'm not so sure that it's "not good." As mentioned above, some of the "premium" labels don't even sell 1000 titles over years of a DVD being available - and that's when they're available on most of the major websites, and selling at much lower prices than Fright Night - but since those are the types of sales they expect, it's not a problem. This is a much more well-known title than the types of movies Olive and Second Run tend to release, but it's still a 25-year old catalog title that had fairly limited publicity (if not just due to the fact that it wasn't sold anywhere other than on the official website.)

In short, considering this is a "premium" label, and considering the price it was available at - and considering the fact that it was only available for purchase on the official website - I doubt they were disappointed with the sales.

kbarkerok

i'm not sure why anyone is questioning that the release wasnt a success.

I guarantee any label who was told they could sell 3000 units of a $29.99 retail Product within 1 week of the Street date, they'd be happy as hell. ( who cares if it was available for 3 years EVEN for pre-order, the majority of people are waiting for a time they can order it, then physically have it)

that being with no promotion, no commercials, no distribution outside of a single website.

i dont even see where the argument is, I've been involved and sold independent releases, and moving that quantity with no distribution is crazy.

Sony really dropped the ball on the release.

just going by FRIGHT NIGHT 2, it's easily selling 8-10 Copies a week, JUST OFF EBAY at $50 Minimum- not including amazon, or any other 2nd hand market.

bare minimum, Part 2 is selling 500 copies a year at $50 ++ for a crappy DVD transfer