The joys of the grey market and other less savory DVD sources...*
*disclaimer: These are the rantings of a geek. Please nod and smile and pretend you know what the nice man is talking about, then back away slowly.
Got an envelope from one of my favorite webstores(which shall remain nameless due to what I bought) today. They are a web site catering to that segment of the film geek market that isn't happy with the spoonfed release schedules of major studios. A lot of what they carry might be considered somewhat marginal by all but the most hardcore cult movie fans, but they actually carry some titles that mainstream audiences might be surprised to see in existance.
Case in point, my envelope today.
Dellamorte Dellamore and Battlefield Baseball, Italian zombie comedy and Japanese bizarre comedy/horror respectively, ordered for my friend Brendan in exchange for a 10-pack of DVDRs(we'll talk about those in a bit.) Both are subbed, Dellamorte having previously been available in the US under the title Cemetary Man, which only sort of makes sense when you watch the movie, and featuring a pre-stardom Rupert Everett killing zombies and falling in love with one of the undead.
Forklift Driver Klaus, which is a 20-minute German short, apparently very gory, which I haven't watched yet.
And the true bounty. Let me just say that I'm not a HARDCORE Star Wars geek. (not like Hillside, anyway.) I don't own every figure and comic and novel and bit of esoterica that relates to the movie. However, I do have cherished memories of seeing the original films in the theatres, and am somewhat of a purist when it comes to them. As a result, in 1997, I was somewhat dismayed to find that George Lucas had gone back and tinkered with the originals, to "fix" them. Lucas has some sort of half-assed theory that he imparts on the VHS of the Star Wars SE about films not being finished, but rather "abandoned." Now, mind you, I did go see the SW and Empire re-releases in the theatre, but couldn't bring myself to see Jedi again. (Frickin' Ewoks~!)
Then came Eps 1 and 2, which are an entire post unto themselves, and then the announcement in February that the trilogy was coming to DVD in September. We all knew that Lucas wouldn't give in to the fan pressure and release the originals along with the "fixed" version. Subsequently, there have been some rumors that Lucas is still tinkering with the trilogy, presumably to fix all the BIG GLARING continuity errors that have been sprinkled through Eps 1 and 2.
Still with me? Okay, back to my magic envelope. The webstore, which shall remain nameless, carries the original trilogy in a hidden section of their site. Not the "fixed" versions. The original theatrical trilogy. On DVDR. All three movies for $30, widescreen and in 5.1 stereo, burned off of the "Definitive Edition" laserdisc releases put out in '95 or '96 before the "fix". They look crystalline on my TV, and slightly less so on my higher definition monitor, but they beat the shit out of my VHS copies of the originals. So I'm having a bit of geek orgasm here.
Some of the other grey market material that I have acquired through this source include the non-unicorn European theatrical cut of "Blade Runner", which retains the Harrison Ford narration and happy ending, a nice copy of Frank Zappa's "200 Motels" also burned off laser, and a Japanese/American coproduction called "Virus", directed by the late Kinji Fukasaku, who also directed "Battle Royale" and the spectacularly bad SW ripoff "Message from Space."
My boy Brendan is also hooking me up, due to the wonders of DeCSS and other DVD crack software. So far, he's given me a great Opeth concert DVD, "Lamentations", and the second disc of Cowboy Bebop. More goodness is to come. (I have no ethics when it comes to money vs. my addiction to DVDs, what can I say?)
Got an envelope from one of my favorite webstores(which shall remain nameless due to what I bought) today. They are a web site catering to that segment of the film geek market that isn't happy with the spoonfed release schedules of major studios. A lot of what they carry might be considered somewhat marginal by all but the most hardcore cult movie fans, but they actually carry some titles that mainstream audiences might be surprised to see in existance.
Case in point, my envelope today.
Dellamorte Dellamore and Battlefield Baseball, Italian zombie comedy and Japanese bizarre comedy/horror respectively, ordered for my friend Brendan in exchange for a 10-pack of DVDRs(we'll talk about those in a bit.) Both are subbed, Dellamorte having previously been available in the US under the title Cemetary Man, which only sort of makes sense when you watch the movie, and featuring a pre-stardom Rupert Everett killing zombies and falling in love with one of the undead.
Forklift Driver Klaus, which is a 20-minute German short, apparently very gory, which I haven't watched yet.
And the true bounty. Let me just say that I'm not a HARDCORE Star Wars geek. (not like Hillside, anyway.) I don't own every figure and comic and novel and bit of esoterica that relates to the movie. However, I do have cherished memories of seeing the original films in the theatres, and am somewhat of a purist when it comes to them. As a result, in 1997, I was somewhat dismayed to find that George Lucas had gone back and tinkered with the originals, to "fix" them. Lucas has some sort of half-assed theory that he imparts on the VHS of the Star Wars SE about films not being finished, but rather "abandoned." Now, mind you, I did go see the SW and Empire re-releases in the theatre, but couldn't bring myself to see Jedi again. (Frickin' Ewoks~!)
Then came Eps 1 and 2, which are an entire post unto themselves, and then the announcement in February that the trilogy was coming to DVD in September. We all knew that Lucas wouldn't give in to the fan pressure and release the originals along with the "fixed" version. Subsequently, there have been some rumors that Lucas is still tinkering with the trilogy, presumably to fix all the BIG GLARING continuity errors that have been sprinkled through Eps 1 and 2.
Still with me? Okay, back to my magic envelope. The webstore, which shall remain nameless, carries the original trilogy in a hidden section of their site. Not the "fixed" versions. The original theatrical trilogy. On DVDR. All three movies for $30, widescreen and in 5.1 stereo, burned off of the "Definitive Edition" laserdisc releases put out in '95 or '96 before the "fix". They look crystalline on my TV, and slightly less so on my higher definition monitor, but they beat the shit out of my VHS copies of the originals. So I'm having a bit of geek orgasm here.
Some of the other grey market material that I have acquired through this source include the non-unicorn European theatrical cut of "Blade Runner", which retains the Harrison Ford narration and happy ending, a nice copy of Frank Zappa's "200 Motels" also burned off laser, and a Japanese/American coproduction called "Virus", directed by the late Kinji Fukasaku, who also directed "Battle Royale" and the spectacularly bad SW ripoff "Message from Space."
My boy Brendan is also hooking me up, due to the wonders of DeCSS and other DVD crack software. So far, he's given me a great Opeth concert DVD, "Lamentations", and the second disc of Cowboy Bebop. More goodness is to come. (I have no ethics when it comes to money vs. my addiction to DVDs, what can I say?)
posted by Jon M. at
11:36 PM
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