Distribution Denied! 25 Films You Can’t Get on DVD

Michael Mann really, really hates that movie, so it's possible he's managed to prevent it from coming out. More than that, it's a movie that made very little money, so there's not a lot of incentive for the distributor to release it.

I didn't see an actual link to the Empire article, so here it is:

http://www.empireonline.com/features/films-not-on-DVD

Here are the films on the list:

The Keep (1983)
Grim Prairie Tales (1990)
The Wild Life (1984)
The Last Movie (1971)
Dudes (1987)
Song Of The South (1946)
Rad (1986)
The Godfather Saga (1977 / 1990)
Inchon (1981)
Let It Be (1970)
Meet The Applegates (1989)
Dead Solid Perfect (1988)
Conan Doyle’s Master Detective Sherlock Holmes (1932)
City Of Hope (1991)
I Was A Teenage Werewolf (1957)
The Road Back (1937)
So Red The Rose (1935)
Freddy’s Nightmares (1988-1990)
The Great Gatsby (1949)
Nothing Lasts Forever (1984)
SubUrbia (1996)
Ben (1972)
Dream Demon (1988)
Naked Tango (1991)
A Fistful of Fingers (1995)

I think the three reasons why most of these are not out on DVD:

1) most (but not all) are very obscure)

2) a lot of them made zero money in their initial release

3) the studio most likely feels they will still not make money on home video.

Cloudy rights are another big factor, and I know of cases where even hiring enough attorneys to figure out who owns the rights could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and take years to resolve... and then you won't make any money releasing a DVD that maybe nets $50K in release.

 

"Gunn"

 

This is on DVD from Kino:

http://www.amazon.com/Man-Glass-Boo...757020&sr=1-2&keywords=man+in+the+glass+booth

Here are some of mine. If any are on DVD (or BD) anywhere let me know.

Eréndira
Citizen's Band (aka Handle with Care)
The Dion Brothers (aka The Gravy Train)
The Woman Chaser
The Ventures: Beloved Invaders (available DVDs are bootlegs, I think, taken from an LD transfer)
Darker Than Amber
Play It As It Lays
92 in the Shade
The Fool Killer
Something for Everyone
The Twonky
Last Summer
Half Human (Toho movie that is a precursor to The Mighty Peking Man, of all things. Suppressed because of reportedly insensitive depiction of the Ainu people)
Letty Lynton (suppressed since the late 1930s because of a copyright infringement ruling)

 

Thanks Walt. Ordered.
Lines from this play still run around my head 30 plus years later.
"Seen the last of Y.A. Tittle?"

 

Haven't see it in 30 years...never on t.v. anymore...

Lucky Lady - Liza Minelli, Burt Reynolds, Gene Hackman. I loved this movie as a teenager...

 

My favorite never-been-released-on-DVD movie is Haunted Summer with Philip Anglim and Alice Krige. Yeah, I know there's a DVD-R version on Amazon, but I'm not paying $18 for a DVD-R, which for all I know is mastered from a VHS. It's not a deathless classic (and is rather comical at times) but I've always enjoyed Anglim's over the top performance as Lord Byron. And it's got Alice Krige in it but it not exactly a horror movie, which is kind of different!

 

It's been available region 2 on DVD, but there has never been an authentic region 1 release of Soderbergh's Kafka. It wasn't well received at the time, but it has its fans.

 

American Hot Wax (music rights i presume, although this may have been on DVD briefly in the 90's?)

Massacre at Central High

 

It's on DVD.

http://www.amazon.com/Lucky-Lady-Gene-Hackman/dp/B004AZ7ZJA

I agree, "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" needs to be on DVD.

Also, "Sing" from 1989.

A recent one would be "54: The Extended Cut". I know it's available on iTunes (U.S. not Canada) and some demand services, but I would love a proper DVD/blu-ray release with commentaries and documentaries.

 

British series: The Tripods
British series: Blake's 7
Doc Savage
I, The Jury
The Last Dinosaur
Godzilla vs. Megalon
The Abominable Snowman a Hammer film with Peter Cushing.

 

A couple of years ago Soderbergh was talking about reworking this movie...

 

The link is embedded in the first word of the first post, "Here".

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

Its the original Swiss Family Robinson (1940) never been on DVD.
Walt Disney bought it before his Disney version came out.
Its never been seen since, correct?


The Godfather Saga (1977 / 1990)

Coppola has been on record that he prefers 1 & 2. I think he said he did the saga for the money.

 

Thanks TO-Tom! It appears my local library has a copy...

The Amazon reviews sure are mixed...

 

Have you seen it? I wouldn't mind watching an extended cut if it managed to make a coherent movie out of what was released.

 

In The Heat Of Passion (1992), starring Sally Kirkland. I had the unrated laserdisc. A guilty pleasure.

 

Not only is it extended; some of it is actually different:

 

The first time a friend told me Sally Kirkland was fifty when that film was shot, I jokingly called him a liar.

He wasn't.

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

Not to be a smartass, but have you tried looking for any of these online? A quick five minute search on Amazon found DVD copies for all of these available and in print, except for The Abominable Snowman, but that was also put out on the DVD and can be found used:

Tripods:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tripods-Complete-1-2-DVD/dp/B000R21294

Blake's 7:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Blakes-Complete-Collection-incl-bonus/dp/B00IOKXOBK

Doc Savage:
http://www.amazon.com/Lucking-Darrell-Zwerling-Michael-Gleason/dp/B00264QI68

I, The Jury:
http://www.amazon.com/I-Jury-Armand-Assante/dp/B00UUI02L4

The Last Dinosaur:
http://www.amazon.com/Last-Dinosaur-Richard-Boone/dp/B004TPJNAA

Godzilla vs. Megalon:
http://www.amazon.com/Godzilla-Vs-Megalon-Katsuhiko-Sasaki/dp/B0088FS1DC

The Abominable Snowman:
http://www.amazon.com/Abominable-Snowman-Forrest-Tucker/dp/6305807914

If you're into British television series like Tripods and Blake's 7 (like I am), you really need to own a multi-region DVD player...or a Blu Ray player that is region free for DVD playback. Many British series will never get an American DVD release. Multi-region players are easy to find and can be very inexpensive.

For Blake's 7, there were individual season box sets released in the UK, but the link I included above is for a less expensive Netherlands edition which compiles the entire series together into one box. Note that the links I included above for Tripods and Blake's 7 take you to the Amazon UK site, but you can still purchase from that site even if you're registered with the Amazon US site. Shipping is more expensive (obviously), but it is somewhat offset when they remove the VAT (UK tax) that is built into the product price.

 

In the UK, I'd like to see The Naked Spur andthe alternate version of The Big Sleep, which I missed when it came around our local independent cinema

 

Every time we do one of these "not on DVD" threads, there are always a few people who seem to just spout off movie titles without doing any research first. Amazon is okay, but www.dvdaf.com is probably the best source of info on the subject.

 

Coming soon to Imax a special screening of The Keep ,with question and answer
sessions with Michael Mann, and two versions of the film.
Oct 30 and 31 at the Hollywood Imax
Michael Mann, secretly loves the keep that why he keeps it for himself.
I wonder if he reads theses boards?

 

I wonder what the problem is with Ben? Did the film age horribly since it's release? I thought it was a hit movie with a wonderful theme song by Michael Jackson, but I've never actually seen it.

 

Get Crazy

 

Kind of an "eh" movie. The article says about Ben:

What’s the problem? Rights issues around production company Bing Crosby Productions (no, really: Bing Crosby financed a rat horror). Very few BCP films are widely available anymore: even the original Willard seems only to be for sale in Spain. The excellent remake with Crispin Glover, however, is easy to get hold of (Glover even sings Ben over the end credits). The producers of the new version got around the rights issue by making clear it was a completely new adaptation of Stephen Gilbert’s novel Ratman’s Notebooks. Calling it Willard again wasn’t a problem because it’s just the name of the main character.

Silly me. I actually reproduced the link in full and said the name of the site.