4K restoration on Star Wars — Page 184

Cobra Kai said:

I just read an interesting quote from a certain person over at the steve hoffman forums.

This is concerning the original restoration for the 2004 release:

I was told point blank at ILM that Lucas kind of didn’t really care that much about home video, and he was mainly concerned with whatever project he was on at the moment. They told me they had considered remastering the theatrical versions AND the revised versions simultaneously, but there just was no time available to do it because Fox demanded a pretty stringent deadline. Money was part of it, but it was more about time than money.

That certainly wasn’t the first time Fox gave George a “stringent deadline” and said it was “more about time than money.” 😉

As for not really caring about home video, that doesn’t surprise me. He was going to wait until RotS was on dvd just to put out the OT on dvd at all, which would’ve been less than a year before the hd disc formats hit the streets.

SilverWook said:

Then they should make a clear concise statement on the matter, so people aren’t left hanging and speculating wildly. The 40th would be a good time to do so.

This.

nickyd47 said:

Windexed said:

nickyd47 said:

Also, does it matter if Kathleen believes in George’s vision when the house of mouse can override that and be like “nope, we like money, put out the OOT, we worked out a deal with FOX”

They let Disney have their way with EP7 so…

This. George was his own boss. If he wanted to make a sw film made of nothing but of cgi potatoes, he could. Kathleen Kennedy is not her own boss. She is a figurehead/manager who answers to stock holders and a corporate board (see: syndicate).

When Disney bought Lucasfilm, they bought EVERYTHING. There’s no contract that says they can’t release the out. For $4 billion, they don’t owe George anything. Kk might have professional and personal respect for George, but also has superiors to appease. Superiors who micromanage every decision to the tiniest detail in order maximize short and long term profits.

Disney can and will release the out, but it will be solely when they feel it will get the biggest bang; not when the fans want it, not to comemmerate some date,etc.

The biggest bang would be literally any time now because they haven’t had a proper release in over 20 years

It’s been 22 years since the widescreen VHS tapes came out. It’s been nearly 11 years since we got those terrible DVDs. What’s to wait for?

What Disco_Lobot said, but even if we put the 2020 thing aside I still wouldn’t expect it before then anyway due to Lucasfilm wanting to keep all the attention on the new movies. We know there’s going to be a hiatus at some point not long after IX. We’re already getting two movies within six months of each other, so I could see them at the very least taking a year-and-a-half breather farther down the line. Maybe they do another standalone movie in 2020 and then put out the OOT that Fall or just wait until 2021 if that ends up being the “off” year.

Fang Zei said:

nickyd47 said:

Windexed said:

nickyd47 said:

Also, does it matter if Kathleen believes in George’s vision when the house of mouse can override that and be like “nope, we like money, put out the OOT, we worked out a deal with FOX”

They let Disney have their way with EP7 so…

This. George was his own boss. If he wanted to make a sw film made of nothing but of cgi potatoes, he could. Kathleen Kennedy is not her own boss. She is a figurehead/manager who answers to stock holders and a corporate board (see: syndicate).

When Disney bought Lucasfilm, they bought EVERYTHING. There’s no contract that says they can’t release the out. For $4 billion, they don’t owe George anything. Kk might have professional and personal respect for George, but also has superiors to appease. Superiors who micromanage every decision to the tiniest detail in order maximize short and long term profits.

Disney can and will release the out, but it will be solely when they feel it will get the biggest bang; not when the fans want it, not to comemmerate some date,etc.

The biggest bang would be literally any time now because they haven’t had a proper release in over 20 years

It’s been 22 years since the widescreen VHS tapes came out. It’s been nearly 11 years since we got those terrible DVDs. What’s to wait for?

What Disco_Lobot said, but even if we put the 2020 thing aside I still wouldn’t expect it before then anyway due to Lucasfilm wanting to keep all the attention on the new movies. We know there’s going to be a hiatus at some point not long after IX. We’re already getting two movies within six months of each other, so I could see them at the very least taking a year-and-a-half breather farther down the line. Maybe they do another standalone movie in 2020 and then put out the OOT that Fall or just wait until 2021 if that ends up being the “off” year.

2020ish time frame makes sense not just because of the rights… but because they can release some fancy 9 movie saga collectors edition (maybe even including the anthology films) - something like that would be the perfect place to release any sort of remaster/restored editions.

I do think it will be kind of darkly funny if they end up releasing the OOT, but only make it available in a full saga package so that you have to buy the PT movies to get it.

Cobra Kai said:

Disco_Lobot said:

It’s not like Lucasfilm hasn’t altered ROTJ multiple times after the director passed away… Am I the only one who sees the hypocrisy there?

Also - why would they do any release prior to 2020? Spending a bunch of money on an OT restoration and having to split the money from TESB and ROTJ with Fox is just stupid. I still don’t know why anyone is expecting anything to happen prior to the rights reverting

First of all, none of us know what kind of distribution deal Fox has, nor what kind of money we’re talking about here. It may not be an issue at all.

By releasing them this year, on the 40th anniversary, they have a huge, built-in marketing message and can take advantage of all of the current hoopla surrounding the anniversary.

I’m not completely ruling out a release this year until May 25th has come and gone, although if we haven’t heard anything by May 4th I’d say the chances are next to zero.

As for the deal with Fox, we may not know the fine details (I did find it curious that Disney was mentioned at all alongside Fox and LFL in the press release for the 2015 blu-ray reissue), but we do know that Fox retains distribution on ANH forever and that the rights to the other five revert fully to LFL in May of 2020.

Cobra Kai said:

Disco_Lobot said:

It’s not like Lucasfilm hasn’t altered ROTJ multiple times after the director passed away… Am I the only one who sees the hypocrisy there?

Also - why would they do any release prior to 2020? Spending a bunch of money on an OT restoration and having to split the money from TESB and ROTJ with Fox is just stupid. I still don’t know why anyone is expecting anything to happen prior to the rights reverting

First of all, none of us know what kind of distribution deal Fox has, nor what kind of money we’re talking about here. It may not be an issue at all.

By releasing them this year, on the 40th anniversary, they have a huge, built-in marketing message and can take advantage of all of the current hoopla surrounding the anniversary.

Actually a lot of the information is public (some is right out of Disney’s 10K).

Check the distribution section here (which is well footnoted):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucasfilm

“20th Century Fox, the original distributor of the first six Star Wars films, still retains the physical distribution rights to the original two Star Wars trilogies, currently owning permanent full distribution rights for the original 1977 film, while also holding the theatrical and home video distribution rights to Episodes I–III, V, and VI until May 2020.[34] Lucasfilm retains the television and digital distribution rights to all the Star Wars films except the original.[35] In December 2013, Walt Disney Studios purchased the distribution and marketing rights to future Indiana Jones films from Paramount Pictures, although the latter studio will retain the distribution rights to first four films and will receive “financial participation” from any additional films.[36][37]”

CHEWBAKAspelledwrong said:

But what we’re curious about us how much Fox earns from those rights.

yeah I didn’t actually go through the 10K in detail - that kind of information (at least at a high level) might be in there.

They should partner with Nintendo to surprise-release the restored OUT this May, to ensure that, while they’re finally doing what the fans want, no one will be able to see it.

Cobra Kai said:

That was my point. We don’t know the details and revenue that they get with their distribution deal. And Disney might believe that releasing this year and taking advantage of the 40th anniversary might be better for them than waiting until 2020.

Now, do I think it’s happening this year? No, I’ve pretty much lost all confidence in Disney/Lucasfilm. I just wanted to point out that it makes a lot of sense, marketing-wise, to release them now.

It’s entirely possible, and they’re not going to have another lull between movies until after IX. Indeed the time to do it would be now. They’ve already said they’re not doing a double-dip of Rogue One like they did with TFA, which kinda leaves the latter half of the year wide open.

Like I said before, I could totally see them putting out a regular 1080p blu-ray of the OOT this year because of the guaranteed dollars it would bring in, even if they have to share some of it with Fox. They would still have a UHD in their back pocket waiting to be released after May of 2020.

Fang Zei said:

Cobra Kai said:

Like I said before, I could totally see them putting out a regular 1080p blu-ray of the OOT this year because of the guaranteed dollars it would bring in, even if they have to share some of it with Fox. They would still have a UHD in their back pocket waiting to be released after May of 2020.

This possible scenario makes the most sense to me.

nickyd47 said:

Fang Zei said:

Cobra Kai said:

Like I said before, I could totally see them putting out a regular 1080p blu-ray of the OOT this year because of the guaranteed dollars it would bring in, even if they have to share some of it with Fox. They would still have a UHD in their back pocket waiting to be released after May of 2020.

This possible scenario makes the most sense to me.

Apparently none of this has anything to do with sense, though.

So here’s a question:

Lets say they wait this out and do nothing until 2020, simply reissuing the same 2011 discs in the meantime. Will they have to phase those discs out of the marketplace by May of 2020? If Lucasfilm gets the rights to Empire, Jedi, and the prequels, will Fox still get their cut on sales of the existing unsold discs?

Fang Zei said:

So here’s a question:

Lets say they wait this out and do nothing until 2020, simply reissuing the same 2011 discs in the meantime. Will they have to phase those discs out of the marketplace by May of 2020? If Lucasfilm gets the rights to Empire, Jedi, and the prequels, will Fox still get their cut on sales of the existing unsold discs?

Don’t underestimate Disney’s ability to put things in vaults.

Cobra Kai said:

CHEWBAKAspelledwrong said:

So I went back and watched the unedited clip. She literally says the Special Editions are his. She says she wouldn’t touch the SEs. No kidding. Literally no surprising info there, and should have no bearing on a potential release (or non release) of the theatricals.

Weird I just now saw that unedited clip. Yep, she had absolutely no clue what he was talking about and then he finally specifies that he’s talking about altering the “special editions”.

And not that it matters much, but she actually says “I haven’t touched those” instead of “wouldn’t.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZO0_yYvmxo

That was a terrible and stupid way to ask that kind of question (at least if he was trying to ask about OOT versions)

A much better way would be “Do you think there might ever be a release of the original theatrical versions alongside the definitive versions so that collectors and fans can see the evolution of the rich history of these films?”